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After meeting Sterling, I honestly wanted to take a break. But I showed up on Monday ready to do whatever job they set in front of me. For some reason, Sal acted a bit nervous when we came in. Max scooped me up in the regular hug, but I could tell he did so to try and take my attention away from his sister. She swiftly grabbed a bag off the desk and shoved it into her pocket. It looked like some balloons. Why was she hiding balloons from me?
“Can you two uh-” She paused to look through her desk and it looked like she grabbed a package at random. “Deliver this? Stay busy for at least an hour.”
“Why at least an hour?” I asked.
Max grabbed the box with lightning speed and then dragged me to the door. Something was up. I couldn’t put my finger on it. These two were hiding something from me. I soon didn’t have time to think about that. The door opened to a deep forest in the dead of night. I stumbled along unable to see until Max picked a flower. With some magic he made it glow to light up the area around us.
“Who are we delivering this to?” I asked as I looked around the trees.
The forest gave me the creeps. It was far too silent. Darkness filled between the trees reminding me that anything could be out there watching us.
“Uh let’s see, Mr… There’s no name. Huh.”
We got no name packages at times. The creature the package was meant for was normally waiting just outside the door, or we dropped it off at a certain location to be picked up later. I hated being out in the woods late at night. Too many dangerous monsters lurked inside them. Sometimes a forest was as deadly as The Maze.
Max stopped and turned his light towards something I didn’t notice. I followed his gaze and my eyes landed on a pale creature standing a few feet away. It had a human body but lacked a head. The arms were so long the fingertips touched the ground. When it knew we noticed it, a mouth with so many teeth split open the body letting out an ear-piercing screech.
Max wasted no time grabbing a hold of me so we could make a run for it. I screamed unable to help it. Max held back his own scream when the monster brushed a hand against our backs.
“Max, we need to move faster!” I told him, my heart beating out of my chest.
One second, I was running, and then the next I found myself getting tossed through the air. I landed hard on the back of a pile of fur running like mad away from the creature chasing us. Max has shifted to a wolf form and let me ride on his back. The ride wasn’t easy. I nearly fell off a few times as his paws dashed over the uneven forest floor.
He needed to detour when another one of those creatures came out from behind a tree. A hand came down missing us by inches. When the hand slammed down into the ground, white mushrooms sprouted upwards. No wonder Max didn’t want to let these things touch us.
“They’ll infect you and make you one of them!” Max shouted but his voice sounded slightly different as a wolf.
He ran for a few more minutes. My arms ached from trying to keep hold and not fall off. He suddenly stopped. A wall of those pale creatures in front of him. He turned only to see more at our backs. To our horror, we were surrounded. With one paw, Max started to draw a circle in the dirt for a spell. He just needed another second, but all those creatures jumped at us at once.
I let out a very undignified scream. I hugged Max tightly waiting to be turned into a pile of mushrooms. At least I could be friends with Gary in the sorting room. The Mailing Company hired a pile of mushrooms once, and maybe they would need to do it again after this job.
Another blur of white came down from the sky. The creature moved so fast I didn’t see it. With ease, it took out the white mushroom monsters. Flames sprouted up in a circle around us burning them away. The monster that swooped in to save us arched back and screamed into the night.
It was tall, at least nine feet. The body covered with white fur, but with clear muscles underneath. Red eyes blazed but I was too stunned by the creature to notice. This thing looked like a white Mothman. A… sort of a cute version. Massive glittering moth wings stretched out for a few seconds. They were folded back in as the fire died down now leaving us with a new monster.
Those red eyes finally landed on us.
“Toby….” A voice rasped.
My body froze up. It looked a little cute but was still a monster. The fact he knew my name freaked me the hell out. I was about to tell Max to run for it when the monster shifted into someone I knew.
“Manny?!” I choked out.
The man with white tied-back hair and red eyes stood staring at us. He still wore his suit as if he was on the job. He helped with the ghost in my apartment. I never expected him to be a Mothman-like creature. I fell to the ground as Max changed back. Stars in his eyes and tail wagging.
“You’re a-” Max started but Manny cut him off.
“Don’t start. Yes. I am. But don’t tell anyone.” He said with a huge sigh.
I didn’t blame Manny for dismissing Max. Having a cute monster form would make it hard for people to take him seriously no matter how strong he was. But I should have figured out his species based on his name.
“We won’t tell… For a price.” Max said and I didn’t like his smile at all.
Blackmail wasn’t like him. He must really want something from Manny. The other man groaned and accepted the box. He signed for it but admitted he had no idea what he ordered. He had a bad habit of drunk online shopping and having the packages ordered through The Mailing Company. After our job was done, Max got to business and told us his demands.
“One Mothman hug please.” Max stated, hands on his hips.
So that’s what he wanted. If he had just asked nicely without the blackmail, Manny would have done it. To keep us silent, Manny transformed into his larger and fluffier version. He offered me a hug first. To be polite, I accepted it. And I was not at all expecting the fur to be that soft and comfortable. I passed out in a few seconds and Max needed to shake me awake. I would rather be a pile of mushrooms than go through something that embarrassing again. Max got his hug and kept a smile on his face the entire way back to the Zero room to report our job finished.
When we arrived, Sal was talking to someone just outside the door on the other side of the room.
“What do you mean Belizas ate them all? We had decoys made! Ok, order some more. Crap, they’re back.”
She slammed the door and raced over to us. With some effort, she picked up a cardboard box to hand to Max. He smiled as if nothing odd was happening.
“Go do this one next, please.” She told us.
“What’s going on?” I pressed but she literally pushed us out the door.
We stumbled into a dirt road leading up to an old farmhouse. A large garden was out front, and some chickens roamed in the bright sunlight. We made our way up to the front wooden porch, passing by countless lawn decorations and wind chimes.
“Max, do you know what your sister is hiding?” I asked him after he knocked on the door.
He nervously fidgeted, not wanting to lie to me. Whatever was going on, he knew about. I wanted to press more but he shoved the box in my arms to rush over to a black shape in the pathway to the porch.
“Oh! Look a snake, it’s cute! I love snakes. And lizards. And a lot of things.” He said, avoiding my questions.
“Be careful.” I warned as I watched his hand get far too close.
“It’s alright. Snakes love m-”
He didn’t finish his statement. The pure black snake shot out as fast as a bullet to clamp down on his outstretched hand. I dropped the box to run over to him. By the time I reached Max, the snake got away and he was gripping his hand. The bite didn’t look that bad. That was until my friend passed out in the middle of the dirt path. More of the black snakes peeked their heads from the grass. I grabbed a hold of Max to start dragging him down the pathway towards the farmhouse. His body felt far too heavy.
I got us up to the front porch, but the front door was locked. No amount of forcing my shoulder against it made a dent. I shouted, praying someone was home or heard me. Max’s face was growing paler by the second and a darkness started to spread from the bite on his hand. He was slowly dying, and I could do nothing about it.
We were blocked in by more of those small creatures hissing and snapping at us. One got too close to Max for comfort. I blocked a set of fangs sinking into his exposed leg with the arm of my uniform. I faced an army of them without enough protection. Just as I thought I was going to die, two claps rang out nearby.
A man arrived. He looked to be in his mid-fifties, short, and with a kind face. After those two sharp claps, all the snakes retreated into the grass. He hurried over to us and checked Max over. Even though my friend was taller than the man, he easily lifted Max up and carried him inside.
He placed Max on a couch and then disappeared for a few minutes. I held Max’s good hand worried as hell about him. When the man came back, he held a small vial of something and a plate of sandwiches. With my help he got Max to drink the mystery liquid that made him recover right away.
“Sorry about that. My husband has made some enemies. We normally turn off the self-defense spells, but he must have forgotten he ordered something.” He explained in such a calm voice it made me forgive him right away.
He left to retrieve the box from the porch. As he signed the delivery paper, Max woke up. He looked terrible but alive. If this man didn’t come back home at the right time, I would have lost him. Max forgave him because he fell on the plate of peanut butter sandwiches right away. He looked up to see who we just delivered mail to and choked on his food.
“Monster Hunter Moore?!” Max gasped.
For the second time that day, he had stars in his eyes. The older man looked embarrassed by the nickname. Apparently, this short man was a bit of a big deal with creatures. He hunted a lot of the bad ones and was super powerful for reasons I didn’t understand. Something about making a deal with one of the original top creatures or something. Max could have died but accepted a head pat from the man.
Moore was pretty nice after I got over the whole snake thing. He said we could drop by any time we wanted which made Max wag his tail. With another job done, we started to head back. Instead of asking Max about what might be happening in the office, I brought up something that had bothered me for a while.
“Are you shorter than before? I could have sworn you were taller when we first met.” I asked him.
Max stood at my height, but I knew he’d been shorter, or taller at some point. He paused with a nod. So, I wasn’t just imagining things.
“I can change slight things with my human appearance. When we met, I didn’t know how tall you were and based human heights on my father’s human form. As we kept working together, I assumed that being shorter might relax you a little. I didn’t want to seem too intimidating because I wasn’t human.”
That explained a few things. He’d been shifting his height trying to find one that worked with us. That made me stop walking to consider something else.
“How… short can you go?” I asked very curious.
“Hm, not much shorter than this. I’ll start messing with my outward age if I go beyond this point. I can look about ten for about a minute. It’s a really bad strain on my body being-” He paused when he noticed my face.
I very much wanted to see a ten-year-old Max. But if it made him uncomfortable, I didn’t want to force him. He already knew what I silently wanted. With a spin, the Max I knew shrank down to a child for thirty seconds. His ears floppy and too big for his head. It took everything in me not to scoop him up for a tight hug. I’ve never seen anything cuter in my entire life. His uniform jacket didn’t shrink with him. His tiny arms lifted up the oversized sleeves.
When he turned back, he was out of breath, and I practically needed to drag him through the door back to the office. His sister scooped him up the moment we walked om the Zero room.
“I need to borrow him for a second. Can you wait out here? We’ll be out soon.”
With that, I was left behind. She dragged her brother into the other room, and I heard what to be a crowd of people before the door closed. Seriously, what was going on? I should have charged inside to figure out what they were hiding from me. The other door flew open making me look over at the newcomer instead.
His appearance stunned me to silence. I really saw a lot of cute things today.
“You! Human! You are a deliveryman, are you not? Come with me!” He ordered and oddly enough, sounded a lot like Rufus.
They didn’t look that much alike though. He was only a few feet tall. He came up to my waist and had a set of very small and cute dog legs supporting his body. His tail was just a massive ball of fur that might be double the size of his body. He looked to be in his forties, and his mature face didn’t match the ring of brown fur around his neck. He wore some clothing put together of different materials with a patch pinned to his sleeve showing he worked for the Mailing Company.
He rushed over to the empty desk and scooped up a box. He then took my hand and with a surprising amount of strength, dragged me forward through a door and into yet another dark forest.
“There has been an outbreak in many different places. We must get this weapon to a set of Agents, hurry along!”
I nearly ran right into a tree due to our rush. I wanted to ask him what kind of outbreak but the answer to that question came before I could even speak it. The same white-shaped creature we faced earlier came charging at us. My co-worker jumped off the ground and off a tree directly at the creature. A burst of flames came from his mouth after a deep inhale. The monster turned into a pile of ash without being able to have a chance at cutting us down. The man skillfully landed on his feet, and I wanted to clap over the display.
“Boy, you are called Toby, correct?” He asked.
I nodded. I’d never seen this man before in my entire life. How did he know who I was?
“I am a distant relative of Rufus. They call me Ruben. I have heard of you. You are weak, but useful.” He said in a stern tone, but his words weren’t cruel.
We started moving again. I couldn’t keep up with his short legs moving so fast.
“Do you know what’s going on in the office today?” I asked him.
He shook his head. He was more focused on doing the tougher jobs than playing around like Max. Suddenly more of those creatures came from the trees. Ruben rushed into action killing off the ones nearest to him. A set of long hands came down on my arm, but I shook them off and darted back. The box we were meant to deliver shifted in my grip.
“Do not drop that! Make haste on delivering that box!” Ruben shouted over his shoulder.
I dodged more arms trying to take hold of my face. I didn’t have a clue where the box should be going, let alone be able to even see that well in the woods at night. With some help, I got away from the creatures but Ruben was trapped in the middle of fighting them.
“Where does this box need to go?” I shouted back over to him.
“Keep running! The creatures shall be attracted to you, and then the Agents shall be attracted to that swarm! Stay running, stay living!”
That was the only advice the small man gave. I booked it into the woods when I saw more of those figures getting ever closer. I tripped over roots but kept going. I risked my life if I stopped moving for even a second. There wasn’t even any guarantee that those Agents in these woods would get to me before those monsters.
I stumbled into a clearing, face dripping with sweat and chest aching. I needed a break but didn’t have the time. I saw flashes of white through the trees. At first, I thought I had another second to recover but was soon proved very wrong.
A monster came from the woods, the body nearly split in half from the massive mouth. I backed up as the creature screeched. I tripped over my own feet, falling to the ground, and raised my arm up in defense.
The moment before the clawed hand came down, a person stepped between us. The claw went through his chest and splattered blood over my face. I yelled, horrified over what I had just seen. A gunshot rang out and the monster exploded in a burst of flames. The man who protected me fell backward. I caught him and carefully got him to the ground.
Someone still in the trees kept shooting and killing the creatures that got too close to us. I took a hold of my savior’s hand, tears in my eyes seeing what damage the claw did. This man was human, no doubt about that. His hair was dark and he looked older than me. Despite the pain, he smiled.
“You ok?” His voice was a whisper through blood.
I nodded, holding back from crying. His eyes drifted shut, happy that he saved a life. I shook his shoulder gently not wanting to believe I just watched a stranger die so easily. A man in a suit ran over to us. He looked a lot like Tooley. Just broader and with a long scar running down his face.
“Are you a delivery man?” He asked, gun at his side and out of breath.
I held out the box for him to sign for and winched at the fact my hands now were covered in blood. For a moment, the area was free of creatures. He saw my clear distress and paused in opening the delivered box.
“Adelaide will wake up in the morning. He’s human and yet comes back after death the next morning. He goes through pain each time, but I think he was glad someone held his hand this time around.” The man assured me and he really did sound like Tooley’s brother.
That made me feel better at least a little bit. I wanted to ask more about how or why someone could come back after getting killed. We did not have the time. With a massive crashing sound, a beast tore through the trees. It was made up of so many bodies of those other creatures. Each body twisted into each other to make a ghastly shape. The Agent fumbled with the package trying to get the weapon out.
He did not have the time. The clawed hand came down about to crush us. He might be able to live through the attack, but I wouldn’t be fully protected by my uniform. I braced for death and saw my life flash before my eyes.
And then something neither of us expected happened. A burst of light came from the woods along with a shockwave strong enough to knock us back. Trees were uprooted or broken in half from the force. Beside the white monster made of other bodies now stood a wolf so huge it could knock down a skyscraper. It pinned the other monster down with his foot, took a deep inhale of breath, and then shot out flames so powerful I nearly died from the heat.
The Agent acted fast on collecting Adelaide and me into his arms to run away from the fire before it roasted us. The back of his suit jacket started to smoke but at least we made it out alive.
The wolf shot out the fire for a solid minute. When he was done, a deep burned crater was left behind. In another flash, the beast transformed back into the very tiny dog man I met earlier. He stood in the smoking area, hands behind his back admiring his work.
“I guess I didn’t need to ask for a weapon to be brought over after all…” The Agent muttered with a sigh.
“You did a respectable job human. Now, let us get you back to the office and on to your next job.” Ruben said after he stopped in front of us.
I was carefully set down to wait for Ruben to make a door to get us back to a Zero room. I didn’t care about what might be happening in the office after the day I had. I needed a break and just wanted to go home. A man died right in front of me. Regardless of if he would be waking up or not, that was upsetting. Ruben shoved me through the door and made a comment about taking care of Max. He then left to go off and help at a different job. I wasn’t aware the company hired such powerful creatures like him. I suspected he only worked part-time and used his strength elsewhere.
“There you are!” Max shouted from across the Zero room.
He took my arm to drag me across the room and to the door he had just come out of. I was so tired; I went along with it. Might as well get whatever they had planned done and over with so I could go home to rest. We walked through the door and the sounds of shouting made me jump and hold onto Max for dear life. Balloons drifted down from the ceiling. The rest of the room was covered in a mix of birthday and wedding decorations. The entire room was filled with people I knew from work. Sunny came over and took my hand so I would relax enough to let go of Max.
“What’s all this for?” I asked stunned.
“You survived a year working here. We all wanted to do something. It’s pretty impressive a human lived this long.” Max explained.
Did they throw me a party? I moved my head around to see just how many people showed up. Belizas was at a table covered with food shoving whatever she could get her hands on in her mouth. She only stopped when Vicky came over to glare at her. An’k was with the sorting room staff and made sure Gary didn’t get closer to me. He was a nice pile of mushrooms but still would turn me into them if he touched me. Some of the cat girls and guys I briefly saw talking in the corner with a very upbeat-looking Alty. The attention did him some good. I think they only showed up because they wanted to party and not because they cared I lived.
Rufus spoke with some of his daughters, his back turned to us. One of the cat girls rushed over to thank me for living long enough for a party excuse. She handed over a cup of mystery liquid and a plate of food. I felt so overwhelmed that I made so many friends that the room was full. I need to take a moment to recover from the whiplash of the entire day.
I took a sip of the drink finding it very sweet. Rufus looked over his shoulder at the same time and did a double take. He shouted something and Sunny rushed to take the drink from my hand.
“Did you swallow that?! Spit it out!” He said frantically.
“Why what’s-”
That was the last thing I remembered of the day. My memory just ended there. Full stop. When I came to again, my head hurt like hell and my mouth felt like cotton.
My arms were also heavy. I blinked away the pounding headache enough to sit up. To my shock, Max was passed out tucked under one arm, and Sunny was in the other. My face flushed realizing I’d gotten very, very drunk the day before. Whatever that cat girl gave me clearly was not meant for humans. I scanned the room trying to see the damage.
We ended up in my living room. Rufus slept on a chair with his arms crossed. I bet he watched us to make sure nothing too bad happened. An’k was passed out on the floor next to Rufus, colorful steamers wrapped around his head. Someone placed an extra bed sheet over him while he slept. I looked behind me to see Vicky curled up on the couch. Belizas draped over her, half on the couch and half on the floor. I’d been sleeping on something against my couch. The smell and the shape let me figure it out. Slithers had crashed the party and we ended up using them as a bed. The slimy body somewhat comfortable. Max stirred and rolled over on the floor.
Sunny sat up, sleepy but not hung over like the rest of us.
“How bad was it?” I asked him in a small voice.
“Not that bad. I think everyone else was too drunk to remember the party. I can’t get drunk, so I made sure everyone was safe. Max overate. He’ll be sick when he wakes up. I think Vicky and Belizas are a thing. But that might have happened before the party. And you just gave a lot of people hugs all night. And cried a little. Nothing too embarrassing.” Sunny reported.
I groaned and let myself sink deeper into the murky slime of Slithers. Aside from the smell, it wasn’t that bad. Since I already embarrassed myself enough, I demanded something of Max when he finally sat up. I took his hands and pressed my face in them to enjoy the feeling of the paw pads.
“Have you been eating popcorn?” I asked him because the smell was on his hands.
He shrugged. He ate so much last night, it was possible.
“We’re glad you woke up. You drank something you weren’t meant to. It was a fifty-fifty chance you fell into a coma.” Sunny said clearly relieved that wasn’t the case.
I didn’t want to know something like that. The day before I’d nearly got turned into a pile of mushrooms more than once. Max could have died. I watched a person get their chest ripped out, and I almost died at a party celebrating that I lived working my job for an entire year.
It really was a hectic day. And I hoped I didn’t have too many more of the same at least for a while.