The Swetky Agency

Sha'Daa

by Edward McKeown

Opening:
I heard a clinking sound above me on the catwalk. I looked up in surprise to see a man standing, looking down on me. Something about him stilled the yell in my throat. He was a white guy, tall and lean, looked to be in his fifties, maybe a spry sixty. He wore a black overcoat in which his hands were jammed, and a wide-brimmed hat. For a second I wondered if he was a Hasidic Jew who'd gotten lost. He stared down at me with huge dark eyes that looked more than a little mad. Slowly he drew a long-fingered, bony hand out of his coat and raised it to his lips. "Shhhh."

"Who the hell are you?" I whispered back then wondered why I was whispering.
His voice was thin but penetrating and I could hear him clearly.

"Johnny I am and have been. But also other names have I." He giggled. The sound made me shiver. I put a hand on the rock hammer in my belt.

His eyes glittered as they followed the movement. "Ah, Johnny sells and buys because that's what Johnny does. Want to sell that?"

The rest of the team had passed out of sight though I could still see the lights from their lanterns splashing on the walls. Maybe I should yell for Jay-jay and Asia.

Suddenly Johnny made an impossible leap from one side of the catwalk over me to the other side, an easy eight feet.

"Yes, Johnny is interested in things that you have. Things that may be needed elsewhere. Valueless to you but important to poor Johnny who must buy and sell."

I held the rock hammer in my hand now. I was maybe thirty years younger than this clown and a solid six-foot and two hundred pounds, but he was scaring me. I licked my lips. "Why would I want to buy from you? We gotta Wal-Mart only a few blocks over."

"Hee-hee" Johnny said with a balletic twirl. His big hands flew out from his sides to full extension. "Why, he asks? Because Johnny always has what you need, merchandise that can't be gotten elsewhere for any price. Johnny is the Salesman." He said it as another man might say the King.

"Thanks. I don't need anything and you, buddy, need to get out of this tunnel. It's a restricted area."

"Johnny Syrdon goes where he pleases. He is the Salesman, now and forever." He came closer and I gripped my hammer. "But Johnny sees that you don't know him and don't believe. You should remember things your grandmother told you about Boggarts, Brownies and the Sidhe riding the winds."

I started. "How did-"

"Never mind," Johnny raised a hand. "Johnny forgives you. He is a good Salesman and knows you will need his merchandise. Johnny will give you valuable information for...say, that's a nice light you've got there."

"The finest kind, bud. A Xenon super Mag."

Johnny's grin grew into a frighteningly wide rictus.

Utterly unnerved I unclipped the maglight I always carried underground, reached up and placed it on the catwalk. Johnny swooped on it.

"A sale, a sale," he cackled. "You are a smart boy, after all."

Suddenly his demeanor changed and he stooped over me. As I looked into Johnny's eyes, the tunnel around me faded and I felt as if I was floating in air. I could not see or feel my body but knew it was still there. A gray fog enveloped me for a few seconds. Then images began to appear below me. To my shock I seemed to be floating over an immense city. A ghastly greenish light seemed to emanate from the stones itself, pallid and somehow unclean. A foul odor wafted from it. Foul even by the standards of sewer workers.

I seemed to float down and then I saw them and prayed to the Virgin that they did not see me. Things shuffled and lurched through the ghost-lit streets, hideous horned and tailed things. Some had green, leathery-looking skin but the worst walked upright like men, yet had heads like alligators. They shared in the pallid light of the city.

"They see you not," Johnny whispered in my ears, "because you are not. Long ago this place. Many of your kind died in its walls as a sacrifice, as food, as entertainment for these."

I looked around frantically but could not see him.

"Dread Falkaya this was," Johnny whispered theatrically, "once linked to your world. Those that lived here feasted on your distant ancestors. Sometimes they did worse, mating with them to produce demonic half-breeds. Some humans, they broke the souls of and made them into the Shadalka, servants of demons. The Shadalka seek to outdo their masters in cruelty. Because they are part human they can cross more easily to your world."

I saw a marketplace below me. The joints and other meats hung there looked all too human. I retched for all that I could neither see nor feel my body.

"Ancient days ago," Johnny continued, "elder gods and fallen angels roamed your world as well. Some helped the demons, some slew them. Some," Johnny cackled, "watched and played. One such was I.

"Your ancestors were brave, priests and priestesses of lost gods and warriors of mighty arm. Always they fought. But it was a smart one who learned from the elder gods and demons.

Smart he was and even traded with Johnny for things no other knew.

"He sealed Dread Falkaya from your world. For the means and the way he gave Johnny a great prize. The white pebble. Perfect it was and so white and Johnny loved it so. So Johnny sold him what he needed and Dread Falkaya and other worse places were sealed away."

My mind reeled and spun.

"Why? Why are you telling me this?"

"Because nothing is perfect. Once every ten thousand years, the walls between worlds thin. The stars align the right way and hell is close. It is the time of the Sha'Daa. That time is now. Those who have hated your kind for no other reason than that they must hate something are massing in their millions, hundreds of millions. Strong they are, filled with the lust for blood and flesh. Not invulnerable, never that. But hard are they to kill who are not so alive in the first place."