Ties Stronger Than Blood

Ties Stronger Than Blood
by Scribe

Chapter Eight

They stopped talking about Ruth, and the rest of the meal passed pleasantly. When they were done, it was agreed that Luther and John had better get the station wagon back to the motel. Ruth was going to want it, and there was no point in irritating her any more than was necessary. Marko decided to walk on the boardwalk for a while. Hopefully Ruth would be gone by the time he returned, and he'd be free of her till later in the afternoon.

They said good-bye, and Marko once again strolled the boardwalk. Since it was Saturday, it was almost as busy as it had been the night before, but somehow it was different. Last night it had been sort of exotic, though Marko supposed that might have just been him. He certainly hadn't gone to such places much in his lifetime. Without the darkness, and the flash of lights it seemed... prosaic.

He noticed that most of the fliers they'd handed out had been placed in very obscure sections of the storefront windows, ripped down, or simply not put up. He didn't blame them. Ruth always made it sound like putting up the free advertising was a moral obligation instead of a favor. The flier was still up at the video store, though. He remembered that the boys had come out of the back room with the owner. Maybe they were there. In any case, it was worth a shot.

They weren't there, and neither was the owner. The clerk said that yes, he knew who Marko was asking after, but they never came in during the day--none of them. "But they drop around most nights." Marko knew he couldn't remain there all day. He had to check in back at the motel. If he wasn't there when Ruth returned from wherever she'd gone, there'd be hell to pay, but he still wanted to see a bit more.

The comic book store caught his eye, though, so he decided to check it out before he left. Comics were a relatively safe buy. They were easy to hide, and he knew that one of the musicians would be willing to claim that they were his, even reading them in Ruth's presence to bolster the illusion. He went inside.

At first he thought that the two people behind the counter were modern art. He'd seen pictures in art books that featured hyper realistic mannequins--security guards, housewives, people sleeping on benches... He thought someone had decided to do a sixties grouping. He stepped to the counter slowly, watching them carefully. He might have seen a flicker of movement, but then that could have been a trick caused by the faint wisps of smoke from the incense that was burning on the counter in front of them.

He scanned the room, but didn't see anyone else. Surely they wouldn't have left the place empty while it was sitting open? What if these were real people, but they'd... He didn't know--had heart attacks? Been bashed in the head and propped back up? *Or more likely taken some sort of drug overdose,* he thought. *I'd better check, in case they need an ambulance.* He started to lean over the counter, reaching toward them. He wasn't quite sure what he planned to do--poke, pat, shake...


"Hands off, dude." The voice was sharp, and Marko whirled, heart thumping. He'd been positive there was no one else in the store. He'd been double wrong. There were two faces peering at him suspiciously over a rack. They must have been down behind it. As they came around the side, he noted that they were both carrying stacks of slim, brightly colored comic books. They'd either been doing some heavy duty browsing, or had been working with the stock.

"I'm sorry. I just wanted to check... I was worried they might need help."

Both of the boys were wearing what looked like Army Surplus clothing, with rolled bandana as headbands. The dark haired one said, "Looks like we have a Good Samaritan, Edgar."

"Don't know about that, Alan." The brown haired boy spoke in a low voice, almost a monotone. "Good Samaritans help people who actually need help."

Alan had gone behind the counter. He pulled a small, polished piece of metal out of his pocket and held it in front of the nose of first the woman, then the man. Marko could see a faint fog appear on the shining surface. Alan tucked the metal back in his pocket. "No one needing help here."

"Yeah, well, I sure couldn't tell that from here," Marko assured them.

The two boys exchanged significant looks, and Marko had the feeling that they were exchanging non-verbal communication at a breakneck speed. Finally Edgar gave a minute nod, then went back and began placing books on the rack. "You're new in town," said Alan. "But you look familiar." His eyes narrowed. "No one's looking for you?"

"Not unless my grandmother has decided I've had too much free time."

"You sure? I keep thinking I've seen you on a wanted poster."

"Gee, thanks, but not quite." Marko stepped over to the door and tapped the flier that was taped to the door.

Alan came over and closely studied the picture. "So, you're Mark Tallmadge."

"No, I'm Marko Blackman." He got another suspicious look, but he was beginning to believe this was just natural for these two. "That's sort of a stage name."

An eyebrow went up. "An alias."

"Whatever. It's just not really me."

Edgar was nodding wisely. "There are a lot of people in Santa Carla who aren't what they look like," he pronounced.

This was beginning to get a bit surreal. "What about you guys?"

"We're exactly what we look like," Alan assured him. "We're the Frogs."

Marko blinked. "You're a singing group?"

There was a flicker of puzzlement in the boys' eyes, then their stoic expressions showed irritation. "It's our name," Alan grated.

"Oh. Gotcha. Look, are you guys open for business?"

"The door would have been locked if we weren't," said Alan. He lifted his chin challengingly. "You a collector?"

"Not yet, but maybe soon. It wouldn't do me any good to try to collect--Mother Ruth would throw them out."

Edgar looked up from his work. "We get a lot of that. Parents decide to clean up, maybe think their kids are too old for them..."

"Yeah, well, Mother Ruth is just a bitch." There was a moment of silence. The Frogs weren't exactly shocked, but they were surprised. Marko continued, "Though I expect she probably would use the excuse about when I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things, but it would be an excuse. So, is it okay if I look around?" Alan gave him an ironic half-bow, and seemed a little put out when Marko returned it before going deeper into the store and beginning to browse.

Marko selected several horror comic books from the seventies--inexpensive, but they looked interesting. He'd always been interested in horror. He remembered sitting in his living room, safely perched between his parents, eating popcorn as he watched the black and white flickers of the classic monsters--Frankenstein and his Bride, the Werewolf, the Mummy, Dracula. Ruth, of course, would have none of that around. Marko admitted that there was plenty of horror and monsters in the Bible, if you looked at it that way. There was plague, slaughter, and bloody murder. There were eaten by dogs, beheaded, and there was even a murder by spike through the skull. But he preferred the cinematic monsters. Perhaps it was blasphemous, but they just seemed to be on a grander scale.

Edgar joined his brother behind the counter as Alan rang Marko up. As the dark brother was sliding Marko's purchases into a bag, Edgar pulled a comic book out from under the counter and offered it to Marko. "How about this one?"

Marko didn't touch it. He was easy going, but he didn't care for hard sell techniques. "No, thanks, I have plenty."

"This is an important book, man. You need it," Alan insisted.

"Look, if it's rare, I can't afford it. This pretty much busted me, and I just don't get my hands on disposable cash very often."

"It's not rare," said Edgar, "but it could be vital for your survival."

Marko could feel his expression hardening. "What is it? The Classics Comics Book of Bible Stories? I have enough of that. I trip over Bibles."

"Not that kind of survival. Look at it."

Marko looked at the cover, then blinked. It was titled simply VAMPIRES. He reached out and took the book. The cover was slick and cool, the image somehow stark and baroque at the same time. It was very stylish, done entirely in black, white, and crimson. It depicted a vampire and some ordinary mortal in combat. The man was wielding a stake, the vampire sported nails that looked as sharp as daggers. His snarling face was subtly twisted out of the realm of humanity, with gleaming red eyes, and wicked fangs. Actually, the book looked pretty interesting, but Marko hadn't been lying about the money. He had less than a dollar left--surely not enough to buy this. "I can't afford it."

"You can't afford to be without it," said Edgar flatly. "Consider it a survival guide. If you're going to be in Santa Carla any time at all, you need this."

Marko eyed the other two boys warily. "You aren't suggesting what I think you are, are you?"

"Vampires," intoned Alan, "walk among us. All the time around here." He threw an arm over his brother's shoulder. "While others are blind to the menace in our midst, we fight them."

"Riiight." *There are all different kinds of levels of craziness,* thought Marko. *From Mother Ruth control freak obsessive to delusional.* "That's a comfort. But really, I don't have enough money for that."

Edgar slipped the comic into Marko's bag. "Consider it a humanitarian gesture. An innocent like you won't stand a chance unless you wise up."

Marko was tempted to remove the comic and toss it at them, but... It really did look interesting. He took the bag and started for the door. Just before he went out, he looked back at the Frog brothers and said quietly, "You don't know me. You don't know me at all."