Crypt Girls

The two girls then went down to the store on their own, Ken telling them to get whatever was necessary for a couple days and tell the clerk to bill it to the cabin.

Two peignoirs, two robes, four more dresses two pairs of shoes and two darling cloche hats later, they checked out with a very tactful clerk, who very solemnly listed their acquisitions to be charged to their "uncle."

As they slowly walked back up the path, Lily looked over at Rose. "You feel the same way about Ken that I do?"

Rose nodded. "It's an 'us' thing. Not just you or me with him, but us. He's ours now. Or we're his. Or something like that."

"Thank Heavens. I feel that way too." Lily giggled. "I hope he's been eating all his vegetables, he's gonna need all his strength, once we ditch Treasury man. I haven't wanted a man like this as long as I remember."

"Me neither."

Rose and Lily cheerfully wandered up to the cabin, but as they pulled the door open, Rose felt a rush of anger. It was a smell, sort of, a sense like a smell anyway. A scent of something wrong, something unclean. Like the man-things, but different. From the corner of her eye, she saw Lily's eyes darken and her lips curl back with a hiss to expose her lengthening teeth, hands forming claws.

"Stop!" Ken stepped quickly between the doorway and the rest of the cabin, hands up to ward them off.

He was blocking them from a figure behind him, a woman, veiled and draped in yards of ornate cloth.

The smell, though, came from the towering figure behind her. An enormous bald man, stolid, powerful and black as pitch.

Rose and Lily froze, struggling to keep from knocking Ken aside and launching themselves at the huge figure, until the veiled woman turned and gestured to the looming thing. It ponderously moved into the bathroom and shut the door. Agent Dietrich stared at them from the couch, holding as still as possible, trying not to even breath.

Rose felt some of her fury slip away, enough of it anyway, and she could sense Lily's subside as well. The woman pulled her veil down. She was a black woman with an aquiline nose and dark, hypnotic eyes. She looked them over slowly. "I apologize. None of the ghul can bear the presence of the zombi. I hadn't considered that." Her voice rolled with the soft lilt of Spanish moss and African music. "I am Marie Beauchamp. I believe I can see why Monsieur Stanton requested my presence."

She walked over slowly, extending one hand toward Rose and one toward Lily. She slowly touched each girls face. "The ghul kept you together in the same room, yes?"

Rose nodded. "They chained us up together."

The woman looked back and forth between them, then shook her head. "That was the mistake the ghul made. You're not just friends, you are lovers."

Rose flushed a little when Ken raised an amused eyebrow. It was the first time anyone other than her and Lily had ever acknowledged it, ever said it aloud. Lily pursed her lips and stepped forward, standing hipshot, with her arms crossed and her jaw set. "So? You have a problem with that?"

The woman shook her head. "Certainement pas. Above all else, despair makes a ghul. Your love for each other gave you hope, and hope defeats despair."

Rose felt a sickening chill. "If I lose Lily..." Lily grabbed her hand, eyes wide with the same fear.

"Non. It is like a vase cast in clay, once you fire it, it is the shape it will be forever. They failed to turn you fully, so you will remain what you are, not entirely one nor the other."

Rose squeezed Lily's hand as a sense of relief washed over both girls. Rose glanced at Lily for a second. "So what are we then?"

"Part ghul. The ghul are the night runners, the eaters of the dead."

Rose's face twisted in disgust. Lily voiced her opinion. "Eeeewww."

Marie studied them for a moment. "Do you crave human flesh?"

Rose thought for a bit. "No... I don't think so. I was so hungry for so long, but it was just for any food, not anything in particular." Lily nodded her agreement.

"Not even at night?"

Lily shivered. "No, but in the dark there were... voices. Horrible voices. I could never quite hear them, never really understand what they were saying."

Rose choked down the lump in her throat. "They whispered and hissed constantly. I was so glad I couldn't hear what they were saying."

Marie shifted, then reached up to touch each of their faces in turn again, looking into their eyes. Then she turned to Ken. "They are telling the truth. They'll crave raw meat, but just meat. They will have to learn to control their anger."

Ken relaxed, and Dietrich looked relieved. They talked for several more minutes until Marie asked Lily and Rose to walk outside with her. "You have... bonded with Mister Stanton?"

Rose shrugged. "We both feel it. What does it mean?"

"I'm not certain, but I am sure it is a good thing unless you cannot bear a man."

Lily giggled. "We aren't that way. We love each other, but it isn't because we don't like guys."

"You'll have to let him know."

Lily smirked. "Oh, we will, Sister, soon as we get a little privacy. Don't have any doubt about that."

Marie smiled a bit. "I almost feel sorry for him."

***

Six Months Later

Agent John Dietrich walked into the Voodoo Lounge as quietly as possible - the doorman barely even glanced at him. Unshaven and in a rumpled suit he hardly looked like a top level Treasury agent. He assured himself that that was the point. Mostly though it was because he was exhausted. He looked around the crowded room for a minute, until he saw Ken sitting at a table off to the side of the bar.

He was almost halfway to the table when they came up on either side of him.

"Fancy meeting you here, Agent Dietrich."

"Good evening, Lily."

Rose touched his other elbow. "It would have probably been easier to come by the library to meet us in the Crypt if you wanted to talk. Thanks for that, by the way. Mrs. Crenshaw was very impressed that a real Treasury agent dropped by to tell her than her two library aides had broken up a murder-for-hire gangster ring. She lets us get away with murder these days."

He chuckled to himself. "I'd rather talk with you in a brightly lit, crowded place where there are lots of witnesses. Meeting you in a dark sub-basement alone seems like it could be unwise."

Lily prodded his side. "Don't you trust us?"

He glanced at them. Lily in an off white silk shift and Rose in an emerald green one. Both dresses were thin as gossamer and hid next to nothing. "Not very shy these days, I see."

Rose smiled. "Didn't you hear? There's a lady's underwear shortage these days."

John didn't say anything as he sat himself slowly in a chair while the two girls glided around the table like feral cats and slid into chairs on either side of Ken, leaning slightly against him with too-wide smiles.

Agent Dietrich kept his hands on the table. "Ken."

"John. What can we do for you?"

"I filed my report. Said exactly what happened. I half thought they'd fire me or send me to an asylum. Two days after I submitted my report I was summoned to the Secretary's office and informed that 'the Department of the Treasury does not have the luxury of pretending that things don't exist.' The Secret Service already has the task of dealing with things like..." He paused, picking his words carefully. "... like what we ran into."

Rose leaned forward, letting her eyes darken and teeth lengthen for a second. "Like us."

"If you make trouble, yes. Otherwise it is mostly hands off."

Ken gave a slight smile. "You got reassigned."

"I got reassigned."

Rose suddenly frowned, then sat back. "Wait. You said 'mostly.' Why are you here?"

"I need some help. The Secret Service needs help."

Lily shook her head. "We're pretty happy here."

"I'd rather not force you to help. But I will if you make me. Some of the things I've seen are pretty horrible. I wouldn't come here if I had a choice."

Ken grimaced. "We've seen a couple things here, too, but we've taken care of them ourselves. Turns out my girls here can smell trouble and they're a little territorial."

Rose rolled her eyes. "There's all kind of weird things happening all the time. I don't know how we never noticed." She started counting off on her fingers. "Let's see, there was that giant reptile-thing in the sewers, whatever it was. I'm kind of glad we never got a good look at it. There was that headless guy walking the cemeteries, that crazy scientist guy..."

Lily cut her off. "That guy. Geez. Puttin' a girl's brain into a gorilla body. Why? Why would anybody even want to do that?"

Rose looked up to the sky for a second. "Who knows? He was nuts. Didn't work out for him, though. Cindy was mad as a hornet when she woke up. Tore his head off when we let her loose."

Lily pursed her lips. "Marie fixed that. Switched them back. Mostly anyway. Cindy has a job at the zoo takin' care of Koko now, so nobody even thinks anything is weird. Cindy eats a lot of bananas and Koko likes to wear dresses all the time." She shrugged. "That was more fun than the guy with the giant brain in the vat. Those 'brain beams' gave me headaches for a weak."

Rose screwed up her face. "And it tasted awful."

"I figured that it was you keeping things down here. And the Secret Service thanks you for that. But this is a little different, we've had some occult activity in Louisiana. Lost three agents there already. Weird religious cult calling something up from somewhere. Something big."

Lily and Rose reached for each other's hand on the table. Lily sighed, frowning. "That's just ducky. Why do I get the feeling we're gonna wish we'd eaten you when we had the chance?"

*****

Post Production Notes:

I am planning more in this series, Crypt Girls versus the Giant Robot, Crypt Girls versus the Times Beach Vampire, etc, but my backlog of stories is getting worse every day, so expect them to come slowly. But this one was sitting on the shelf mostly done for several months, so when I got asked if I was ever going to publish it, I went ahead and finished it. I am very fond of Rose and Lily, and if any ghouls are going to haunt my dreams, I'd just as soon it was them.

The Winchester Model 1897 shotgun, modified to the M97 trench gun was(and is) an absolutely lethal weapon. It could be fired in what we would now call "Slamfire" - just holding the trigger back and working the slide for rapid fire. It was often heavily modified with heat shields, extended magazines and muzzle brakes. Also known as a Trench Sweeper or Trench Broom.