The Grand Old Gods were laughing to themselves over a pitcher of lager, all seated around a scarred wooden table a few feet from the roaring fireplace. “Not really sure I’d have asked them in,” Mitchell said, because that’s the sort of sour take Mitch has on everything. The bartender nodded some agreement. She was very short and incredibly muscular, with a mane of white-blonde hair and a patch over her left eye. She reminded me a lot of Helgritte Odindottir, but I didn’t dare ask. She reached over the bar, which seemed quite a stretch for her, and topped off the neat Scotch Mitchell was drinking. He winked one great blue eye at her and she flushed. “Mitchell, that’s not why we’re here,” I reminded him. But he didn’t really have any reason for being here other than cheap drinks and women young enough to be my daughter. Which made me think maybe I needed to have someone call Helgritte with a delicate inquiry. The look he gave me made it very clear he knew his role. “I gave up a dinner with my mum to come with you. Roast beef. Gravy. Possibly some sort of cake. Festering guilt. But cake.” “You are lying." "Sure, but I could have plans." "I’ll try to get you out on time,” I said, and just about on cue one of the Grand Old Gods realized he was in an American bar decked out with lots of baseball memorabilia and signed photos of actors from very bad sitcoms. The roar shook the place to the foundation. A mocked up Pete Rose Hall of Fame plaque fell off the wall and shattered. Nothing else moved. “Cosmic commentary?” Mitchell asked. He had on a sweater vest over an oxford shirt. Khakis. Saddle shoes. His hair was unstylish and graying. His glasses were black and plastic. And yet the bartender kept drifting back to smile at him. Daddy issues, I thought, and then felt a chill unrelated to the tentacled beast-thing throwing pint glasses at the jukebox. “Now, listen, Rys-Shoffolith or whatever,” I said. It was grey like an elephant with no head, just fifteen or so tentacles spouting from what should have been a neck. The five of them at the table turned to give me withering glares. I expect in their place it would have been filling me with dread and probably even a coronary. Here they were disgusting lumps of flesh, some without form as much as just puddling, all with far too many eyes and mouths. “We created your weak species. Serve us.” Mitchell handed me a drink. I took a sip as the five of them ranted at me. Orange juice without vodka. “Bars are a bad place for an alcoholic to do business, you do realize?” I ignored him. Well, I flipped him the bird and turned my glare on him a moment. But I didn’t throw the glass, so it was basically ignoring. “I think there’s a fair amount of theological dissent on that opinion, Shuggalo Shum Shurpy, but I’m not here to rain on your parade on that front. I asked you here to discuss that certain cult in Detroit trying to sacrifice the city to raise you all from Lake Michigan.” They hissed at each other and spoke in guttural language that probably would have driven a man insane if he had to listen to it too long. Like Taylor Swift songs. “How did you call us here?” “What summoning did you do?” “Who are you?” The questions all came at the same time, in a variety of voices that sounded like nails on chalkboard or boiling fat with a bad attitude. “You’re in a nice little bar in a nice little college town. We’re having a nice little chat. That’s all you need to know.” One of them that was something like a gelatin dessert with a fraternity’s worth of bloodshot eyes set down his beer and turned thirty of the eyes to me. He didn’t have arms, so I wasn’t clear how he was even holding the beer until it hit the table. “You are not an Old God or Elder Being. Who are you to make demands?” I shrugged and tried to give him a reassuring smile. “I’m just a guy asking a favor. Someone is destroying the life energy of a place, like they’d sacrifice people, in the hopes of calling you. I’m just saying…maybe take a vacation. Don’t answer the call.” Three of them hissed or growled. One of them sipped his beer through a three-pronged snout. The tentacle one paused, looking at me. “This place is your city of power. It represents your culture and your power, like our dead cities are the bases for our aged power.” “Very eloquently said,” and I made a sour face as I sipped the juice and found the most important piece missing. For my own good. “Potentially, I’m an Unknown New God with my archetypical nerdy assistant. Wave, Mitch.” I got the finger instead. “Potentially, I knocked up a Valkyrie and that girl behind the bar is my kid and I’m going to owe some angry Norwegians a lot of child support. Or, simplest of all, I’m a guy who is just asking you to not rise out of Lake Michigan, because the whole concept of sacrificing places of power opens doors I’d rather remain closed.” “You brought us here. Five Old Gods. Creators of this world and you insects.” “Tentacles, I thought we were getting on good. And if I did really call four Old Gods from slumber to come have a beer, maybe you ought to listen to me?” There was a break for more of the keening noises and low grunts as they put their non-heads together. Gelatin turned the eyes back to me. “We do not agree with your conditions. We do agree we need to go study what you are and how you call us. So we will not rise at this time.” And then they were gone, taking the pitcher of beer with them. And a chair. I wasn’t sure if they were upgrading the furniture in the dead cities or it was just an error. Mitchell toasted me with his glass of amber. “Better than when you tried to talk the banshees into returning to Ireland.” “Or the wendigo back to Alberta,” the bartender pointed out. I gave her a look and she smiled. It was a wry twist that had seen too much and knew misery waited at every turn. She had my smile. “I didn’t even have to hit anyone this time,” Mitchell smiled, fixing his already proper sweater. “You’re the embodiment of the violence that underlies American culture,” I objected. “You can’t smile at that. You’re supposed to hit people.” “It makes it more surprising when I don’t sometimes. I’m a complex man,” Mitchell grinned. The bartender followed suit, giving him the sort of look with her unpatched eye that made my stomach churn. I really needed to learn her name. And call Helgritte to have a cup of coffee. “You’re not a man. You’re an abstraction.” “An abstraction with a German luxury car and 4500 square foot condo. What time are you done? I have the fixings for an excellent arugula steak salad marinating now.” He wasn’t talking to me anymore. He never offered me steak. “I’ll just hang out in the bar and not drink until I’m summoned,” I said, but everyone was gone as I said it. Such was the nature of unreal places and the need to slumber. Fortunately the bench seat in back was very comfortable for a nap until the next call came.
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