Among the Living (Tyler G Book 1) (13 page)

"You see though, Vampires
can't
throw up. It was so bad that it pushed the boundaries of reality."

It wasn't something he could even
try to outdo, and really, he kind of had to hope that he never had to. Just the
description, which wasn't that graphic, made him feel a bit queasy.

"You win. I can't top that.
Now, I need to get my room in order, and go to bed early."

That got everyone to nod along,
as if talking about sleep before eight at night made sense, but he normally got
up at four, so it really did to him. Though, and it was a thing that made a lot
of sense to him, he needed to make a point of getting in touch with his mother,
so she knew what was going on.

That only seemed fair, since
things had really happened pretty damned fast.

There was a window in his room,
if only a single one, and it had an eastern exposure. No curtains either, which
meant that Ty was up at about four, which was about his normal time for that
kind of thing. It took a few seconds for his sleepy brain to fill in that
something was wrong. There shouldn't be a window there, for one thing. Blinking
he glared at it. Then he noticed the walls were the wrong color, too. A pale
blue instead of stark white.

A sense of panic ripped through
him. Jolting upright he looked at the space, which was sparse, as far as
furnishings went. It was all his stuff, naturally. The things he'd brought the
day before. Sitting where he'd left them, after unpacking as well as he could
without furniture the night before.

His bed was there, and so were
his blankets and pillows. Reminders that he'd simply moved, and not been
suddenly translocated to a different place. Not that thinking that was sane.
People didn't do things like that, not as far as he knew.

Except wasn't that kind of what
Zack did at work? He took people places that were very far away, kind of like
that.

On the floor, next to his bed,
were his pictures. One of his mom, Lucy, and his biological parents, Karen and
Thomas. Lucy had never hidden that his parents had died when he was young, or
that she'd taken him in, because she couldn't have her own child. Even given
that, she'd always been his mother. Ever since he could remember.

When he was five and the larger
neighbor boys were bullying him, she was the one that had told him to fight,
the next time they tried. Including a few dirty tricks that had let him win
too. Mainly scratching and hair pulling, but it had worked pretty well against
seven year olds.

At ten she'd scraped and saved so
he could take singing lessons. Then she'd bought his keyboard for him that
Christmas. That hadn't made the trip, since it was old now, and broken from
constant use, but it had been his favorite present ever. He'd practiced for
hours every day, for years before it had broken a few months before. Really, he
was good on it. Probably pro-level. Singing was about the same for him.

It was Lucy that had helped prop
him up when he was sad, and who'd spent eighteen years making sure he had what
he needed, even if it meant not getting to have the life she should have had.
Just to make sure
he
was okay. That was a thing that even as a kid he'd
realized he could never really repay. True, that was most parents, but it meant
more, he thought, since she didn't
have
to do it for him.

The story was an old one for him,
so he got up, changed into the slightly sodden running gear that he'd used the
day before, and then brushed his teeth. He kept his hair short, but did comb it
first, before setting out to find a new running route. That way if anyone saw
him, he wouldn't look like a disheveled mess. Not too much.

The new neighborhood was solidly
residential, and quiet, at least at four-thirty or so when he got out into it.
No one yelled at him, or tried to kill anyone on the path he chose, and a few
slow and plodding hours later he got back inside. It wasn't that he'd intended
to go that far, having had a nice long run the day before, but he got lost.

Still, he'd also found himself,
by orienting on the mall, and then working back from there. The front door had
been unlocked, since he didn't have a key yet. That seemed fair, since he also
hadn't given Calley any money either. By seven he was showered and ready for
the day. Not that he had anything specific to do. There was a big screen TV in
the living room, which had a game station thing hooked up to it. Not wanting to
demand expensive things, Ty had never gotten into games, choosing to read free
books from the library instead for entertainment. Television was a different
matter, since his mom had always made sure they had cable hooked up. Never the
pricey premium channels, but they
had
it. A computer too.

Normally he just flipped past the
news channels at that time of day. There wasn't much on anyway, and being
halfway informed wouldn't hurt him. Lucy had always told him that, so he'd made
a point to try and pay attention to the world.

Keeping in mind that everyone
else there had super hearing, he turned the volume down as low as he could, and
realized that it was probably still the same as if was blasting the thing as
loud as he could for their poor ears. Sure enough, a few minutes later a sleepy
and glasses free, Calley came out. She did smile though, and watched the flat
picture box for a while before speaking.

"Nothing about Shifters?
Good. We don't need the grief." Then she closed with him, and gave him a
hug, settling in very close. Snuggling sleepily.

Which promptly got him to have an
erection. He didn't mention it or let himself shift uneasily. It was kind of
clear that she was just the kind of person that needed contact, and it was part
of why he was there, to her mind. After about three minutes of cozy cuddles,
she popped up, stretched with her hands over her head, and twisted a bit.

"Coffee! Do you want
some?"

"Sure?"

She was already in the other
room, running water, so he couldn't tell what she said next. Not even after
turning the television off.

It came again a few seconds
later, without him saying
what
, like a freak.

"What's on tap for the
day?"

"Oh. Um, I don't know.
Technically
I have the day off. I have that list though, for Anne. A lot of the stuff is
gibberish to me. Only four things though, I just don't know where to start on
it. I don't even know why she asked me to do it, really. That kind of doesn't
make any sense, does it?" Now that he took a half moment to consider the
idea, it really didn't.

She'd said that it had to do with
Zack and being near him, so maybe he was supposed to ask there.

Calley mumbled something, and
didn't speak for a really long time. When she came back in she had a few apples
on a plate, sliced up, and four slices of buttered toast, which was clearly for
her.

Between bites, she made a face.

"Well, and this is just me,
but since you aren't really beholden to any particular group in any sort of
official capacity, I think you should just go from embassy to embassy and ask
about it. People may not help you, being new, but no one will kill you for it,
either. Even if it doesn't work, there are worse things to try and do than make
new friends."

The coffee was set on the low
table in front of the sofa, so he sat there and drank his, black, while she
made crumbs happen. His food was far tidier. Still, it was her place, and they
could clean.

After a while she took a deep
breath and stood.

"Now, I need to get going,
or Catherine will have my ass. One of us has to take the morning shift, and you
can't ask a Cat to do that in the main. Not that they're always lazy, but they
do sleep a lot. Naps and all that. That means a shower." She started
stripping her baggy shirt off before she was all the way back to her own space,
showing that her back was lean and muscular, considering how slight she really
was.

That pretty much had to be on
purpose, doing that. Unless it was a Shifter thing, not caring about being nude
in public. In that case it was important to not read into things too much. One
misplaced pass and he could find himself riding the curb pretty quick. That
might not be true, but he couldn't
swear
it wasn't the case either.

That meant care was a great
freaking idea.

He finished eating, and then
cleaned up the dishes and cups, washing them all in the sink. There was a dishwasher,
but he'd actually never used one before, so didn't now, just washing the
things, then leaving them in the sink. He did clean up the table in the living
room and the sofa, where toast bits had managed to migrate.

Then, not knowing what else he
should even consider, he headed off for the mall. Calley had a good plan, after
all. Still, Tyler Gartner wasn't exactly a social butterfly, so it was a bit
awkward for him to really do it. He took the list though, and his writing pad,
as well as a pen. Then, starting at the power lifting gym on the bottom level,
he walked in, and tried not to seem like an a-hole.

The girl at the desk looked at
him like he might be about to attack, but when he got a bit closer she sniffed
the air, looked slightly puzzled for a half moment, and then smile at him.

"Good morning! Have you come
to exercise here?" She looked at him, a close and detailed inspection. It
was clear that she didn't think that was very likely.

"Um, no? Not yet, though
Lars suggested it. I need to get paid first, you know?"

"Ah! Very good. Do you need
our help then?" She paused and then went slightly wide eyed. "Agh.
I'm Hilde. I work the desk here and do training." She smiled again, her
heavy featured face seeming pleasant, for all that it was a bit manly.

"I'm Tyler Gartner. I...
Really, I don't know how to explain what I'm doing. I have a list of things
that a Greater Demon wants to buy, I guess I'm supposed to try and find shops,
or people, that might be selling them?" He held the list out, not even
knowing if the woman, who was larger than he was in almost every way, even
seated, could read English. Then, it wasn't all in that language, as far as he
could tell.

A large finger pointed at the
third item down, and she took a bic pen from the desk and wrote next to the
thing.

"This. A Revenant Conluset.
I know that one. It's a type of horn. Like from an animal? You can't get them
near here, but they have them in the Forest Dawn marketplace, if I heard
correctly. How to get there, or who there will have one, I cannot say."

He let his own face light up. It
was more than he had known.

"Thanks! That's really
helpful. Do any of the others look familiar?"

There was a slightly sad head
shake then. One that felt weary.

"I do not. That does not
mean that no one else here will know. I shall ask for you, Tyler Gartner. I can
find you at the place of books?"

"Yep! Most days, probably.
Thanks again. We should, um, hang out, sometime. I don't know
how
to do
that kind of thing, but it seems right."

There was a strange look and a
smile that seemed like it could be on his face, instead of the strange woman in
front of him.

"Ya. We could do that.
Soon?"

"Sounds good." Then,
feeling watched, he left and went to the next place. That was a pet store, that
seemed to be focused on fish. They didn't know anything, but offered him a mall
employee discount on Beta fish, if he ever wanted some. It was a thing to keep
in mind. He'd had pets before, a few times, and liked fish, as long as they
weren't just for decoration. The people there were standing out openly, in
their empty space, which seemed odd to him. They were all pretty much the
creature from the black lagoon, having gills, green skin and webbed hands and
feet.

In short, they were
fascinating
.
Plus, really nice. They all seemed sad that they couldn't be of more help. They
kept a really neat shop, too. Most pet stores had hardly anything in them, but
this place was filled with animals of different types. Mainly fish, and sea
life, but a few other things. Puppies. They had a large box of them in the
center of the room.

He petted one of them, an
adorable all black puppy that had a pink tongue and really reminded him a bit
of Calley, in that it kept trying to jump into his arms.

That took about five minutes,
since he didn't want to leave her, but he also had to get back to work.

The next space was the food
court, which was kind of useless to him, being that he couldn't really eat
there. Even if he could afford it, the vast majority of the food there was
junk. Burgers, fries, fake Chinese food that was probably loaded with salt and
sugar, and Italian food that seemed slightly better, but probably wasn't. There
wasn't a single fruit stand in the place, or even a salad bar, so he nearly
skipped it. That would have, it turned out, have been a mistake.

The very first place he went, the
"Burger Joint" was being worked by a good looking copper haired guy,
who as soon as he explained the list, glanced at it, and smiled.

"This one? The Least
Calendar? I have one, and never use it. Do you want it?"

"Um, I'm just supposed to
find a person that has it for sale. Can I send the buyer around for it?"

The man nodded, then asked if he
wanted anything to eat.

"Heh. No money. I only eat
certain foods." It took a bit to explain, but the man, Kent, actually took
notes, and while he didn't offer him anything in particular, it seemed like a
thing.

That reminded him to take his own
notes. It turned out that Kent was an
Elth
, and that most of the others
at the foot court were too. The rest of them were nice, but didn't have
anything to add really. Some were a lot shorter than Kent, but the man at
"Fried Things" Leaf, was about the same height Tyler was. He was also
the Ambassador.