Fic: The Family Business - Chapter 3

[rusakko]

Chapter 3: The Idiot, the Madwoman and the Man with the Throat Illness

“We need a plan.”

Lalli groans into his cup of coffee. He’s slept for roughly twenty hours, but he wishes he could crawl back under the bed instead of facing Tuuri’s determination. He hates plans. They always go wrong anyway.

“Look, Grandma thought she could protect us from… it, but she’s not here to protect us anymore, so we have to do something ourselves.”

“If it got Grandma, how do you think we can beat it?” Lalli asks pessimistically.

“I don’t know, but we have to try, don’t we?” Tuuri snaps. “We can’t just stay holed up here and hope that a bit of rock salt keeps it away.”

Reluctantly, Lalli has to agree.

“Right then. I’ve been going through Grandma’s notes, and there are a few contacts I think we could ask for help. People who might know what leads she was pursuing during her last months.”

She means they need to talk. To people. The plan already sounds horrible.

“While you were sleeping, I tried calling the phone numbers she’s written down, but most of them aren’t in use anymore, and the last one I tried belonged to a woman who died recently, a Taru Hollola. Her widow picked up the phone. She died in a violent house fire. A distant relative of ours, apparently.”

That’s not very promising.

“Then there are a few addresses without phone numbers. Most of the places are in the middle of nowhere – who on Earth even lives in Keuruu? – but there’s one address in Helsinki. I googled it – it’s a bar in Kallio. The Grade A Cat, pretty weird name for a bar if you ask me. Still, I thought we could start there.”

---

The Grade A Cat is located in a narrow side street. The windows are dirty and the neon sign spelling out the name of the bar is flickering annoyingly. It doesn’t look like Lalli’s type of place at all. Although, to be fair, bars in general are not his thing. They’re smelly, and noisy, and worst of all, there are usually people.

Luckily, The Grade A Cat is completely deserted in the early afternoon. The place appears to have some kind of a kitschy Viking theme, with carved dragon heads and fake helmets with horns hanging on the walls. Looking more closely, though, Lalli realizes that there are some kind of subtle runes carved all around, too: on the walls, the furniture, even the ceiling. He recognizes the feeling of protective magic, even though the style is unfamiliar to him. No wonder the place feels strangely safe.

The bartender, a blonde young man who looks like he could be around Lalli’s age, has his back towards the door and seems to be busy arranging his hair with the help of a comb and a small mirror. He doesn’t notice them come in, too concentrated on admiring his reflection. What an idiot.

Tuuri clears her throat loudly.

“Excuse me, could you help me with something?”

The blonde man is startled and drops his comb, then proceeds to almost knock over a stack of glasses as he turns around, flustered. “I’m sorry – how may I help you?” he stammers, blushing. He has a weird accent. Probably Swedish.

“I’m looking for information about someone. Does the name “Hotakainen” mean anything to you?”

The Swede’s brow furrows for a moment, but then he brightens up. “Oh yes! You’re talking about that crazy old lady, right? The one who’s on a one-woman mission to kill all the demons in Finland?”

“She was our grandmother”, Tuuri replies frostily.

“She’s dead”, Lalli adds, to clarify.

The Swede freezes, his grin transforming into a horrified expression. “Uh… I’m so sorry… I didn’t mean…” He waves his hands in the air, as if compensating for the lack of coherent words. “You probably want to talk to my boss instead of me”, he adds, turning towards a door that seems to lead into a back room. “Sigrun! I need your help!”

Lalli hears a crash from the back room. A few seconds later, the door is kicked open, and he finds himself facing a tall, fierce-looking redheaded woman, who is pointing a gun right at his head.

“Er de demoner?” the woman demands, glancing at the Swede. He’s now looking even more horrified.

“Nej, nej, nej!” the Swede exclaims. “Please put the gun away! They’re just looking for information about the cra- I mean, about Mrs Hotakainen”, he adds, in Finnish. “They’re her grandchildren.”

To Lalli’s relief, the woman lowers her gun.

“Dritt! Emil, how many times have I told you not to shout for help unless there’s an actual problem? As in, a lethal one? And sorry about that”, she continues, turning towards Lalli and Tuuri. Her accent is even weirder than the Swede’s. “A couple of demons tried to burn the place down last month, so I’m not taking any chances.”

“That’s… understandable”, Tuuri replies, though she’s still eyeing the woman warily. The redhead grins at her. She probably means to look reassuring, but in Lalli’s opinion, there’s something rather predatory about her white teeth. She reminds him of a tiger. Interesting to observe, but only from a safe distance, and preferably from behind thick steel bars.

“Drinks are on me, and I’d be more than happy to give you any information I have”, the woman says. “I’m Sigrun Eide, by the way – the most best hunter in Scandinavia. And you’ve already met my buddy Emil Västerström. He’s really good at explosives. A bit too good, really.”

Lalli doesn’t know what that means, exactly, but it’s not reassuring.

As Tuuri introduces them and begins to explain their situation to Sigrun, Lalli lets his head sink down on the bar counter. The bar is not very brightly lit, the counter is not terribly uncomfortable – it’s entirely possible to snatch a nice fifteen minutes of sleep while the others babble on.

“Uh, Tuuri? Does your cousin want anything to drink?” he hears the Swede ask.

“He doesn’t drink.”

“What about something to eat, then?”

“He doesn’t really like anything except cookies.”

The Swede doesn’t say anything to that, and Lalli is just about to doze off when someone pats his head softly. He opens one eye. It’s the idiot Swede.

“I, uh, brought you something to eat.”

Lalli opens his other eye and turns his head slightly. There’s a glass of milk and a plate with cookies on the counter. Maybe the Swede isn’t a complete idiot after all.

“Your Grandma did visit us a couple of months ago”, says Sigrun, taking a big gulp of beer. “She was looking for some kind of a weapon.”

“What weapon?” Tuuri asks. “She had plenty of guns and knives of her own.”

“I don’t know exactly, but she thought it might be able to kill the demon that’s after your family. I’m no good at all that research stuff, so I told her to talk to this Danish theologian dude at the university. He’s really annoying, but he knows pretty much everything about everything. Don’t know if she ever did talk to him, though.”

“It’s a good start, anyway!” Tuuri says, excited. “Where can we find this Danish theologian?”

Sigrun reaches over and fluffs Tuuri’s hair, smiling. “I’ll take you to see him right now if you want, little fuzzy-head.”

“Well, that would be great, if it’s not too much of a problem…”

“It’s no problem at all. Emil can stay and watch the bar. Your Grandma helped me a few times over the years, I owe it to her to help you kids if I can. Besides, this demon of yours sounds fun. Nothing better than a good demon-hunt!”

Lalli suspects that their new ally may be more than a little crazy.

---

Mikkel Madsen, Doctor of Theology, says the sign by the door. Sigrun barges in without knocking. The broad-shouldered man behind the desk raises his head from an ancient-looking book and sighs deeply. He has impressive sideburns.

“Hej Sigrun. Hvordan kan jeg hjælpe dig?”

Lalli instinctively steps back. The man sounds as if he’s suffering from some nasty throat illness. Best not to get too close.

”These two kids are looking for information about their Grandma,” Sigrun says in Finnish. “The old Hotakainen lady. She’s dead.”

“I am very sorry for your loss,” the big man says to Lalli and Tuuri, rising from behind his desk. “My name is Mikkel Madsen,” he adds, reaching out to shake Tuuri’s hand. Lalli tries to back away, but Tuuri pushes him forward so that he has to shake hands with the Dane, too. Great. Throat illness it is, then.

“I was wondering why your Grandma had not been in contact,” Mikkel continues, walking over to a huge bookcase. Lalli assumes it was because she didn’t want to get the throat illness, either. Well, and because she was dead. Mikkel pulls a huge, worn old book off the shelf and carries it to the desk. “She visited me approximately two months ago and asked me to search for information concerning a certain weapon, known as Häyhä’s rifle.”

“Hyäöyhöy what?” Sigrun doesn’t even try to pronounce the impossible diphthong correctly.

“It is a legendary rifle, built with the aid of magic in the late 1920s and named after the famous marksman Simo Häyhä, who is believed to have used it during the Winter War. It is said that it never misses and that it can kill anything.”

“Even, say, a demon?” Sigrun demands.

“Yes, Sigrun, even a demon”, Mikkel replies patiently.

“And did you find any information?” Tuuri asks, wide-eyed.

Mikkel gives her a small smile. “I did indeed.” He gestures towards the book. “According to these records, when the war ended, it was deemed best to lock the rifle up somewhere safe and hidden in order to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands.”

“So where did they put it?” Tuuri exclaims. “And please don’t tell me it’s somewhere in Northern Lapland, Utsjoki or something…”

“They did not”, Mikkel reassures her. “In fact, you are currently merely a block away from it. They buried it under the floor of the crypt underneath the Helsinki Cathedral.”

---

“Okay, so this is what we’re going to do,” Sigrun says, inspecting a blueprint of the crypt that Mikkel has dug up online. “We’ll scout out the location during the day tomorrow – there’s even a café there so it won’t look weird if we stay for a while – and then break in and grab the rifle during the night. Fuzzy-head, you’re in charge of driving the escape vehicle, so you’ll wait outside with the engine running, ready to go. The little guy –” she waves her hand at Lalli “– will keep watch and let us know if someone’s coming, while Emil, Mikkel and I -”

Mikkel interrupts her decisively.

“Sigrun, I am not going to participate in a burglary.”

“Oh, come on, don’t be a wimp!” Sigrun exclaims.

“I am not a wimp, I simply do not wish to break into an important historical building with people who are no doubt planning to blow something up. Moreover, I believe you will all be caught and end up in jail, and I would prefer to avoid that.”

Sigrun’s eyes narrow dangerously. “Maybe I should call Uncle Trond and ask what he thinks.”

Mikkel stills. “You would not do that.”

“Wouldn’t I? He’s a close family friend, you know, and I think he owes my parents a favour…”

Mikkel closes his eyes for a moment. Lalli suspects that he may be counting to ten in his head.

“Very well, then. I will assist you with this idiotic mission and attempt to ensure that we do not all end up dead or behind bars.”