Boogieman Blues: The Legend Continues

With Halloween right around the corner it is about time for another installment of Boogieman Blues; the continuing adventures of history's favorite trio of classic monsters, as they ponder over the human realm. Enjoy 🧟‍♂️

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~5 Months Later~

“Well, that was a bust!”

The trio of monsters were once again back at The Abyss, as the wolfman sulked in his seat; shirtless, and fully transformed with his head resting on the table. Dracula was situated across from him dipping his finger absentmindedly in his blood sangria. Meanwhile, Imhosen, was sitting between his two companions, dolefully picking away at his bandages. 

“I will take that as a sign you had no luck in your endeavors as well, then?” Dracula finally took a sip of his drink without looking up at the wolfman.

“What do you think?” He sucked his teeth but then proceeded to gnaw at his fur, between his elbow and shoulder, to get at an itch that had been bugging him for a bit.

“Well, what happened?”

“For starters, I now suffer from a permanent case of tinnitus trying to reason with a banshee.”  The wolfman stuck a finger in his fur covered ear as he tried to quell the low, dull ringing sound residing within it. “They have been experiencing the same problems as everyone else in the monster realm, apparently. But in their case, the humans keep mistaking them for whatever new popstar sensation is making their way up through the charts.” He sighed, but soon afterwards, his lips curled into a smirk across his muzzle. “I got to give them credit, though. They found a way to cash in on the fad by coaching wannabe idols in vocal lessons and attitude. Talk about squeezing lemonade from lemons.  Who knew banshees were such an entrepreneurial bunch of opportunists?”

Imhosen spoke up with a series of strained gurgles and grunts.

“Yep, they coached her too.”

The mummy made a noise which gave the impression that he was impressed by the wolfman’s confirmation of his suspicions.

“Did you try anybody else?” Their vampire friend pressed his fuzzy companion.

“I thought about trying the Grindylows but then I remembered they were basically pushovers who couldn’t even scare a baby out of its diapers.  But I did run into a boggart along the way, and I tried convincing him to join us in our campaign, but the bastard kept transforming and mimicking me! To the point where I punched him and gave up on even trying to find anyone else anymore.”

The wolfman frowned.

“I shouldn’t have hit him, though.”

“Why?”

“He followed me home and is now haunting my place as revenge.”

“Yeah, they tend to do that with anyone unfortunate enough to cross them and get on their bad side,” Dracula sympathized. “Good luck getting him off your back. Their wrath can be as enduring as the memories which drives it.”

The wolfman leaned back in his chair and rolled his eyes at the luck of it all. Meanwhile, in the moment of silence shared between the trio, an old looking crone with a black cat trailing close behind her had hobbled up to the jukebox near them, placed a coin in its slot, and selected a song before returning to her table at the other end of The Abyss.

“You’re telling me,” the wolfman reflected as the initial chords of Sympathy for The Devil began to pluck its funky beat from the speakers. “I have not had a good night’s rest ever since the damn thing attached itself to my home. Not to mention the havoc it has played on my dating life. I can’t even bring a woman over without that damn boogieman cockblocking me at every turn!”

“Well, there is a lesson to be learned from all of this,” Dracula sipped pensively from his glass. “Don’t go around lashing out at everything you find annoying; it may just come back to bite you in the ass.”

“Thanks for the advice, Confucius! I will take that into consideration the next time I run into a vengeful spirit in some random marshland,” the wolfman glared at his undead pal through narrowed eyes while he chugged down the rest of his beer. “Since you are so chalked full of advice,” the wolfman signaled Gills at the bar for another drink after he was able to get the bartender’s attention, “how did everything work out for you on your side of things?”

“Not so well either, actually.” The vampire leaned back in his chair as he reflected upon the events over the last few months. “I went to the islands over in the earth realm-”

“Wait a minute,” the wolfman interrupted as he raised an eyebrow and stared at his pallid friend. “The islands? As in sun, sand, and sea…Key word here being Sun!”

Dracula sighed.

“Yes, I know. Not the best vacation destination for a nocturnal creature such as myself, but night does exist in the Caribbean, if you were not aware. And, man, let me tell you something, the nightlife there can be extremely invigorating. The music, the dancing, and the abundance of culture…” Dracula had a far away, dreamy look on his face, as he reminisced about his time spent touring the tropics.

“No need to brag,” the wolfman snorted with pursed lips.

“And the women…” the vampire made a motion with his hands to his lips—like a cook appreciating a delectable selection of culinary delights which had been meticulously prepared—as he kissed the tips of his slender fingers. “Mwah!”

The wolfman and Imhosen glared at their friend, unimpressed.

“Well, anyway,” Dracula shifted in his seat, uncomfortably. “During my time there I kept an eye out for anybody who could be useful in our endeavors to make Halloween terrifying again. I thought I was making some leeway with a few of the witchdoctors and Obeah practitioners in the area, but, apparently, the only thing they are known for nowadays is their specialty in creating Cuckoo soup.”

“Cuckoo soup? What is that?”

“Similar to a love potion, except, it is made into a soup, where the ingredients involve cooking the items of a person longing to be loved into a broth of some kind. Usually the underwear or pubic hair of a woman looking to capture the affections of a man.”

Imhosen and the wolfman stared at each other in disgust, while Dracula concurred with a nod.

“A good way to make a Valentine’s Day dinner into a nauseating occasion, but not quite suitable for our needs.”

“That’s an understatement,” the wolfman felt a little queasy as his imagination got the best of him. “So, was that all you could find?”

“There were other creatures I encountered, actually. I ran into some Lougarou cousins of mine, and a couple of Mami Watas, but they were too busy living up the island life to be bothered with the need to scare humans anymore. ‘Boy ain’t cha sees I too retired to be concerning myself with petty scares?’, was pretty much the consensus.” The languid expression dawned upon Dracula’s face, once again.  “Although, I cannot say that I blame them for turning me down. During my stay down there, I was pretty tempted in packing it in myself, and calling it a day with this whole Halloween business.”

“Focus, Drac, focus!” The wolfman snapped at him.

“My apologies.” The vampire’s face flushed with the little amount of blood coursing through his veins. “But all my efforts were not in vain, however. I did come across a chickcharney.”

“A chickcharney?” Imhosen simply shrugged when the wolfman glanced over at him.  “What’s that?”   

At that moment, Gills had made his way over to them with a platter of drinks to refresh the round they had finished.

“Sorry for the wait, fellows.” Gills interrupted as he began to clear the empty mugs and wine glasses from the table before replacing them with a whole new set. “It’s been a long day and I have been dragging ass ever since this morning.”

“You do seem a little ragged today,” the wolfman eyed the fishman, when he quickly took a swig of rum from a shot glass left in the middle of his tray. “I thought you had given up drinking?”

“I only did it in solidarity of my boyfriend’s sobriety,” Gills glowered at the small glass in his hand before he placed it among the rest of the empty cups; it clinked against them, as the fishman exhaled with frustration and rolled his protruding eyes. “But he will not shut up about it! He keeps going on, and on, about how many days he has been sober. It is like we cannot have a normal conversation about anything, anymore, without him bragging about it. He talks about it so much at this point, that now I’m back to drinking just to drown out his incessant adulations over the whole thing.”

“Ouch, that is rough,” the wolfman sympathized with the bartender’s plight. “It’s nice and all that he was able to overcome his problem, but it gets frustrating when it becomes the only thing someone can talk about.”

“I know, right?” Gills shook his head before returning to the bar.

“Rough stuff,” Dracula’s gaze lingered on the bartender for a moment. “Anyway, where was I?”

Imhosen let out strained moan.

“Ah, that’s right, the chickcharney.”

The vampire took a sip from his glass before continuing.

“They are a strange bunch, seeing as they have long legs and arms that bring them up to half the height of an average person.  They resemble a barn owl crossed with a human. Innately solitary creatures, they live in the pine forests of the Caribbean, most notably the island of Andros in the Bahamian archipelago.  That is where I met one of them named Charlie; he was sitting on top of an array of pine trees that were pulled and lashed together at the middle of their trunks. The preferred method of nesting for their kind, apparently.”

“Charlie the Chickcharney?” The wolfman grinned as he mused upon the name. “Kind of on the nose wouldn’t you say?”

“Maybe,” Dracula responded, indifferently. “But I wouldn’t make fun of it in front of his face.  Chickcharneys are a fastidious and mannerly brood of creature who do not appreciate being treated with disrespect.”

The wolfman snorted.

“What is Charlie going to do? Hoot at me all night long?” The wolfman laughed, while Imhosen nearly choked on his drink.

Dracula frowned.

“Has your experience with the boggart taught you nothing? You would be lucky enough to be cursed with a spate of misfortune, that is if he did not simply twist your head around where you stood. As the saying goes, ‘Be kind towards the chickcharney, unless ya wanting to be seeing down the back of ya shirt!’”

The wolfman instinctively rubbed his neck as the grin disappeared from his muzzle.

“But, all in all, they have a pretty sunny disposition when you are nice enough to them. In fact,” Dracula fiddled with the ornament he was wearing around his neck, “that is how I got this pearl you see here in the middle of my medallion. Charlie gave it to me after the wonderful conversation we had.”

“That’s nice and all,” Wolfie began to tap his fingers on the table. “But did you talk to him about our plans for the coming Halloween season?”

“I did.”

“And…?”

“He said he would think about it.”  The wolfman shook his head and he rolled his eyes. “Charlie and his kind are not particularly interested in terrifying humans on a regular basis. They prefer to be left alone for the most part. But if he finds himself with nothing else better to do when the season rolls around, he might join us in our campaign.”

“So, basically a bust when it comes down to it, huh?”

“We will see whenever Halloween rolls around.”

“What about you, Imhosen? Any luck on your end?”

 The mummy grunted.

“What do you mean, ‘you slept’?” The wolfman scoffed.

Imhosen spurted out a series of wheezes and gargling sounds from his decayed larynx, while he motioned with his hands to emphasize his point.

“So, the gods just do not give a damn about what goes on in the human realm, huh? Typical!” The wolfman grabbed at his frosted mug of beer and chugged it down with one gulp, which left a foam mustache below his nose. “What good are the ancients if you can’t count on them for anything?”

Imhosen cackled a bit before gurgling and grunting some more.

“I am surprised you were able to get that far with the Sphinx, I would have given up by the first riddle.”

After clearing the beer foam from his lip, the wolfman sighed in reluctant resignation while the trio began to mope over their predicament for a minute.

“Well, even if we were able to get an entourage of spooks together, it would not have mattered anyway.”

“Why do you say that?” The wolfman nibbled at the itch on his arm again before Dracula could answer.

“Have you not been watching the news lately?”

“Not with a freaking boggart around; he blew it up a couple of weeks ago.”

“Okay, then,” Dracula stifled a grin with a sip of his Sangria de Platelet. “Us monsters will be the last thing on the minds of humans with a pandemic looming in the horizon for them.”

“What?!”

“Because of some virus there are talks of lockdowns, quarantines, and economic upheaval floating around the earth realm, and that seems to have the lot of them extremely nervous.”

“Are you kidding me?!” The wolfman nearly knocked his mug from the table. “You mean with all the bloodsucking, face ripping, head twisting fiends out there, are you telling me that these humans are terrified of a measly freaking virus?!  What the hell is going on with people nowadays?”

“Do not scoff at viruses, my friend.” Dracula scolded him in a serious tone. “Bubonic plague aside, do not forget that our powers are derived from those microscopic, dastardly bastards. Even human evolution has been affected one way or the other through microbial interference.”

“Says you! I’m cursed, not diseased!”

The Mummy chimed in with a wet, cooing sound.

“Yes,” the vampire nodded, “in Imhosen’s case, he is a cursed corpse. Although, that is still up for debate, since he is practically a zombie and they can be spawned through pathogenic origins. But werewolf curses were merely old wives’ propaganda created to shield humanity from its ignorance over the issue.”

“Don’t tell me from what I am, to what I am not, you pasty faced bastard! I’m the one that has to live with this curse on a daily basis.”

“You mean on a lunar basis, don’t you?” Dracula corrected him with a smirk.

“Say one more word and I will beat the living immortality right out of you!” The wolfman took a massive gulp of his beer in frustration.

“Look, I am not trying to be difficult with you, or biased against your race by any means,” the vampire began explaining to his friend in an apologetic manner. “But things have changed over the millennia, and a lot of myths surrounding our kind have been dispelled by some very compelling evidence. Hence why many humans in the Earth realm are no longer afraid of us; they have been pulling themselves out from under the yolk of the dark ages for centuries now, and that is something we will have to accept. No different than those slasher chaps who came on the scene back in the 80s, we have to find a way to adapt with the change, but in our own way.”

Wolfie sucked his teeth and sighed.

“I don’t know…maybe you are right. It just seems like we cannot catch a break these days. If it ain’t slashers making us look like a bunch of harmless pushovers, it is either some conspiracy, virus, science, or gremlins undermining our ferocity.”

“Be that as it may, we must not let all of that keep a good monster down! After all, fads are cyclical and limited to the reality in which they dwell. As soon as humanity regains its senses, we will be back to lurk in the shadows and haunt the hearts of men once again.”

The wolfman mumbled incoherently under his breath.

“Come on now, Wolfie, my boy!” Dracula consoled his furry buddy. “Cheer up, give us a smile!”

When their friend did not respond to the vampire’s attempt to cheer him up, Imhosen, gargled.

“What makes you think anyone wants to hear a joke right now?” The wolfman snarled.

The mummy grunted.

“Fine! If you are going to whine about it, go ahead, then. Tell it!”

Dracula and the wolfman listened, as the bandaged laden corpse proceeded to let out a series of guttural tones and inflections from his rotting vocal cords.

“Okay, I’ll bite,” the shapeshifting lycanthrope acquiesced. “Where does a dehydrated person who cannot stand being corrected get their opinions from?”

Imhosen grunted.

“Da-Nile?” The wolfman stared at the mummy with a slack jawed expression on his face.

“Now that’s funny!” Dracula nearly choked on the blood-filled sangria he was in the middle of drinking after Imhosen told his joke, as he chortled at the punchline their mummy friend had recited so eloquently.

“I don’t get it…” Wolfie glanced back and forth between the two creatures.

“Of course, you wouldn’t.” The vampire chuckled.

“Don’t be an asshole!”

“The word, Denial, as in ‘the action of declaring something as untrue’, sounds a lot like ‘The Nile’: a river located in the Egyptian region of Africa. Where in this instance of the joke, a person who does not want to accept a proven fact different from their own opinion would be in denial of such information. Such as how you were in denial of the fact that your lycanthropic condition is the result of a contagion rather than a mythical curse.”

The wolfman thought it over for a moment before he gave Dracula and Imhosen a dirty look.

“Oh for-, the both of you could go right ahead and screw yourselves!”

Most of the Abyss’ patrons were bewildered as they gawked in the direction of the trio’s table, after both of Wolfie’s companions broke out into a fit of raucous laughter.

“Lighten up, man! Cheers!” Dracula offered his glass in a toast. Imhosen clanked his mug against the vampire’s chalice, after the wolfman grudgingly accepted the symbolic offer of merriment. “Anyway, up for another round?”

“I’m good, actually.” The lycanthrope declined as he began to gather his coat, which was draped over the back of his chair. “I have to get out here if I am going to make it for my date on time.”

“A date?” Dracula raised an eyebrow. “With whom?”

“Allie Bale.”

“The succubus? Really? I thought she hated you?”

“Goes to show how much you know,” The wolfman grinned. “After I apologized to her and seeing as there was nothing much going on in the human realm, she decided to give me a chance. We have been casually dating for a couple of months now. Although it has not been easy for us to get any action with that damn boggart haunting my place. So, we are going to hang out at her pad tonight and see where that gets us.”

“I see,” Dracula mused, impressed, and then raised a glass to him. “Well, I wish you lots of luck, buddy.”

“Who needs luck when I am chalked full of charm?” He quipped. The wolfman got up from the table and proceeded towards the exit, and as the last notes of Thriller eked its way from the jukebox with the maniacal laughter of Vincent Price trailing behind the final cords, a pair of eyes materialized through the fur on the back of Wolfie’s arm and winked at his friends. Imhosen tried to get his attention but Dracula stopped the mummy with a pasty hand on his bandaged shoulder.

“He will figure it out, eventually.”  The vampire sighed and the pair simply sat in silence, while the steady bass of Dr. Dre’s The Next Episode began thumping its beat throughout The Abys