True to his word, Richard leads Landis up two flights of stairs, to the top floor of the apartment complex.
“That one,” he says, gesturing to the door down at the end of the hallway. 608. Landis approaches it cautiously, and knocks, letting his knuckles just barely glance off the surface of the door. Maybe no one’s home.
He knows he’s wrong even before his hand drops back down to his side. He can hear the scuffle of someone inside the apartment making their way over to the door, jostling things and swearing, and it isn’t long until the door swings open. The man behind it is a few inches taller than Landis, with a wild mane of shaggy brown hair, glasses, and a five o’clock shadow that looks too carefully maintained to be accidental. He’s wearing only a t-shirt and boxer briefs, and strangely, Landis recognizes him. It’s only a vague recollection - they’ve never spoken, but Landis is sure he’s seen this guy at the diner before, or hanging around the laundry room. From the brief surprise that flashes in the man’s eyes, Landis thinks it’s a safe bet that he recognizes Landis, too.
“What,” the man says gruffly.
“I, uh,” Landis stammers, drumming his fingers on his thighs as he fights not to fidget. “Do I know you?”
“Christ, I hope not,” the man says. The corners of his mouth twitch a little, but he doesn’t smile. “That isn’t really what you knocked on my door for, is it?”
“Well…uh, no.” Landis looks back over his shoulder, helplessly, at Richard.
“Tell him you know he’s with the Department,” Richard says quietly, “and that Austin’s in trouble.”
Oh. The Department. The mysterious Department that saved Landis from probably a lifetime in prison. The Department that Austin doesn’t like to talk about. Landis has gleaned from talking to Richard that the Jones family has run the place for decades on decades, and that Austin ran away from home and came to Antlers rather than work there. Richard has also said that there’s a good chance Austin will have to go back eventually, and bring Landis with him, because the Department took jurisdiction on his case. Landis isn’t sure he grasps the implications of that, but it keeps him out of jail, so he doesn’t think about it.
“I know you’re with the Department of Paranormal Research,” he parrots at the man standing in the apartment doorway, trying to sound a lot more sure of himself than he actually feels.
The man’s face splits into a wide grin. “You didn’t come here to kill me, did you? Like you did all those other people? Or, what, did Austin send you up here to tell me to get lost? Is he afraid he’ll lose if he fights me again?”
Landis’s stomach clenches up. He doesn’t understand half of what this guy is talking about - Austin never said anything about getting into a fight, not recently. But he can feel his cheeks burning at the suggestion that he’d murder anyone, ever again, and he curls his twitchy fingers into fists at his sides.
“No,” he tells the man, his voice much more firm than before. “Austin’s in trouble. And I know you’re his co-worker, or bodyguard -”
“Babysitter,” the man interjects.
“Well, whatever you are, you’re going to help me go and get him.” Landis pauses to breathe for a second. He keep his eyes locked on the other man’s, resisting the urge to flinch away, look somewhere else. “Okay?”
The man sighs. “Whatever. You’d better come in, I guess.”
He steps to one side so that Landis can slip through the doorway. Landis looks over his shoulder to see if Richard is coming, but Richard is already gone. Probably back in Otter’s apartment, playing lookout with Danton. Walking into an aggressive stranger’s apartment by himself won’t exactly do wonders for his already spiked anxiety levels, but Landis does it anyway, sitting down awkwardly on the couch as the man vanishes into a different room. The sound of what Landis assumes is the man getting dressed follows soon after.
“You are the guy, right?” The man asks loudly from the other room. “The lake murderer guy?”
“Yeah.” Landis projects his voice, hopefully enough that the man can hear him.
“Oh, good. I get you and the other one confused.”
“I have a name, you know,” Landis says. “It’s Landis. And I never got yours.”
The man pokes his head out of the room he vanished into, his hair somehow even messier than it was before. “I didn’t give it to you. It’s Walker.”
“Nice to meet you,” Landis says, purely out of habit.
“Yeah, yeah.” Walker ducks back out of sight. “What happened to Austin?”
“Whatever was in the lake possessed - uh, possessed the other one. Otter. It’s got him and Otter’s younger brother down in one of the abandoned mine shafts, and is using them for some kind of blood sacrifice. I think. Austin’s hurt, but he’ll probably be okay if we get there soon.”
Walker finally emerges from the other room, fully dressed, and comes into the living room to raise an eyebrow at Landis. “So, you’re some kind of precog or something?”
“Precog?”
“Like, you predict the future? ‘Cause that’s some pretty specific information.”
“Oh,” Landis says. He looks away from Walker, feeling a little stupid. “I heard it from a ghost. Austin’s dad, actually. He was following them around in the mines, and came here to get help. Austin and I can both see ghosts.”
“Well, I knew that about Austin. Not about you, though.” Walker looks thoughtful as he jams a pair of shoes onto his feet. “I’ll tell Jacob to add it to your file, I guess.”
“I have a file?”
“Yeah, sure, everyone’s got a file. Austin’s got a file. I’ve got one this thick.” Walker grins, holding his hands a few inches apart demonstratively. “The DPR keeps records on everything. You’ll get used to it, once you start working for them.”
Landis blinks. “Once I what?”
“I mean, that’s generally what they do with criminals. Didn’t Austin tell you?” Walker grins a little wider, like he’s telling his favorite joke. “They either lock you up in a containment cell, or give you the option to work for them. Rehabilitate, you know. I just assumed you’d go for the latter, but hey, it’s up to you.”
Landis smiles, nods, and stows the information away for later, when he can privately panic about it, or get on Austin’s case for conveniently forgetting to tell him. He can’t afford to focus on anything else right now, not when they’re basically working against the clock. His hands are threatening to fidget again, the fingers of one hand straying to the long scar on his left to scratch at it. He puts both hands together instead, interlocking his fingers and keeping them that way as he stands up from the couch.
“Can we go?” he asks Walker.
“One sec.”
Walker gestures back down the hallway, towards the room he got dressed in. For a moment, Landis thinks he’s being directed towards it, to get something, or shut off the lights. But before he can take a step in the direction of the room’s doorway, something’s propelled out of it, zipping through the air into Walker’s hand. It’s a rectangle of black plastic that Landis thinks for one horrifying second might be a boxcutter, but realizes quickly what it really is. A taser.
“Just in case,” Walker says, pocketing it.
Landis stares at him, trying to figure out how he made the taser fly, or at least trying to find the words to ask. Can he levitate things? People, too, or just objects? How much weight can he lift with that trick? Why doesn’t he use it for everything, instead of getting dressed the normal way? Has he always been able to do that?
He opens his mouth to try and get at least one of his questions out, but Danton interrupts, sticking his head and shoulders up through the floor.
“Hey,” he says, “our ride’s here.”
“Thank God,” Landis mutters to himself. He brushes past Walker, out the door into the apartment complex’s hallway, and heads for the elevator. “Let’s go. The Sheriff’s Department is gonna drive us out to where Austin and everyone are.”
“Do we have a plan?” Walker asks, falling into step beside him.
Landis shrugs. “I was hoping we’d figure one out on the way.”
obsessed with walker calling landis “the lake murderer guy”. walker you are such an ASSHOLE