Mix Me Up a Buck Jones

Same as any night in recent memory, the tavern's regulars lined up at the bar, nursing their beers like pigs at a trough.

The barkeep, a burly man named Pete Henderson, wiped absently at the counter and refilled a mug. He made small talk with the bellies, Pastor McFaul was there and a great fan of the Blackhawks, and often they'd talk about that.

Pete had the game schedule posted on the wall in the stockroom and while they didn't get but four channels at the bar, sometimes the game came in clear. He was returning from the stockroom to tell the Pastor about the next watchable game when he stopped cold.

A traveler stood at the bar. Man-shaped, with eyes shining a brilliant white, no pupils. Flurries of alarm went off in Pete's brain and a tendril of fear crawled down his spine.

In the traveler's eyes he saw waves of pearlescent color churning endlessly. The froth of eternity. The electric terror of a moment ago was next saturated with and overtaken by feelings of comfort and euphoria. The barkeep had no reason not to love the traveler with wonderful eyes. He'd give his life for this love--his life and anything else he had to give.

“May I sit here?” The traveler’s voice was like work boots on gravel.

“Of course, friend. Something to drink?”

The traveler leaned in, grinning. He blinked. Pete watched his eyes.

“I thought you'd never ask. Do you have sherry? Mix me up a…I forget the name of it. Sherry and rum, with ginger ale and lemon, I believe.”

“Ah, a Buck Jones,” Pete said, back in familiar territory. “I haven’t mixed one of those in years. This isn’t one of those bars, you know. Draft beer and whiskey is the menu, but I’m pretty sure I have a bottle of sherry around here somewhere.”

Pete dug around the upper shelves and reached for a bottle.

“Here we go,” he said, hefting the sherry.

The recipe rolled through his mind: shot and-a-half of light rum, shot of sherry, squeeze in juice from half a lime, splash of ginger ale, on the rocks.

Pete had almost started humming when he caught sight of the traveler's coy face.

No feeling of love. Instead he felt empty.

The next time he looks at me with those eyes, Pete thought, will be so wonderful, so awfully wonderful.

He reached for a lime and a knife, lips pursed, purposely looking away from his odd customer. He felt eyes on his face, probing. He looked to his other customers. There remained no other customers.

No one but the traveler now sat at the bar.

The regulars' mugs, some full, some half-empty, cluttered the surface of the bar. Pete was alone with the traveler.

His regulars were on the floor, dead.

The initial fear grew, tendril now wrapped around each of Pete’s vital organs. Killed them. Bastard killed my regulars. Pete’s hands trembled as he sliced the lime, and he narrowly missed slicing off the end of his index finger.

Before long Pete served the drink to the traveler.

"Your Buck Jones."

"I'm not," the traveler said, grinning. He drank.

Pete cracked his knuckles. He stared at the floor and listened to the traveler drink. Only now, after the fact, did he think of putting something poison in the drink. Too late.

“Peter,” that ugly voice said. “Peter, I think it’s time we talked."

"Oh?"

"A young man was in here the other day. You gave him information in exchange for something else. Would you like to tell me what this young man…paid you?”

Pete didn’t look up. He muttered something inaudible.

“What did you say, Peter? Look at me when I’m speaking to you.”

Pete’s head snapped upwards. He squeezed his eyes shut. I don’t want to look at his eyes. I won't look!

“I said I--I don’t want to talk about it.” Veins on his neck and forehead bulged. Some force pulling him, willing him to move his muscles, was winning. His eyelids fluttered, trying to open.

Pete redoubled his efforts to keep them shut.

“You're making this harder than need be, Peter. All you had to do was tell me up front. Why don't you open your eyes and tell me where that boy was going and what he gave you? I’ll make your death as quick and painless as I can.”

Pete couldn't hold on much longer. The lids of his eyes felt slippery, and his grip on them was failing. He thought of grabbing and pulling them shut with his hands, but the idea of moving his arms was leagues beyond comprehension.

“I won’t…help you find him. He’s going to save us.”

Tears dripped from the corners of his eyes. He clenched harder, knowing it wouldn't matter.

“I think you'll help me, Peter. You’ll help me and you’ll die.”

The traveler snapped his fingers and Pete’s eyes opened wide.

As Pete Henderson told the seeker what it wanted to know, it sucked his soul into its smoking eyes and whisked him along to Hell.