The Crows were a violent faction of the Thunderbird Order. They were among the only Thunderbirds, in fact, who traveled in groups — “a Murder of Crows,” they called them.
Murder was an appropriate moniker for the Crows. They were the toughest, grittiest of all Thunderbirds. Upon completing my voyager training, I elected to concentrate on the channeling aspect of the Thunderbird Order, instead of the enforcement side of our kind. But I was going to have to get in good with these hooligans to cover the story for the North Star.
I had just left the editor’s office where he’d issued me this assigment. Upon exiting, I signaled to Kitty, who had accompanied me on this visit to the North Star newspaper, it was time to go.
“What’d he say?” Kitty had been patiently waiting outside to see if I had a new job, after submitting a writing sample to him, based on a recent, brief stay of 42 years down on a version of Earth.
“He liked it,” I said. “He even gave me an assignment.”
“You’re not gonna have to leap blindly into a new body down on the ground again, are you?” Kitty said. I could detect half sarcasm and half concern in the tone of her voice.
I was quick to reassure her.
“He wants me to cover the Crows,” I said.
“What or who are those?” As a trainee, Kitty had not been exposed to all Thunderbird forms yet. I was happy to enlighten her.
“He mentioned that the Thunderbird Order is experimenting with planetary intervention, on particularly militant worlds. He said an Earth version was likely one such candidate. Right when he mentioned ‘militant’ and ‘intervention,’ only one type of Thunderbird came to mind: the Crows.”
“That still doesn’t answer my question,” she said.
“Right. The Crows are a swarm of hornets. They’re the enforcers of our Order. I had encountered them in my own trainee days. They chased me from one end of the multiverse to the other, as I mastered my voyager craft.”
“I thought the Thunderbird were peaceful,” she said. Kitty had become perplexed.
“For the most part, yes. But one can’t ignore Murphy’s Law: if it can happen, it will… especially among a multiverse of all possibility. The Murder of Crows, ‘MoC’ for short, are our security against any threats that could injure an otherwise stable multiverse. There’s such a thing as worlds becoming too peaceful, too susceptible to outside, nefarious antigens. MoC exist, then, as the necessary evil to combat these opposing forces who may prey on unsuspecting worlds.”
“Uh huh, I see,” she said. “So, what now?”
“We’ll have to visit another Dew place—the Equipment Room. We’ll need to reference the Thunderbird logs to see if my hunch is correct. We must locate that particular Earth version the Crows have descended upon. We may also have to brace ourselves for an unwelcome reception. The Crows don’t usually get along with other Thunderbirds.”
Kitty’s eyes lit up at my description of this mysterious faction of her Thunderbird Order. She held a keen attraction to danger, I thought.
“That’s fine, but can we stop off at the Cheshire first? I haven’t eaten all day.”
She also didn’t like surfing the multiverse on an empty stomach.
They say from the dawn of time to the modern era on Earth-42, not a day went by where war wasn’t waged on the planet’s surface. This civilization knew no time when it was completely at peace. They were getting close by the mid-2030s, though, which was a few years after I leapt back to the spacecraft Cheshire for good.
The Thunderbird Order summoned the MoC to swoop in and provide the final balm to quell any lingering societal rash once and for all. They were a militant, formidable bunch—the Crows—but that aptitude also availed them abilities to squash beefs quickly before any humid antagonism wafted over neighboring territories, infecting their moods. The MoC Thunderbird faction would be the group to ultimately accomplish peace throughout a planetary version adjacent to Earth-42.
Kitty and I left the Equipment Room. After a brief meal back on the Cheshire to avoid any “hanger,” as she called it, from an otherwise agitated and hungry Kitty, we both leapt to Earth-42.
“Is this where we’ll find them?” Kitty said after leaping from the movierain onto terrestrial Earth-42.
“No,” I said, “but my gut tells me the version they’ll attempt to intervene is off an adjacent quadrangle to this Earth version. When I leapt off finally, I had the feeling the planet could approach peace eventually. We can explore possible Earth versions from this ‘-42’ vantage spacetime to pinpoint the specific Earth the Crows have targeted.”
We had re-enterd Earth-42 at precisely my initial exit point. It was roughly the year 2024 and wars still waged. There was an ongoing skirmish in Ukraine. The Gaza Strip had heated up over the last few years too, among another two dozen substantial conflicts that peppered our globe. We fast-forwarded congruent timelines in pursuit of a possible Earth that would eventually achieve peace of its own accord.
Lo and behold, we found one such peaceful Earth in the year 2035, as projected from my Earth-42 launch point. I coined this version “Earth_PeaceProject.”
“If they’ve already achieved peace, what’s the point of intervening?” Kitty said, as we touched down upon this Earth_PeaceProject version.
“Warmongering is baked into the human DNA,” I said. “It’s certainly an accomplishment that this modern human civilization has finally extinguished large-scale offenses across its surface for the first time in its questionable history. But there’s no question of if future conflict will sprout; it’s only a matter of when.”
That’s why the Crows were so crucial to this Earth version’s survival, as a peaceful planet. While they couldn’t have forced peace while sections of the planet still waged war, the Thunderbird Crows could now swoop in as a salve to quell any lingering pangs from a history of violence. They could also delve into the ruminating psychology of the Earth’s collective unconscious of post-traumatic stress that remained. The MoC knew rage better than any other Thunderbird, and knew how to alleviate terrestrial strife, having been there themselves.
“Any minute now,” I said, “the Crows should dip into this dimension to intervene. And we’ll be here to cover it.”
Kitty gazed up to the sky in pregnant anticipation.
“What are you going to say when they arrive?” she said. I hadn’t thought of that yet, having been mainly concerned thus far with locating the MoC among our highly subtle multiverse.
“I never know what these guys will say or do,” I said. “It’s best not to over prepare or rehearse anything. I’ll know what to say when I see them.”
Kitty was satisfied with this response. I could tell she was excited. I was also rather bated in my anticipation, and nervous for the first time since I had become a full-fledged Thunderbird.
A few moments passed, and then we heard the crackle of thunder in the distance.
“That’s them,” I said.
The sky opened and a murder—dozens of Crows—descended down to the ground, from the heightened multiverse reality—the movierain. Their swarm hummed as one organic entity, teeming with each angry hornet Crow contributing his own brand of buzz.
While a Thunderbird body can assume any size or shape retaining Its fine definition—the way a vector design graphic can retain its resolution however large or small—the Crows typically chose a rather broad-shouldered shell to my preferred lean build. They wore helmets like mine too, but they had etched mouth pieces with fierce teeth and angry eyes above them. Having dealt with the rabble of riffraff about the outskirts of the multiverse, the Crows chose to strike fear as a first impression. The nerves I had experienced just prior to their intimidating entrance made sense. Kitty seemed unfazed.
They answered to call signs like “Teeth” and “Jab”—short, punchy monikers that could instill a sense of dread from a single syllable. Heckle and Jeckle were a tag team within the MoC, named after a cartoon duo from the 1940s of many Earth versions, including -42. I knew to steer clear of those two, having seen the cartoon in reruns when I lived down on the ground in a past life.
Their leader was a Thunderbird called “Leviathan,” a giant Crow who commanded respect and your attention, should you find yourself within the vicinity of His dominion.
Thunderbirds can sniff out their own, and Leviathan quickly caught wind that Kitty and I were also occupying Earth_PeaceProject at the same time as them. Once his faction fully entered the Earth space and landed on the ground, Leviathan made his way toward us.
The Chief Thunderbird stood 10 feet tall, towering over Kitty’s and my more slender frames. As He loomed closer, He eclipsed us under his ominous shadow.
“What’s your business here, channeler?” He said. Leviathan was direct and a bit dismissive. He didn’t even look at Kitty.
“We’re here to cover your mission for the North Star, sir,” I said.
“I can’t say I condone this, ‘Big Cat,'” He said Big Cat sarcastically to imply that I hadn’t earned his respect. Of course, he expected mine. And then he threw me a bone. “But let me know if you need to talk to anyone specifically in my MoC. I only ask two things: 1. Stay out of our way; and 2. I get final draft approval before you submit to your editor.”
“Yes, sir,” I said. My many tense conversations with the Captain to this point had prepared me for interacting with the military.
The ‘R’ from “sir” had barely left my lips and the large Leviathan was already gone. The big bird was quick.
In the distance, I heard Heckle and Jeckle mocking me.
“Oh no!” Heckle yelled. “Watch out for Big Cat! He’ll teleport you right outta here, oooOOOOOohh!”
Jeckle chuckled, as they both flew up to join the rest of their MoC. We didn’t have their respect either. I looked to Kitty at my side.
“You sure you want to stay with me while I cover this story? I can take you back to the ship,” I said, but I already knew the answer. I could see the sparkle of possibilty dancing in Kitty’s eyes.
“I want to stay,” she said with a smile.
Yup, Kitty craved danger. To me, it was more of an occupational hazard I normally tried to avoid. But to get this story for the paper, the Big Cat was going to have to become a Crow.
Anger and channeling mix about as well as oil and water. Stern were the Crows—not necessarily angry, but the continual exposure to other worlds’ strife could induce rage reactions from the uninitiated. The Crows were weathered for this dirty work; channelers like me were not. In order to locate the rarest, most elusive of worlds, I had to maintain a perfectly pristine zen mind. Not so for the Crows, who proliferated this Earth planet with fleet efficiency. It was truly a privilege to watch them work.
A newly peaced planet was like a throbbing wound warmed over by a few days’ healing. The imflammation coarsed and pulsated to breach new skin and shed more blood. At no other time was a planet more vulnerable to burst into conflict once again. The recently extinguished anger, still smoking, begged to breathe more life, like the bitten piece of flesh inside your mouth, swollen, and ever so ready to be painfully between your teeth.
The Crows had to handle this sensitive moment with the utmost caution (and a little silent strength) to say the least.
It was a sight to watch these warrior poets work.
They deployed in packets, circumnavigating the globe to concentrate on hotbed pockets of potential outbreaks. Their radios kept them connected.
“Attention, Leviathan,” Jab pinged his fearless leader from afar, “we’ve descended down to the New York City streets. We’ve caught wind a few skirmishes about to break. We’re going to investigate and report back.”
*Kssht*
“All good, team leader Jab,” Leviathan responded. The Crows leader had agreed to let us tail him until I could gain a better sense of where their ubiquitous deployments had landed.
Once the MoC’s waves coagulated around all known problem areas, Kitty and I were free to leap between locations. In fact, I could channel all sites simultaneously, so as not to miss any of the action.
We first decided to concentrate on the developing situation on NYC streets. The local organized crime there knew peace would not be good for business. They continued to shake down the citizens in their neighborhoods the only way they knew how.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass about this world peace shit,” said a capo for the family currently running Brooklyn to the bodega owner at the corner of 9th and Roebling Street. “You will continue to pay me every week or you will be counting your teeth on the floor.”
Crows had a sixth sense for violence. At this threat, immediately, Jab’s team swooped to the store front as the street tough exited.
Jab towered over the capo, who himself was a healthy 6’5″, 250 lbs.
“You think you’re a force to reckon with??” Jab’s billowy voice sent shivers through the cowering criminal.
“Wh- Who or what are you?” capo said.
“I’m what you’ll deal with if you lay a finger on that store owner. Your planet has finally achieved worldwide peace. Let’s leave it that way.”
The capo sprinted down the street away from Jab. This Crow had met fire with fire to win the battle.
But the intimidation tactic didn’t stick. The war wasn’t over. Jab and his team tailed the capo culprit for a few days. Sure enough, the miscreant returned with the same evil motives. The bile had burned deep into this ex-con’s bones. Newly achieved planetary peace or not, this certain man’s soul would still err with the inertia to perform ill will.
Once capo entered the storefront, Jab’s team swooped in for the sequel.
“You again?” the capo cooed dryly. He was packing heat this time, which he now brandished and began firing in Jab’s direction.
Bullets were mere mosquitos to Thunderbirds. Jab dropped from hover to the ground with a heavy thud that shook the nearby concrete. He conjured a force field—like the way I form my Drop to leap dimensions—around him and his team. The impenetrable membrane effortlessly deflected the capo’s bullets. Jab then grew, at will, to a staggering 15 feet tall, five feet in width, growling with a guttural roar that vibrated the very chests of everyone within a block radius.
“Seriously, what the fuck are you??” the capo cowered, all out of ammo and his pants full of accidental deffication.
Jab answered like the Almighty: “I am the nightmare who will return to you every time you think of harming another. I see all and hear all and will always meet your misdeeds with exact and terrible force. You have two strikes. You do not want to see three.”
The capo took to running again. We never saw him again, in fact. We heard he was admitted into a mental hospital upstate. Apparently Jab’s entering god mode had shook the connected chap past the point of sanity.
But that’s the measures these Crows had to take, across this Earth during their newfound peace, in all areas where nefarious characters lurked. Evil, ill will was unfortunately baked into some of the usual suspects’ DNA. There was no honor system among them. “No honor among thieves,” as they say.
The Crows remained for generations, until the last bit of bile had been expunged from that Earth’s collective unconscious. The murky, chop of angry waters ceased to a pristine, crystal lake of glass, calm, soothing to the soul, with hardly any inkling of aggression. The MoC and their leader Leviathan gave the signal to this Thunderbird channeler. I rose up above the Earth’s atmosphere, encircling the globe at speeds beyond light to snapshot this peaceful moment in this Earth’s history.
In Leviathan’s words: “You’re here to channel the resurgence of the Heavy Presence, something in the air when you bore into your own Earth-42 in 1982. It’s benevolent and all-encompassing. It inspires new thought. You will perform this subtle art that’s too fine for the coarse Crows.”
I had wondered how the notoriously insular MoC had let me tag along with them.
Leviathan continued: “Bill Thunderbird, the only reason I let you witness our usually clandestine craft was that we required an experienced channeler such as yourself. Now that we’ve wrapped up this world, we had to call on you to put a bow on it—encircling the entire globe to snap an instant of this Earth version’s peaceful moment to be recorded in its local Akashic. That will serve as our re-entry point should anything go awry.”
So I did what I knew best, and channeled that Heavy Presence—a gloriously divine Higgs-Boson field from not so long ago.
That time stamp became the breadcrumb of the first recorded peaceful Earth of the modern era. It got logged in the local Earth Akashic and I wrote a story about it for the North Star. Leviathan approved.
This is what the editor kept of my 800 words, after lopping off a few of the less important bottom paragraphs:
The Crows: A Misunderstood Thunderbird Faction
The “Earth Peace Project” was a success, due to the Murder of Crows—the most militant of Thunderbird classes.
In the first time in its recent history, the Earth_PeaceProject version has sustained peace for more than a decade. After quelling all apparent conflicts down on the ground, the earthlings would have likely succumbed to future strife, had it not been for the Crows’ intervention.
“We flew in swiftly and addressed all potential hotspots with direct counters to keep the peace on this planet,” said Leviathan, the large leader of the Crows. “We’re confident the threat of our return shall hold our effect intact. We’ll soon depart for our next mission.”
Leviathan even let this reporter in on the action. The Big Cat (that’s me) was assigned to snapshot this planet’s peace moment as a breadcrumb for reentry, should the Crows need to return. Ripple effects are certainly a concern for this experimental planetary intervention. The Crows said they’d keep an eye on Earth_PeaceProject from afar.
For now, though, all’s well that ends well. And no more “Crowing” for this Big Cat. Back to channeling.
If you liked this short story, you might like the novel Big Cat.
delodell.com 
Pingback: Letterman | delodell.com
Pingback: Streaming Consciousness | delodell.com