I'm on TDY from Hell

by BeamMeUpScotty

  Gerry looked over the names and saw the Fuller’s were one of the lesser families. That fact was mildly irritating.

  “At the age of seven they are given their first trial, their second at fourteen, and their third and final at eighteen. If they survive all three they are allowed to go out into the world as a martial magician.” There were crudely drawn illustrations of some of the trials, but all involved fighting something.

  One of the pictures was a lopsided woman, with a head way to big, and fangs than nearly reached her knees. Poorly drawn humans lay dead around the disproportioned creature.

  “Many of this world’s legends of vampire hunters originated from martial magicians.”

  “I got that much.” Gerry replied. “But what about the contracts and the specific nature of their powers?”

  “Contracts are the means by which martial magicians sustain themselves. They come to a place, meet with local leaders, and determine their needs. Over time, needs became contracts of choice, and that’s what happened to you yesterday. The more renowned a martial magician is, the more generous the payment on a contract.”

  There were a few examples of old contracts in the book, and the payment items listed were animals, shelter, or magical trinkets. Not the cash Gerry had been offered yesterday night.

  “Martial magicians by nature are not materialistic.” Jeb followed his eyes. “Honor, reputation, and the need to be challenged is what drives them.”

  Gerry guessed as much, he’d met a lot of men and women that sounded like these martial magicians. For all he knew, several members of Seere’s Legion might have once been these magicians.

  “And that’s why I have to do some of the contracts. A martial magician turning them down would be out of place and raise some questions.”

  “This is why I discouraged you from doing this in the first place.”

  “Keep your eyes on the future not on the past, Jeb.” Gerry growled. “We aren’t going to win this city by sitting on our asses and playing it safe.”

  “Yes, Dux.”

  “Now, tell me about their power.”

  “Martial magicians draw from the magic within them. It is an art that walks a fine line. If they don’t use enough power then they will fail and be killed. If they use too much then they will burn themselves out and die.”

  “Not an issue for me.”

  “No, Dux. The issue is going to be disguising yourself during battle. The Infernal use of æther will light you up like a bonfire for any Divine in the area.”

  “So I need to pull from a more natural source of magic?”

  “Yes, Dux. You’re human form has that same internal magic as a mortal. Many martial magician families refer to it as Chi.”

  “Very well.” Gerry got to his feet, and with a sweep of his hand the table vanished and a wide space was cleared away.

  He was confident the wards of his demesne were powerful enough to hide a little magic from the outside world. The first step was to block out everything but his body and the power. It wasn’t that much different from calling the æther. He felt the powerful force there within him. He was a creature of æther now, just like any Infernal or Divine being, so pushing his true nature aside and grabbing the softer, weaker power of his human form’s Chi felt wrong. But he still did it.

  “I have it.” The new power filled him, but it was like a leaky faucet instead of a surging river.

  “Most martial magicians use the Chi to empower themselves with strength, speed, and durability. Many carve anti-magic runes into their flesh to repel magical attacks so they can close with and dispose of their enemies.

 

  Humans and the weak central construct that was their souls couldn’t do anything with the æther at their core. But as an Infernal being Gerry’s essence was hardened against mundane magical attacks. It would be like a wooden bat hitting a steel beam, and with enough preparation he could absorb the power, just like he’d done with his vanquished victims in the Legion.

  Not all attacks were able to be absorbed, and he wouldn’t dare us that technique against a member of the Divine or the Remnant without considerable preparation, but he was more than a match for a human sorcerer who thought they’d gotten the drop on him.

 

  Gerry concentrated and felt the Chi flow through him. It was already there, coursing along its normal current. He just had to turn up the heat. His body didn’t bulge like when the æther filled him, but he felt himself harden as the power came to the surface. He would be stronger and more durable.

  “Excellent, Dux.” Jeb smiled.

  “A child with severe mental defects could do this.” Gerry frowned at the other Infernal. “Anything else?”

  “Martial magicians who become masters of their craft are able to extend their Chi beyond their body and create offensive or defensive constructs.” Jeb finished, turning the book toward Gerry to look at.

  There were several options laid out step by step, and completely detailed each hand motions. The two simplest ones were the two simplest weapons: a sword and shield.

  Gerry looked at the first for a second and then concentrated. He placed his hands together like he was praying, but faced them horizontally and perpendicular to the ground. He pulled his Chi from him as he drew a line straight up into the air, then separated his hands, and brought them down in two half-moon arches on either side of the line he’d drawn in space. They met, completing a circle, and a shield blazed to life, its orange and red glow sparking slightly as if it were alive.

  “Simple.” Gerry swung it though the air a few times to test it.

  He looked at the book a second time and reviewed the gestures for a sword. He held out his arm in front of him at its full length. He made a circle with his hand, pressing his thumb between his middle and ring finger. Then, he violently pulled his arm back toward his hip. The space in between all his fingers crackled like lightening as a blade appeared between them. When he got to his hip, Gerry closed his fist, and it closed around the hilt of a red-orange sword.

  “It seems, my Dux, that you have mastered martial magic.”

  Gerry just smiled. He could see where the concentration and activation of mind and spirit at once would be difficult for a person with only one lifetime and no practice with æther. But for an Infernal it was second nature after two centuries.

  “Time to hunt a troll.” He let the constructs absorb back into himself and headed for the elevator.

  ***

  Gerry had never seen a troll before. There were no trolls in Hell, but they were ugly enough to be there. It was tall, with rolls of fat hanging off it, and its naked genitals waving in the wind. A soft breeze wafted underneath the overpass where the I-77 crossed over Lake Norman, and that waft brought with it the smell of decay and death. The bones of fish, small woodland creatures, and even a human or two was piled next to the big ugly beast. It was facing away from Gerry when he finally scaled down to the opening and saw what he was going to be fighting.

  The leader of the circle of witches had been ecstatic when he texted her he was taking her contract, but he requested she not be present. This was his first test of martial magic, and he didn’t want to look like a fool.

  “Lovely place you have here.” It wouldn’t be any fun to sneak up on the big, dumb creature and stab it in the spine. Gerry at least wanted to see how he handled his new human body in combat.

  The troll jumped a little and turned toward Gerry. “You see?” It asked in broken English.

  It had about five chins, and a single bloodshot, yellow eye that surveyed Gerry without any discernable intelligence. From what the Dux knew, trolls were simple brutes, but that was enough to make them dangerous to humans.

  “Yes,” Gerry answered simply, repeating the motions to draw out his Chi into a sword and shield.

  The troll looked at him hungrily and licked its lips, showing rotting brown teeth.

  “Food.”r />
  “Just get on with it.” Gerry held the sword and shield at the ready as the troll charged him.

  He waited for the creature to make the first move, and it did, rearing back with a club that hadn’t been there before, and swinging it at Gerry.

  He knew the Fey were known for this type of spell work, but he didn’t count on the troll being skilled in it.

  The club smacked into his shield in a shower of sparks as the shockwave of the hit rebounded around the enclosed space. The trolls blow was powerful, it drove Gerry back, his feet carving two shallow trenches into the ground, until his foot slipped up on a wet rock and he fell backwards onto his ass.

  He cursed to himself as he turned the trip into a controlled fall.

  He bent his back into a crescent moon shape, rolled with the fall until he got to the section where his back met his neck. Then, with his core and shoulder muscles he pushed up, propelled himself into the air. The action allowed him to dodge the follow up attack where the troll swung for his head, and brought him within striking distance. Gerry lashed out with his Chi-powered sword and sliced the troll’s hand clean off midway up the forearm as he spun in the air.

  The beast howled in pain and his hand and club dissolved into smoke. Gerry landed on his feet and then went on the attack. He slashed and hacked in controlled strokes, driving the now-stricken creature back. He swiped low, going down on one knee, and sliced through the troll’s leg midway through its calf. The creature squealed as it toppled over. It caught itself with one arm, but left itself open. Gerry leap forward with strength way beyond a normal human and drove the sword deep into the troll’s chest, piercing its heart.

  It exploded like a ball of confetti smoke, leaving Gerry disappointed, wet, and slightly muddy. He re-absorbed the sword and shield with a thought and tried to sense the energy of the dead Fey as it crossed back across the boundaries into the adjacent Fairy Realm. If he was tempted, Gerry’s Infernal powers would have been able to stop and absorb the troll’s essence, but that would be too dangerous. By now, everyone knew the martial magician was taking on the troll.

  Gerry walked back to the rocks and started to climb back toward the road.

  Already the smell was vanishing and being replaced with nature’s normal scent. The witches would appreciate that.

  Vicky’s Day

  Vicky fumed as she took the turn tightly into the school parking lot.

  There was a loud squeal of tires and the smell of burning rubber as she fishtailed and regained control of her Porsche coupe. A brief spike of fear shot through her for the moment she was aimed directly at another student’s SUV, but it quickly subsided as she straightened out and sped between the rows of fancy cars to her assigned spot.

  Even after more than a hundred years on earth, Vicky still feared death. The blazing ball of light was shining it’s annoying rays down on her from nearly ninety-three million miles away, and ruining her existence.

  As she stepped out of the car, undoing the top two buttons of her white blouse in the process, she was as weak and helpless as any old human at the school. Weakness like that pissed her off, and on top of the Dux’s decision to go after the troll, she was in uber bitch-mode.

  The security monitor was walking brusquely toward her with a no-nonsense expression.

  “Fuck off.” She strutted past him as he opened his mouth to yell at her reckless driving.

  She’d get a ticket, and a summons to the principal’s office, but she didn’t give a flying fuck. She opened the email Caroline had sent her.

  As a business practice, Vicky encouraged her employees snooping around the homes of their clients. They couldn’t ever take anything, but submitting incriminating photos of the powerful men and women of Charlotte added to the blackmail files she kept on everyone. While the power players of the city were busy sleeping off a blowjob or a good fingering she was gathering intelligence to keep them in her good graces for life.

  Caroline had done the same for the Dux. Vicky frowned as she walked through the front door like the queen bitch she was.

  She tossed her phone in her expensive purse and strode down the hall with a confident swagger that turned every male head in her direction.

  “Hey, baby.” She plastered herself to the varsity quarterback’s chest and kissed him. She tugged at his lower lip a bit when she pulled away, and felt him instantly get hard. “I just needed to tell you I can’t make it tonight.” She added cruelly, seeing the joy drop off the jock’s face. “My dad is being a hardass and won’t let me out. I’m still grounded.” She pouted for emphasis.

  “No problem.” The jock tried to sound like it wasn’t a big deal, and failed miserably.

  Vicky had him, a few other popular guys, her gym teacher, and the vice principal wrapped around her finger. She would have had the principal, but it was a woman and she didn’t swing that way.

 

  The quarterback was still waiting to tap her ass, and she could practically feel his blue balls from here.

  “I’ve got math, gotta run.” She twirled, her already short skirt lifting up just enough to see something, and walked away.

  She didn’t know what she wanted to do with him yet, but ideas were formulating. At the very least he could be a blood bag for her.

  Math was her least favorite subject, mostly because she’d taken the class dozens of times over her lifetime. She kept the anger hidden below the face people expected to see on the most popular girl in school.

  She plopped down in her chair, crossed her legs, and opened her hand over her shoulder.

  “Here you go, Victoria.” The voice had an edge of hero-worship to it.

  “Thanks so much, Mary.” Vicky took a look at the homework she was handed. “I was so busy I totes forgot about this.”

  She perused the information and determined she’d get a B on it.

  “My name is, Maria.” The girl’s reply held a bit of exasperation, but it was gone by the time Vicky turned around and smiled sweetly at her.

  “Sorry.”

  Maria was a sixteen year old sophomore. Vicky was an eighteen year old senior and queen of the school. The pecking order was firmly established and everyone knew their place.

  “Good morning class.” The teacher walked in, an old guy Vicky would rather kill than debase herself for. “Today we’ll be working on the sine and cosine functions.”

  Vicky felt like she was in hell.

  ***

  Maria sat a few feet behind the unsuspecting creature. She knew she’d be in deep shit if the school found out she was carrying weapons on school grounds, but somethings were more important than human rules.

  Despite the absolute need to act, Maria sat there patiently, more patiently than most of the children in the math class until it was over. Then she let Victoria walk out alive surrounded by a crowd of admirers.

  Maria had no problem admitting that there was a hint of jealousy in her tone.

  Puberty had been a bitch for her. She was thirty-two years old in the body of a sixteen year old. Some women would kill for that, but they were all idiots, and had no idea of the sacrifice.

  “Maria, can I speak with you for a moment?” The teacher called as she headed for the door.

  Everyone in the class knew she was Vicky’s homework bitch. There was one in every class, and it was a position Maria had worked to attain. That way it kept her within arm’s reach of the Soulless.

  “Sure thing, M
r. Delgado.”

  Mr. Delgado was in his fifties, had been teaching at the school forever, and was beloved by his students. He had a quirky sense of humor and was slightly mentally trapped in an earlier time. No matter what he said he couldn’t quite get the modern lingo and pop culture down.

  “Please don’t ask me if I’m a fan of NSYNC or the Back Street Boys?” The last few people left in the classroom laughed, and then Maria was all alone with her math teacher…and brother.

  “I just wanted to check with you. Mom said she stopped by and saw you earlier.” Gabriel Delgado had been watching over the Charlotte-Mecklenburg School district for thirty of his one hundred years.

  It was only because of him that they had caught the scent of the Soulless in the first place. The evil creature recycled through school once a decade, and Gabriel just managed to recognize her from before. A little digging on top of that proved what she was.

  “She talked with you too?” The family rarely got together, and her interactions with Gabriel over the last six months were the most family-like time she’d been involved in for the last few years, other than mom literally dropping in every once and a while.

  “Yes, she told me to make sure you didn’t do anything stupid.”

  Maria looked up and around like she expected her mother to come floating down through the ceiling, but nothing happened. The angel that gave birth to them and paid to have them schooled by the finest martial arts masters came and went according to her schedule. It had made for a tough childhood.

  “Yeah, I get it. I’m the baby sister and everyone needs to watch out for me.” Maria rolled her eyes. Until her mother had another child she would have that mantle. It didn’t matter how old she was. She was the youngest of six overprotective siblings.

  “No,” Gabriel chided. “You’re the headstrong little sister who is going to do something rash and get killed.”