Both girls drew their weapons from behind their backs and jumped up. They stood cop-style, each holding their pistol with both hands, arms outstretched, legs spread wide for stability and accuracy. Then:
POP
POP
POP
Blood splashed out of the groin one of the demons. One down.
POP
POP
POP!
POP
POP
“Rocks” Manzer’s junk got hit twice. Meanwhile, Def C’s groin was bleeding, too. Eight shots, three hits. In an instant, the two male demons were in the air, screeching. The female demon slapped Dani to the ground, and Dani’s gun slid across the room, smacking into the soles of Patty Patty’s lifeless feet. Dani’s face opened up as it dragged against the concrete. More plastic surgery required, she thought without thinking. The mind was a funny thing. The room was spinning and getting dark.
Then she heard:
POP
And then again:
POP
That’s ten shots, Dani calculated. That’s all they had in those magazines, with only one magazine left for each of them. Dani looked over at Helena. She was still standing. But the female demon was now bent over on its hands and knees, in agony.
Bullseye! Helena had made a direct hit.
Always did like that girl, Dani thought, trying to force herself not to pass out. Dani saw her gun on the floor about ten feet away. She started to crawl to it, more of a slithering movement than true crawling. She was almost to the gun, but it took more than willpower to will a concussion to disappear.
Taking one last deep breath, she grabbed the gun, released the spent magazine, and reached around to her back where she had a fresh magazine jammed into her waistband. The room was an amusement park ride, spinning as she watched Helena running towards her in a tilting room, shouting her name. Dani jammed the new magazine into her gun, then blacked out with a smile on her face.
Yep, always did like that girl.
At the last second, Helena took a flying leap to reach Dani, just barely dodging one of the enraged demons. She fell to the ground, half on top of Dani, and listened to her heartbeat in her chest.
“Hang on, Dani girl!” she shouted. “We aren’t done here yet.”
Helena jumped back to her feet and resumed her stance. She shook the used magazine out of her small gun and slapped in a fresh one, which unfortunately was also her last.
The screaming demons approached like giant, red, bleeding bullets themselves.
Helena tried to shoot them in their vulnerable places, but they flew horizontal, their swollen, horny heads the largest target. Helena figured she would take what she could get and shot one of the male demons between the eyes. It was as effective as throwing a pebble at a stubborn bull’s hard skull. The slug bounced off, leaving only a small scratch mark, which healed instantly. Helena tried again, this time aiming for the soft squishiness of the eyes, but she missed. They were almost upon her.
Helena turned and ran, sliding into home base: the stack of large chemical containers, knocking them over and upending a few. She got back up safely behind a wall of metal containers. She rested her elbows on top of one of the containers, took aim, and blasted away again. Another miss. She re-aimed, and centered her sights on the female demon. New target, same results. The bullets weren’t having any effect. She needed the soft underbelly of the beast. She fell to the ground, flattening herself on her back, gun raised, as the savage furious things dropped down on her.
One last chance, she thought. She shot again, but her shot went just left of the wounded crotch of the bigger male demon, who lifted her up in his teeth, cutting through her arm all the way to bone, and carried her into the air. Helena screamed as blood spurted from the brachial artery in her arm. Following right behind, the female demon used her long toes to clutch Dani up, and lift her away. The slightly smaller male demon, bleeding profusely from his groin area, followed in anger and agony.
Once released from the grip of the monsters, Helena and Dani crashed to the concrete floor like bales of laundry. Helena bled profusely. She was pale and woozy and the drop had knocked the breath out of her. Dani lay crumpled like a dropped puppet. Helena couldn’t tell how hurt Dani was, or even if she was still alive.
Before the three mega-demons could begin their hideous killing ceremony, a tiny voice said:
“I don’t think so.”
The beasts turned and Patty Patty—standing just a few short feet below them and so small and insignificant that they had never even noticed her creep in—filled their crotches with hot lead, walking under one beast and then under the next and then the next.
Patty Patty had never used a gun before, but she’d seen enough other people use them and Dani’s cute pink and silver gun fit just right in her hands. It was pretty, too. It even had a cat face engraved in the pearl handle.
The three giant beasts toppled to the ground, grabbing at their groins and screaming.
Now that the gun was empty, Patty Patty placed it with deliberate care onto the cold, sticky cement floor next to Dani and Helena. Then she limped her way back to the others.
HEALING GAME
But before Patty Patty could make her way to the rest of the survivors, Dani called out to her. “Patty Patty,” Dani said, crawling out of the demon’s nesting room. “You all right?” She leaned back against the wall, exhausted, and patted the ground next to her. “Come here.”
Patty Patty turned and walked over to Dani and collapsed in her lap, her face pressed against Dani’s ample silicon breasts. Patty Patty’s lone shoe clanged against Dani’s chastity shield, and the little girl whimpered.
“You did an amazing thing. You saved us,” Dani said. Both were silent for a moment, then Dani said, “Go ahead and cry, girl. No one should have to go through this nightmare, above all, not a child.”
Dani stroked Patty Patty’s hair and continued to murmur words of reassurance into her small ears.
The problem with living nightmares—Nazis, cults, drug cartels, human traffickers, serial killers—was that unlike nightmares in your sleep, you very rarely get to wake up from them and have it all be over. Even as Dani comforted Patty Patty, even as the group enjoyed a moment of relief and a minor sense of victory, the moment would quickly and for all time be snatched away.
Dani looked up. Helena was tottering out of the nesting room. She was pale and shaking. She collapsed to the ground a few feet in front of Dani and Patty Patty. An Asian woman ran over to help her. A thin man with long white hair in a ponytail followed and assisted. While they dragged Helena to what was laughingly called “safety,” Dani and the others, all looking past Helena and beyond into the other room, witnessed a shocking scene. A scene of healing. But not the good kind.
Someone called out, “Oh my God!”
The three demons—Rocks, Def C., and Angie—were standing together in a kind of loose circle. They were staring at themselves, and they were healing. Their wounds were slowly clotting , closing up, the skin reforming. The creatures’ eyes had rolled up into their heads, so only the reddish-whites were showing. They appeared to be in a trance.
“Holy Hell,” Dani Pistachio said, forcing herself to stand and take Patty Patty’s hand. “We have to get the out of this place. Now,” she said. “Before they have healed completely.”
“There’s only one way out,” Malcolm S said. “And we can’t go out the exit tube. It’s twenty feet straight up and they’ve destroyed the ladder that used to be there.”
No one spoke for a moment. Then, McMillian, a short, white guy with a comb-over and an orange-ish fake tan that gave him a decidedly orangutan-ian look, said, “I think we should try. We need to try.” He scratched his ginger-haired armpits in his tank-top and puckered out his lips with concern. “Anyway,” McMillian continued. “At the rate they’re healing, we won’t make it halfway there. The exit tube is nearly a quarter of a mile from where we stand.”
“Who–who are you?” Helena said
in a voice that could almost not be heard.
“I’m McMillian. Call me Mack. Like the truck.”
Helena stared at the man as if she was having trouble focusing on him. “I don’t know. . .”
“What choice do we have?” Dani asked, addressing Helena. She knelt down and took Helena’s hand. Helena’s arm was roughly bandaged in rags, but at least it had stopped the bleeding. “We stay here, it’s certain death. Slow torture, painful, sure death. At least if we try to escape, we have a chance. Maybe only one in a million, but still a chance.”
Freight Train, a three-hundred-twenty-pound woman with a flowery muumuu and a shaved head, said, “I have to ardently not disagree.” She hooked her meaty hands on her substantial hips. “I have to say emphatically that it is far, far better than just staying where we are, waiting to die!” She stomped her foot and made a convincing sad face.
“You poor thing,” said Grace Smothers, whom the group had christened Smother Mother. She was as thin as a splintered broom handle. She placed a sympathetic hand on Freight Train’s shoulder.
After a short silence, McMillian jumped in again.
“Okay, okay, everybody: focus!” he said, waving his hands around.
Dani hated being rushed, but they did need to get back on task ASAFP.
“Look,” he continued, talking too fast to possibly have time to think first. Maybe all this sidebar jibber-jabber was making his head hurt. “No more chatting, all right? We need to take action. As in, get walking. The wounded will have to be carried; it’s that simple.” He made a monkey face; that is, he squinted his eyes and rolled his upper lip under his nose until it was almost touching.
Dani looked at Helena, then down at Patty Patty, and considered the situation herself. There were a lot of wounded, maybe half the group. That would make for slow progress. It would almost guarantee that no one would survive.
“I think only the strong should go,” Dani said, rejecting Mack’s advice. “The children can be carried. But the wounded adults, myself included, we should stay here. Having us limp along with the rest of you means none of us get out alive. If we stay back, then maybe some of the group can make it to freedom.”
Tears stung Dani’s eyes. She sat down on the concrete floor, looking up at everyone else.
“No,” said Patty Patty, with a weak little voice. “Then I stay, too.”
“Absolutely not, my friend. You have a chance to live. My time is up. I’m okay with it. But you must go,” Dani said.
Patty Patty started to cry, but she was so beaten up and exhausted that no tears came out, only dry shaking and a kind of hacking noise.
Helena shuffled over and took her hand.
“Let me talk to you a second, Patty Patty, okay?” She grabbed Patty Patty’s hand as the girl nodded. Helena gazed up at the rest of the group. “It’s up to the wounded who will stay. It’s a personal decision. But the healthy should not linger behind to help them. Save yourselves first. If there’s time, then maybe help the wounded stragglers in the tunnel. Now, you must go. Please, there’s very little time.”
Malcolm S reached out and touched Helena’s shoulder.
“I’ll never forget you,” he said.
“Godspeed,” Helena said. “But, um, Mack? Can you hold back for a sec? The rest of you, please, get going. Run if you can! Mack, I just want to have a quick word with Patty Patty. Then, would you mind carrying her out of here? I’ll be quick so you can catch up with the main group.”
“Of course,” McMillian said. He wiped his palms on his pants and glanced with concern at the monsters in their nest, who were healing the way that chameleons do when their tails have been chopped off. Only these hellspawn were doing it in fast-forward.
SAVE THE CHILDREN
Helena led Patty Patty by the hand away from the crowd so she didn’t feel shy or intimidated. But it was probably not necessary. She didn’t appear all that shy or intimidated when she shot those demons in their private parts a few minutes ago. Then again, you never know with kids.
They strolled together toward the back of the room, Helena limping a bit and Patty Patty shuffling her feet. Patty Patty’s hand felt so tiny. It was warm in Helena’s hand, though, and a little damp.
Why do little kids heat up so much? Their foreheads, cheeks, and hands always seemed as if they’ve just popped out of an oven, freshly baked dinner rolls.
They stopped near the chemical barrels Helena had upended during the battle when she had previously slid into them. Patty Patty looked up at Helena, who stared at the barrels and thought, We can stand there, the barrels provide a little bit of cover, a modesty panel, a bit of privacy. Or we can use them like park benches and just sit on one. Patty Patty might find that more relaxing.
But before she could make up her mind, Helena glanced down. And froze. She was looking just past the barrels, where the drums had previously stood.
“What is it, Mommy—I mean, Helena?” Patty Patty whispered.
“Of course,” Helena said, mostly to herself.
There’s a drain there, where the barrels used to be. Which makes perfect sense. Should they leak, whatever chemicals were inside would, presumably, be drained away from this work area.
“Um, guys?” Helena called out.
Most of the group was still in the room, despite all of Helena’s encouragement to get their collective butts in gear. They were waiting for Patty Patty, and only a few were thinking not about the group’s best interests, but their own survival.
These few consisted of —Freight Train and her new friend Smother Mother, Cacklebird (a bent over, scoliosis-inflicted meter maid), and Winterwheat, a long-suffering mental health worker with an insane husband and two crazy children of her own. They were long gone up the tunnel to, well, nowhere really.
The group shambled over, expecting the worst.
What they got was the only good news they had gotten in weeks. As far as most were concerned, the best news of their entire lives.
“Well, what do you know,” McMillian said, a big smile growing on his face like a flower.
“Wow,” others said, while still others said, “I don’t believe it.”
There, in the middle of the ground in front of them, was a drain cover. Helena and Patty Patty stood just to the side. A number of the men, plus a few of the women, including Helena, Dani, and even Patty Patty, pounced on the thing. In a minute, they had inched it up. In another minute, they had skated it along, scraping it across the floor just beyond the opening.
The exhausted group sat around the hole, catching their breath. The opening, in keeping with the oversized nature of everything else in this big space, was huge. Less like a drain and more like a manhole.
“Wait a minute,” said Helena, and she looked down inside. “Holy Baby Jesus! It is a manhole.” She jumped up smiling, tears in her eyes. “Okay, let’s get organized. Same as before, healthy first. No, check that, some ‘healthies’ first, then the kids so they can get help getting down there. Then the rest of the ‘healthies.’ At the very end, after everyone is safely down below, we go: the broken, wounded, dazed, confused, tired, poor, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore—”
“Let’s go!” McMillian shouted, cutting off her speech. Then he turned to Helena and said, “Thank you, thank you. You’re an angel. A sexy angel, like in Victorious Secrets62, you know?”
“Oh, just shut up,” Helena said, but she couldn’t repress a smile.
McMillian just stared at her, his eyes getting a bit scary-looking, like a rutting loon.
Sounds of roaring and growling grew stronger from the other room.
“Time’s run out,” Dani said, stepping up. “Let’s move!”
McMillian was the first in, cutting in front of the others and scurrying rat-like down the hole. Realizing at the last minute how this might look, he shouted up to the rest of the captives, “I’ll wait here down below, see? That’s my plan. We don’t need half the healthies down there, just me. Get it? So, um, start sending the kid
s down right away, soon as you hear me shout.”
“You got it,” Helena said, not sure if she just got conned or not.
The floor trembled.
“Someone is back in action,” Dani said, looking behind her. “I’d say we’ve got less than two minutes to get somewhere around eighty people down that hole, and at least thirty of us are near cripples.”
“Ready!” McMillian yelled from below, his voice echoing up as if from a subterranean cave.
Dani and Helena lined the kids up, and the first of the children started climbing down.
Some of the kids and none of the adults other than McMillian were down in the manhole when the demons returned. Deflagro Cinefactus was first, looking a bit drunk. As he stumbled into the cavernous main room, his wings were hanging oddly behind him like a poorly fitting overcoat. His left wing drooped almost to the ground, which matched his half-closed third eye. He seemed like a man drugged. He knew something was going on, but he couldn’t quite put two and two together. As he lurched in, all fifteen feet, five inches of him, his topmost head hit one of the overhead pipes, sending him tripping backward.
“Go, go, go!” Helena yelled. This, of course, only upset the kids and had a reverse effect, slowing them down to almost a dead stop. One of the smaller ones started to cry, maybe from Helena yelling or quite possibly from the five-year-old above him on the ladder, who had lost bladder control and was unintentionally peeing a yellow waterfall down the hair and clothes of the crying boy directly beneath him.
“Sorry, sorry,” Helena said. “I shouldn’t have shouted. Okay, everybody calm down. It will be fine. Julian, can you stop crying?”
“He peed on me,” came the plaintive voice from down below.
“Okay, I’m sorry that happened, but he didn’t mean it. Now, let’s play a game, shall we?”
“What kind of game?” a little girl in the line and closest to the manhole said. “You mean ‘pin the tail’ or ‘hopscotch’?”
DEMON DAYS: Love, sex, death, and dark humor. This book has it all. Plus robots. Page 11