[Demonworld #2] The Pig Devils

by Kyle B. Stiff

  “Clear out!” he yelled, his voice booming and deep. “I’m about to do some technology.”

  He busied himself with unfolding the tarp and adjusting the tanks. His movements were sure. A dark-haired youth seated on a bucket watched him and smiled.

  Children ran up to Edwar, shrieking and touching the tarp and aping his movements. “Scat!” said Edwar. “No money for you. Scat!” They backed away, but watched from the sidelines.

  Edwar inspected the large basket. “Earth,” he said to himself. “Earth is first... earth, the heaviest. Earth, the lowest. What we’re going to upend today.” He unrolled the coils of rope that attached the basket to the tarp. He tapped himself unconsciously, then said, “Water, that’s next, that’s me. We’ll fit that inside the earthly cradle...”

  The dark-haired youth sitting on a bucket spoke up from across the square. “My!” he said. “Nice day for doin’… whatever the hell it is you’re doin’. Isn’t it?”

  Without looking, Edwar said, “I don’t have any money, sorry.”

  The tarp was spread out flat. People gathered around the scene. Edwar rolled the heavy iron tanks near the tarp. “Primary,” he said to one. “Backup,” he nodded to the other.

  “Edwar!” shouted a voice. “Damn your thick head!”

  Edwar turned and saw a bearded man who wore a red bandanna and black apron. Two men similarly dressed stood behind him. Each wore a heavy pistol at his side.

  “Smiths,” said Edwar, voice thick with disdain.

  “We gave you the chance to join us, and you turned us down,” said the Smith. “So what d’you think you’re up to now, doin’ Smith work?”

  Edwar bent to adjust the iron tanks. “I’m not doing Smith work at all,” he said. “The way I see it-”

  “Doesn’t matter!”

  “The way I’ve always seen it, is that the Smiths just sit on technology. Copy it half the time, worship it the other half. But you boys never create anything new, do you?”

  “You’re a smart man, Edwar. That’s why we wanted you. And that’s why you’re not going to do anything in public without our protection. It could be dangerous.”

  “Join you?” said Edwar. “Your kind wouldn’t know your own asshole from a hole in the ground, unless it was in a blueprint passed down from some Ancient creator, like myself.”

  Edwar turned a heavy bolt atop the primary tank. He could hear the hiss of compressed air. He craned his head upwards, said, “Air. Next of the elements. Light, very light, has the property of rising.”

  “Name’s Edwar, is it?” said the dark-haired youth. He sat opposite the Smiths, with Edwar between. “Looks like you’re up to something special, and you’re not getting the appreciation... and reward, that you justly deserve.”

  Edwar ignored him.

  “Edwar, I represent a group that appreciates men like yourself. Men of vision, men of ability. Why, if you’re up to something special, and I think that you are, then perhaps you’d like to meet the group I represent. They could set you up very nicely, if your work proves to be-”

  “You Coil maggot!” screamed the lead Smith. “You’re about to get your head blown off, you shit!”

  “I wouldn’t draw steel if I were you,” said the Coilman. “Just because you don’t see the gray serpent of the Coil flag flying overhead doesn’t mean we don’t run this city. Know your place. We’re everywhere.”

  “Your brains are going to be everywhere,” said the Smith, reaching for his gun.

  “I’ve got comrades with guns on your head right now.”

  “You’re bluffing,” said the Smith.

  “The Coil bluffs when it has to. The Coil kills when it has to.”

  “Bullshit,” said the Smith, but he still pulled his hand away from his gun. Another Smith pulled a radio from his belt and said, “Need backup in Sellers Square, we’ve got Coil, numbers unknown, need backup.”

  Edwar pulled a knife and a black stick from his wagon. Unfazed by the argument, he paced around the iron tank, then said, “Fire. Last of the elements. Lightest, always climbing. Higher than the others. The element to contain and control.” He stopped, staring down at the pressurized air tank. He raised the knife and held it over the black stick, then cried, “The element I have to steal!” His blade struck the black stick, sparks flew, and there was a blinding flash of white light and heat. The crowd screamed and fell back. The Smith and Coilman drew guns.

  A great plume of flame danced above the iron tank.

  Edwar laughed, rich and deep, and all the care on his brow melted away.

  He crawled to the tank and adjusted a bolt. The flame shrank. He lifted the tarp and held part of it over the flame.

  “Just what the hell are you up to?” shouted the lead Smith. They held their guns on the Coilman, who held two pistols drawn. Edwar stood directly in their line of fire. A Smith looked to the side and saw that another plain-clothed man had a gun pointed at them. The new gunman exchanged a signal with the Coilman. The Smith wheeled his head around, paranoid.

  Minutes tip-toed by the doorstep of violence. The gunmen watched as, magically, the tarp began to rise, to fill out, as some mysterious, invisible substance filled it. Edwar’s smile grew and grew, hovering on mania. There was silence in the Square. Everyone watched, barely breathing. Sellers held goods outstretched, buyers balanced coins in still hands, their eyes and mouths hanging open. They had been prepared to ignore the gunfight. They could not ignore this.

  Suddenly the tarp made a great fwump sound and bounced into the sky. A great cry went up from the crowd. The tarp fell back to the earth, but it retained its news shape: It was like an uneven sphere, sides bulging, pregnant with some god. Edwar gripped the opening, yanked it down, and held it over the iron tank.

  More Smiths ran up to join the others from behind, their faces grim, full of anger - then they stopped, copying the same slack-faced amazement as the others.

  The great sphere pulled away from Edwar, rising unsteadily. The ropes attached to the iron tanks pulled taut, then lifted them off the ground. Edwar leaped into the basket. Soon, the entire balloon was in the air. The basket danced about, then rose and lifted Edwar with it. Edwar pounded the sides of the basket in triumph, laughing like a madman.

  * * *

  Before the Invention of the Airship

  Edwar Bruner sat in Nadir Gentleman’s Theatre, itching in his fine suit and sipping his fine drink. Colored torches lit the stage and rubbed against the glitter and sweat on the servant girls. Scarred guards stood in the shadows of pillars. Finely dressed men drank and chortled and shook hands strangely, and while he felt lonely, he knew he had never been in a finer establishment.

  He had been in debt for his entire life. He was an inventor of unwelcome devices and a discoverer of nature’s principles among a superstitious people. But his latest venture - dog breeding and training - had, within a few generations, produced fighting animals that gained him some renown among the Ugly who worked the arenas. Now he was making money, but because his clients moved in circles about which he was clueless, many of his debts were simply disappearing, even without an exchange of money.

  The lights dimmed, conversation dimmed, and actors took the stage. It was a familiar story: The Sound of a Wish. The actors moved about slowly in their decorated robes, each of their painted faces a work of art. The main character, Agamemno, was played by an actor owned by a very powerful Ugly clansman, a man who was said to have the Head’s favor. The man chanted his lines, deep and slow, and moved as if the air was leaden. It was difficult to breathe. In the play, he was a cellist, and planned to sell his soul to a devil so that he could outplay a rival and win the heart of a noblewoman.

  The noblewoman Figurina made her appearance. The actress was tall, stately, with a long nose and wide, red lips. Brown hair in a bun, streaked with white. Face painted white, blue whirls extending around her black eyes. She chanted lightly, whirled her arms slowly, shook glitter from her gold-laced black robes. She chanted the words
>
  How to win my heart

  If there is one better?

  How to move the world

  Without some infernal lever?

  Edwar could not take his eyes from Figurina. How did she balance shoulder, elbow, wrist, knuckles, like the stem of an underwater flower? How did she chase all the light away from those black eyes, make it form a halo about her neck, her shining chest, those blunt-fanged teeth? She stomped the ground, lifted the hem of her dress to stomp, to chase away her suitor, and her thighs were wet, and shook with the pounding. Edwar saw the saltwater splash onto the stage. Agamemno cowered before her, lowering himself to the ground. Just when Edwar did not think he could handle the sight of her any longer, she slowly rotated her upper body, then pivoted on some point and spun, terrible, terrible, slowly, and the fold of her gown parted just so, just so, so that he could see the inner edges of her breasts, shining, wet, bouncing with each rotation.

  Edwar rubbed a hand on his forehead. He glanced around and noticed that every man in the room had some sort of erection tent-poled against his pants. Then Agamemno cried out

  Mercy! Mercy!

  Only down below

  Will I find relief,

  Only ’neath the shroud

  Will I find rest!

  Figurina laughed and bounded away, relishing Agamemno’s pain. Agamemno called upon a devil. A wide screen was lit from behind. Shadow puppets danced upon reds and yellows, wicked-looking horned things laughing and shrieking. Agamemno and his cello were blessed, but only blessed so long as they stayed together and remained as one.

  The world dimmed around Edwar; only the play existed. Agamemno destroyed his rival, who actually seemed the better man overall, though a bit haughty. Agamemno’s cello began to crack in places. A string broke; Agamemno got a new string, but the blessing left him. His fawning critics turned on him. Agamemno replaced the string with a bit of his own intestines. The power returned, though he could no longer eat. Figurina fell in love with him. Edwar wanted him to die. Part of the cello’s casing cracked entirely. Agamemno replaced it with a strip of his own skin, but then he had to replace the part every day with fresh skin. Someone high in the rafters dribbled thick, red liquid onto the actor. Another string broke; more intestines came out. The neck of the thing rotted out; he had his tongue removed, stretched out, dried, and placed onto the neck of the cello. Figurina licked at his feet, now covered in the red syrup. The bow of the cello was stolen by his rival, then the dishonored rival killed himself; Agamemno tore the skin free from one arm so that he could run his bare bones along the strings, and made a horrid sound that all agreed was pure angelsong. The actor who played Agamemno stripped, revealing a white, chalky suit, the skeleton that was Agamemno. He was covered in blood. Figurina loved him for his sacrifice. Finally he threw away the cursed cello and revealed his true self to his love, the part of him that loved her, and she was disgusted, then apathetic, for in the end there was nothing left of him.

  The curtains fell. The crowd stared ahead, dumb with shock. Edwar ran to go backstage. He found a door hidden in a dark alcove and went for it. A scarred man whirled on him, stuck an elbow against his throat and a fist in his ribcage, and threw him against a wall with arms like iron. The scars, the wrinkles on his face, never moved.

  “Wrong way,” said the Ugly.

  “Uh!” choked Edwar. “I bred the dogs... uh, Meat Crusher... and Wolfkin... and another, I think your clansmen renamed it... uh, Last Dog You Fight...”

  “Shit, man!” said the Ugly. He smiled and released him. “Them boys is killers. G’on back.”

  Edwar went backstage, a dark, wooden set of hallways, actors stinking of sweat, milling around, laughing. Edwar threw his eyes around wildly.

  He saw the actress who played Figurina sitting on a lonely chair, still in makeup. His stomach lurched horribly; the single drink he’d had now stank like rot in his mouth. He went toward her, saw her turn to look at him, he stopped and looked at someone else, then gritted his teeth and continued toward her.

  He never remembered what he said to her, never quite remembered her reply. She looked as if she had once been some sort of ideal, long ago. Now limp, now tired, now worn down, tired in her core. Her smile seemed so used, and his heart ached to see it. She told him that she was a slave to none other than Utrecht Sera, that vicious warrior who was leader of the Right Leg of the Ugly. A torturer, a genius. The fact that she bore no physical scars terrified Edwar. She was a prostitute, and named the price by which he could have her. The figure was ridiculous, was probably made up by her on the spot. He agreed to pay the amount. She pointed to a man nearby, a short man in a fine suit but with no ears on his head. He was her protector, a man who handled her finances but answered to Sera.

  He went to the Ugly. The man said he would need a down-payment at least. The considerable amount of money Edwar carried was nowhere near enough. He tried to call on a favor, mentioning that his canines had helped several clansmen, then he realized the dog-fighting Ugly were nobodies to the pimp even as he rambled on. He stopped. The horrible longing must have been in his face, for the Ugly scratched at his nose, then said in lieu of a down payment he could have the whore if the pimp was allowed to watch, for if Edwar was indeed a gentleman, as he claimed, then he must understand that all property was fluid, all borders intangible, and perhaps he could be called on for payment at a later time by his friendly debt-keepers. Unsure of the nature of the scam, and really not caring, he agreed. He went back to her and sat beside her. She looked at him. He removed a handkerchief and lightly applied it to her cheek. He wiped the makeup away just below her eye, then wiped her chin. The flesh yielded. He slowly wiped the mask away.

  The three went to a small hotel and registered under Edwar’s name. They never turned the lights on; the moon shone through the window. She led Edwar to the bed. They laid down and he placed a hand on her belly. There was a commotion in the hallway, and Edwar was only dimly aware of the fact that the pimp cradled a gun in both hands and listened at the door.

  The Coil were in the hall.

  Edwar realized there must be some plot to kill the pimp, Sera’s man, and perhaps the pimp wanted to be near the whore and the dog breeder so that he could use their lives as bargaining chips should the Coilmen find him. But none of that mattered to Edwar; the only thing that mattered was stroking her belly under her robe and looking into one another. Realizing that they might soon die, she told him her theory that the living had to create and cultivate a soul before it could be judged or recycled or enjoy an afterlife in the first place. His face took on such a serious expression as he considered this theory, then she laughed, then he laughed as well and kissed her neck, her ear. He told her that she could sleep for a while, if she was tired. In answer, she parted her robe to the navel and felt of her own breasts. As he kissed her belly they could hear the pimp kneeling to peak under the doorway, cursing loudly, his gun held high as if he thought that contact with the floor would make it inoperable.

  Footsteps pounded back and forth across the hallway as the two stripped and sucked on one another’s tongues. He rolled onto his back and pulled her on top. She slipped him inside, then made a strange yelp as she plopped down and rode him more back-and-forth than up-and-down, tickling her insides.

  The pimp rose suddenly and pointed his gun at the door, convinced that the Coil killers were drawing near. The two rolled over, she dug her fingers in between each of his ribs, starting from the top and working down, while he held her shoulders down, lifted himself, and pounded away. Her breasts bounced and nearly flopped loose from their moorings. The two started yelping like small dogs. The pimp went to look for a place to sit down, his suit soaked in sweat, then Edwar came as she made some intense wheezing sound.

  He collapsed and stared at the white streaks in her hair; not the remnants of makeup, but dead mutations. They held each other close and talked in broad strokes about the nature of their lives. They were disappointed not with their lives, but with others. They could s
mell smoke from the pimp’s cigarette. Edwar asked her why she acted in plays; she answered that it was because Sera knew she hated the stories they told in Pontius. He became cross with her, because he realized that every woman he had ever met had been sad. Near some kind of breaking point, even. What could he possibly do to change that? Was he supposed to change the world?

  Fortunata, that was her name. It even sounded like Figurina, the role she played.

  * * *

  In the next few days, Edwar Bruner decided that he would change the world.

  * * *

  The hot air balloon hung high in the air above Sellers Square. Edwar heard a sharp crack below and looked down in time to see the first Coilman spinning, holding the side of his head. His knees slammed into the pavement, bits of his head toppled through his fingers, then he fell. He saw Lawmen in denim running down the street. Plainclothes Coilmen fired on the Smiths from the alleyways. One Smith grabbed his gut, fell on his behind, and fired blindly into the air. Edwar heard a bullet whiz by his ear. The Lawmen yelled “Freeze!” even as they fired on the Smiths, who withdrew and fired as they went, shattering windows that peppered glass on the crouching civilians. Smith reinforcements charged from another street and fired at the Lawmen. Both groups hunkered beside buildings and behind fruit carts. Dozens of eyes glanced up to Edwar, waiting for him to drop something terrible on their heads.

  “My name is Edwar Bruner!” he shouted, driven nearly insane by the height and the sound of the guns. “I declare myself King of Sky Land! Stop your fighting before I stop it for you!”

  “That man belongs to us!” someone shouted from another street. He saw a group of armored Ugly racing down another street. They carried shotguns, and they looked so wild that Edwar knew they could only be berserkers from the Leg of the Ugly. They hunkered down, firing and pumping their shotguns, their teeth clattering like rabid animals. The Lawmen and Smiths cursed and dug into their cover. While a few Coil tossed their guns and laid down among the civilians, most had already retreated.