by G A Chase
“You’re just going to kill me no matter what I say.”
“You’re not wrong, but I want some answers before I dispatch you back to where you belong. How did you escape hell?”
He continued to move under her knife-edges as if trying to discover a weakness in her hold. “Why should I tell you anything?”
She pulled the black knife tighter to his neck and whispered in his ear so that neither Bart nor Mr. Fisher could hear. “I still have powerful allies in hell. You think you had it bad before? Wait until the entire dimension turns against you.”
“I have my allies too.”
From the ground, Mr. Fisher let out a bloodcurdling scream and spasmed so hard it looked as if his life was being sucked out of every muscle and organ of his body. Monty used the distraction and increased energy to spin so hard to his left that Sere felt her knife slice through muscle in his neck as he escaped her death threat. Though he had avoided losing his head to Bart’s blade, she held tightly to the remaining handle in his back as the razor-sharp steel severed his spinal cord.
He crumpled to the grass, taking the thin blade with him. Sere spun around like a ninja ballerina, building momentum. As she sliced down toward her victim’s neck with Bart’s Navy knife, Monty rolled his torso over and lifted the barrel of the shotgun from the ground. The satisfying resistance of sharpened metal cutting through tissue and bone was countered by small pellets of paranormal stone penetrating her side. Monty’s head rolled off his shoulders and hit the ground while his body remained sitting, propped up with the butt of the shotgun.
“Shoot him!”
Bart ran out from the tree line, shotgun in hand. “Why? He’s already dead. He can’t hurt you now that he’s decapitated.”
“Stop arguing logic with me, and fire the goddamned gun.” She looked over at Mr. Fisher, fearful she would see the man transform into the demon she’d just dispatched.
Bart came around beside her before leveling the gun at the propped up body. The blast knocked Monty’s broken and lifeless torso three feet before it came to rest next to his head.
The side of Sere’s rib cage burned as if hot coals had been seared into her flesh. She gasped for air. She’d been hurt enough times to know the drill. When she was younger, her body often needed a few minutes to adjust to its new condition. Through rigorous training, she’d cut that time down to seconds. But with each passing moment, Sere felt her grip on her consciousness slipping away. Unfortunately, it wasn’t toward a comatose state.
Sere clung to her personal messed-up history while her body sought out any source of energy it could find to combat the disruptive damage the pellets were creating. Her perception glazed over as if she were being put into a nesting doll. Not fucking Jennifer Cranston again. Please, woman, be doing something other than shopping with that dimwit friend of yours. But instead of slipping into her real’s world, Sere witnessed her body falling into Bart’s arms like some movie scene featuring a dumb-ass damsel in distress fainting into her lover’s embrace.
“Now we’ll face off on my home turf.” The man’s words were more felt than heard.
She was having trouble breathing. Dirt and grass filled her mouth. The scene of her body in Bart’s arms continued to play out in front of her. “Damn it to hell! I must be in Mr. Fisher. He would have been the easiest body to access since his image is being projected into hell.”
“Very good.” Even without changing her focus, she knew it was Monty standing over her like some egotistical misogynist boyfriend.
“How did you manage the leap?”
“Your boyfriend over there was a little slow with the shotgun, for one. But that wasn’t your real mistake.”
“I had him shoot the goddamned body.” Sere could kick herself for her stupidity.
“Did no one ever bother to tell you only a head shot would kill a zombie?”
“Fucking Artie Andy and his lack of instructions. I’ll bet anything he knew and didn’t tell me.” Being trapped in Mr. Fisher’s soul meant every thought came out for Monty to hear.
“Leave her alone.” The words shook Sere to her core. Monty fell to the ground and raised his hands over his head as if God himself had spoken.
Sere instantly recognized the voice. “I promise you, Montgomery Fisher, that I will do all I can to get this pestilence out of you.”
The intense pain of the buckshot in her side had gotten so much worse that she returned to her body. Someone was pressing a hand hard against her side.
“What the hell?” she said.
“Just once, would you please shut up and let me help you?” The rugged features of Bartender Smooth came into focus. “Tell me what I need to do to keep you from fading out again.”
“You have to get the buckshot out of me.”
He lifted his hands off her naked torso. Blood started pumping out of her.
“You’ll bleed out long before I can get all those pellets removed,” Bart said. “Let me wrap you up and get you to the hospital.”
His denseness provided a useful distraction to her need for human energy. “We already went through this the last time I was shot. No fucking hospitals. Everyone I know is too far away to help. You’re a Navy SEAL. Surely, you must have some medic skills.”
“I don’t have any supplies, not even a bottle of whiskey to numb you and disinfect the area. Anything I do would hurt like hell and send you into shock.”
She reached up and grabbed him by the shirt. “Get these fucking pellets out of me. The pain will keep me focused. You’ve already seen how fast I can heal.” She rolled to her side so the holes would be more accessible and turned her attention to Jennifer. If she did slip into another soul, at least it wouldn’t be one plagued by a demon.
Bart yanked off his leather jacket and pressed it to her side. “Push this as hard against the wounds as you can stand to slow down the blood loss. I need to find something to get at those pellets.” Bart left her and hunted around the reeds along the swamp until he found a grove of young bamboo. He started hacking at the brown stalks with his MacGyver knife and blew through each one.
Sere looked back at Mr. Fisher. The poor man’s eyes had glazed over like he was in a trance. What the hell am I going to do with you?
Pain from the knives and sharpened bamboo skewers that Bart used like straws or chopsticks—depending on the pellet’s depth in her flesh—kept Sere from slipping into another person. However, the connection that she’d previously experienced as a hardwired direct link to Jennifer now felt like blaring, overlapping radio signals—and the paranormal pellets were spinning the dial. Every person in a ten-mile radius seemed to be projecting his or her consciousness for Sere to tap into. If she focused too long on any specific input, she could easily take on that person’s identity. Only by remembering the young child that she’d been and her odd upbringing by the handful of people who truly cared about her was she able to maintain some sense of her own identity.
Bart used his GIGN Glauca B1 knife to cut and strip some vines. Then he pulled off his shirt, revealing a muscular, well-tanned chest that perfectly matched his rippling arms. He tenderly pressed the sweat-stained folded cotton to her wounds and secured it in place with the vines. His smell was nearly as intoxicating as the adrenaline she’d relied on to stay sane.
“I think that’s it,” Bart said.
I’m out here with fucking Tarzan MacGyver. His face was so covered in blood that Sere started laughing. He looked like a vampire who’d lost all control.
Bart turned to Mr. Fisher. “She’s going into shock.”
“Fuck shock,” Sere said. “Call Kendell. Tell her to bring the van. I’m not going to be able to ride my Triton in this condition.”
“In the meantime, what do we do with that body?” Mr. Fisher asked as he pointed a trembling finger at Monty’s remains. She hoped she wasn’t just imaging that he sounded more like the kindly CPA than the demonic serial killer.
Sere stared hopefully out toward the swamp. From the swath of cl
eared water hyacinth that was moving her way, Lefty would be there in a matter of minutes. “I have that covered.”
Eventually, the demon’s death might still attract the loas of the dead, though without a soul, she wasn’t sure how they would respond to Monty’s corpse. The only safe place to dispose of him was back in hell, where his body’s supernatural molecules would disassociate into nothingness—hopefully taking along with it his memories and intentions.
When Sere’s serpent companions slithered ashore, both Bart and Mr. Fisher leaped four feet back toward the trees. They hid even farther into the brush when the thirty-foot alligator cozied up to the shore.
“Holy shit,” Bart said. “The Pleistocene gator is real?”
“Maybe next time, you’ll treat my boots with more reverence.” She turned away from her beloved pet and toward the two men. “It would be best if neither of you ever mentioned his existence. I can’t have those brain-dead gator hunters wandering into the deep swamp.”
“So we’re sharing secrets now?” Bart asked.
She still wasn’t fond of putting her trust in anyone, but Bart had proven a useful ally. “I guess you’ve earned the benefit of the doubt.” She watched the two men gather up as much of the bloody, scattered remains as they could, but neither seemed inclined to push the pile of limbs, organs, and tissue closer than six feet from the swamp’s shore.
“Just leave it and back away.” Sere pulled another shotgun shell from her waistband and scattered the contents from mangled flesh on the water’s edge. First to answer her call were her two faithful snakes, but they were quickly joined by a host of their brethren. Together, they worked like a scaly, reptilian conveyor belt, transferring every bit of Monty onto Lefty’s back. When no drop of blood was left, Sere dragged her body to the water’s edge. Lefty truly looked like a gator from hell with the body remains coating his back. She leaned in close to the giant reptile’s head. “Take this shit back to hell.”
“I may never leave the city again,” Mr. Fisher said.
Sere was still double-checking that she wasn’t absorbing some random person’s energy when Kendell and Myles emerged from the trees. Kendell ran over and knelt down to smooth the sweaty, swamp-water-smelling, bloodstained hair out of Sere’s eyes. “We should have been here with you.”
Sere felt like shit, but at least her feelings were all hers and not an amalgam of different inputs. “I couldn’t be worrying about you while facing a demon.”
Myles helped Mr. Fisher to his feet. “How are you holding up?” Sere could tell from Myles’s intensity that he was searching for signs of possession.
“I’ve been better,” the professional businessman said. “It’s not every day you meet your demonic double. I’m just glad Sere was able to decapitate the beast before he killed me and got to my family.”
“Get him back to the van,” Bart said as he hunted around the weeds and grass for anything that might have been left behind.
Mr. Fisher put his arm around Myles’s shoulders. He could barely stand, let alone walk on his own. “Some lunch break.”
“Don’t worry,” Myles said. “We’ll take you to Professor Yates’s lab. He’ll get you back on your feet. Then we’ll see about retrieving your Jeep.”
Sere leaned in close to Kendell. “Mr. Fisher isn’t fully himself. We shouldn’t let him out of sight with Myles. It might not be safe.”
“We’ve dealt with possessions a time or two. Myles knows what to look for.”
Why does everyone think they know more about hell than I do? Sere thought. “Not like this. Mr. Fisher isn’t being controlled by some other spirit. It’s a part of him.”
“Then we’d best get you back to the van as well.” Bart wrapped his strong arms around Sere’s legs and torso and lifted her from the ground as if she were a little girl. His embrace enveloped her like the hammock she slept in on Sanguine’s porch. Those peaceful, secluded days on the swamp seemed like a lifetime ago. “You’d have been proud of her,” Bart continued to Kendell. “She crept up on the Swamp Strangler like a ninja then dispatched him before he could kill Mr. Fisher.”
Sere punched his bulging chest muscle. “I don’t need you exaggerating my exploits. I told you before. I don’t need a sidekick, and I certainly don’t need a raconteur.”
“What’s that?” Bart asked.
She squinted at him, hoping the snarky attitude would convey through her words. “A traveling minstrel who follows along, singing about the exploits of his brave knight.”
“You’re making that up.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck for stability as he carried her down the path. “Embellishing maybe.”
“Well, you never know. I have been told I have a lovely singing voice.”
Kendell’s lack of response wasn’t helping. This is not some budding romance. You don’t have to pretend you’re not even there. As they exited the dense brush, Sere leaned over Bart’s broad shoulder toward Kendell. “Can you ride a motorcycle? I don’t want to leave my Triton just sitting out here.”
Kendell shrugged. “I used to putter that yellow scooter all over town. How different can it be?”
You have to be kidding me. “Just go easy on the throttle, and stick to the back roads.”
Bart bent down to lower Sere onto the VW’s bench seat. “I’ll ride my Ducati and keep her company. She’ll be fine.”
Kendell looked down the dusty road at the two motorcycles. “First, though, you might want those clothes we lent you. I’ll go grab your saddlebags as well.”
Sere settled back on the blanket-covered vinyl bench. With Myles in the driver’s seat, she was able to talk in private to Mr. Fisher, who sat in the back seat. “I know what’s inside you.”
“Don’t worry about me. A man doesn’t reach his midfifties without facing down more than a few inner demons. Besides, I deal with the IRS on a regular basis. Any government agency that goes by a three-letter acronym must come from hell.” From the determination in his eyes, she could tell there was resolve behind the forced sense of humor.
“Monty isn’t some secret dirty garbage bag of past longing. The desires he’s dumped into you would be more like having a dump truck bury you in filth. You might have the upper hand now, but he’ll never quit. I want you to know I’ll do all that I can to free you. You just need to hang on.”
The kindly old CPA’s smile had to be one he reserved for people in grave economic straits—a combination of sympathy and partnership. His attitude did inspire confidence. “I have my family to keep me sane. They’re all the support I’ll ever need. But it will be a pleasure to see you again when you’re ready.”
12
When they pulled up to Professor Yates’s lab, Sere saw the two motorcycles already parked alongside the building. You just couldn’t resist pushing Kendell to the limit, could you? Fuck you, Bartender Smooth. That woman can barely ride a motorized bicycle.
Being the first one out of the building, Bart wasn’t even smart enough to try to avoid her wrath. “Looks like your friends have everything ready. Let me help you inside.” He reached into the van for her arm.
She pulled it away in disgust. “You were supposed to give Kendell a gentle riding lesson, not turn the trip into another of your fucking competitions. You just can’t resist showing the size of your dick, can you?”
Kendell stepped out from behind the mountain of a man. “Don’t blame him. I might have instigated the race. That bike of yours is really something. If I didn’t think Myles and Cheesecake would have a fit, I’d consider getting one for myself.”
Bart’s leather jacket over his bare chest gave off the familiar crunching sound as he crossed his arms in satisfaction. “Anytime you want a real lesson, I’d be happy to offer my services.”
Myles revved the VW’s engine before shutting it off. “Not while I’m her partner. Kendell has used up her allotment of death-defying activities. Now, someone help Sere inside while I give Mr. Fisher a hand.” He turned back to the kindly old man
. “Once the professor gives you a quick once-over, I’ll drive you home. Then I’ll call on a friend to help me retrieve your Jeep.”
“After this, I may take the afternoon off,” Mr. Fisher said. The CPA’s seersucker suit, which just a day before had been white and characteristically New Orleans, now looked like it was made out of dirty dishrags.
Sere reached across the seat and took the man’s hand. “I was serious. I owe you, and I won’t rest until I make it right.”
“First, take care of yourself, darlin’. You’ll know where to find me when you come up with a cure.”
She hobbled off the seat and fell onto the floor of the old VW. Bart loomed over her as if waiting for her to request his help. Fat chance.
“Oh, for the love of Pete. You two are like kindergarteners.” Kendell leaned down under Sere’s shoulder and helped her to her feet before turning on Bart. “Get her other arm. She’s not going to ask, and she’s not going to swoon over you like some sex-starved romantic. You’re just going to have to do it because it’s the decent thing.”
He took the other shoulder, walking hunched over to allow Sere’s feet to remain on the ground. “It’s not like I haven’t tried.”
Kendell shook her head next to Sere’s. “Next you’re going to say, ‘She started it.’ In case you haven’t already figured it out, Sere’s pretty good at taking care of herself. If you want to be in her life, it’d be best to let her take the lead.”
If Sere could have bent her neck far enough, she would have kissed Kendell on the cheek for standing up for her. Instead, she felt her legs give out from under her. The two carried her in like a limp doll and laid her out on Professor Yates’s metal worktable. She regained full alertness when Polly pulled the technology-enhanced bandage so tightly around her abdomen that she thought her breasts were about to explode out of her bra.