by G A Chase
Peachy. Now I’m responsible for making this fool self-aware. I’ll bet this idiot thinks that qualifies as having a soul.
“You’re still just an empty shell,” she said. “Just because you can now see the glass, that doesn’t mean there’s anything in it.”
“For someone who’s tied up and defenseless, you’ve sure got a lot of spunk.” He picked up her shotgun from where she’d dropped it and opened the barrel. “One load left.” He closed it up, cocked the hammer, and aimed the weapon at her head. “I just witnessed what this thing can do to an empty glass. I wonder what would happen if you were on the receiving end. Do you think you’d land in hell or in Guinee? The loas of the dead might even offer me a reward. I think I’ll ask for my real in return for their lost little girl. That sounds pretty reasonable to me. What do you think?”
Fear wasn’t an emotion Sere accepted. Showing weakness had its place in drawing an opponent off guard, but actually breathing in that level of vulnerability implied that there was no way out. Besides, she’d already lived most of her life in hell, so that wasn’t a meaningful threat. If she ended up in hell, she could finally help Sanguine out of whatever mess she was in. And as for the loas of the dead, they were only a problem if they ran across her while she was still alive.
“I’m kind of curious about what a full load would do to me as well.” She arched her side so the leotard separated along her ribs, displaying the peppered black dots from Monty’s shotgun blast. “So far, they’ve just left me with the beginnings of an interesting tattoo.”
“You’re so full of shit.” He raised the weapon to his shoulder.
Sere held her hands to the ground as if that would help quiet the rumbling under her body. Her former play toy was so focused on scaring her that he didn’t notice what was racing up behind him. With one loud crunch, Lefty snapped his giant jaws closed around the doppelgänger, folding him in half like a taco. Only the end of the shotgun barrel protruded from the interlocking razor-sharp teeth.
“Drop it, Lefty. Drop! Bad gator.”
The giant opened his mouth and let the crushed gun fall out. Blood and gore dripped from his teeth. Most of the doppelgänger’s body was still intact but snapped in two like a twig. The demon’s distorted face and wide red eyes still glistened with life.
“You’re just damn lucky, mister. If that gun had discharged in your mouth, you’d be facing one killer set of cavities. Even in hell, I don’t know of any vets willing to work on your ornery hide. Finish your treat, then come snap these lines. I hope you’re hungry. We can’t leave any evidence behind, and there’s another doppelgänger morsel around here somewhere for you to clean up.”
It had already been a long morning when Sere settled in between Lefty’s broad shoulders for the daylong trip back to civilization. He kept his head high in the water and tail swishing with joy after his satisfying meal of two freshly caught doppelgängers. Not many animals in the swamp were the size of one human, let alone two.
She patted him between his eye bumps. “You did good.”
She hadn’t done badly herself with three doppelgängers down and no human casualties. Out in the swamp, she could give herself the rare pat on the back. Her self-congratulations didn’t last long. Even though she had dispatched the demon at Riley’s on her own, he had found his way to town, and there were four more to contend with.
“If I were calling the shots, what would I do with my remaining four soldiers? My enemy sent one, then two.” Having a computer projection of her real’s brain created a superhuman skill set in Sere that Jennifer Cranston would never master—most notably, an ability to understand mathematical concepts. “Exponential escalation—doubling the attack force with each conflict. He’ll go all in with his last four combat drones.”
With the shotgun between her knees looking like a crumpled straw some child had chewed, she was down one of her most potent weapons. Beheading doppelgängers provided a much-needed release for her combat lust, but those hand-to-hand altercations worked better one-on-one. Taking on four at once—even if they lacked Sere’s fighting skills—would create too many variables.
“Guess I’ll be slinking back to Joe’s cabin with my tail between my legs. I hate leaving the swamp unattended. Hopefully I’ll have better luck talking to the hunters out here on the water, where they work, than dealing with their drunk asses at Riley’s.”
Lefty lowered his head below the water, sending a wave over his back that drenched Sere’s legs. She jumped to her feet and grabbed her shotgun before it could float off Lefty’s back. “Hey, now. That was uncalled for. I know you’ll remain on guard duty out here. You’re still my first line of defense, but I need people to do their part as well. After all, these demons aren’t coming to the land of the living to collect alligator hides. Those who are in the most danger should at least take on the responsibility of identifying the enemy.”
17
Chapter 5
Sere stood on the back of her giant alligator as he swam out of the cypress grove and back into the hunting grounds. The evening sun was just touching the horizon over the bayou, casting her long shadow over the water. Her pulse raced as she guided Lefty with her feet toward the main river that connected the tracts of wetlands. “Don’t worry, old friend, the gator hunters can’t hurt you. Those puny bullets would just bounce right off your hide.”
If one of those idiots did have the stupidity to shoot, however, and the ricochet managed to hit Sere, things would get a little dicier. Their confirmation of the thirty-foot-gator myth would bring more than enough trouble. Having a swamp witch heal from a bullet wound right before their eyes was not an option. Some magical abilities were best left unseen.
She rested her hand on the butt of her chomped-barrel shotgun. At least it still fit in her thigh holster. At the shock of seeing a mythical alligator and its supposedly armed mistress, the testosterone-fueled hunters would hopefully think twice about whipping out their weapons.
She pulled a couple of cartridges from her bullet belt and tossed them in the river behind Lefty. “You’re more than enough gator for anyone, but a little backup couldn’t hurt. Plus, those river lizards could use a little courage. Seeing you and me deal with their murderers just might give us some reptilian support in our quest to contain hell.”
Lefty continued his gentle rocking through the water, seemingly oblivious to the dozen gators that had fallen in line behind him. As they rounded a bend, Sere saw the first indication that they were getting close to their prey. A dead chicken dangled from a rope tied to a sapling.
“Take me over there. I can’t afford to have one of our friends succumb to his hunger and end up thrashing for his life. The gator hunters need to know I’m in control—not guiding their catch straight to them.”
Lefty drifted slowly up to the hunk of meat, which looked like a small dog treat compared to his massive body. Sere pulled out her knife and cut the rope, then she removed the massive hook and tossed the morsel behind Lefty. The gators that followed him fought over the meal like a bunch of angry seagulls. “I suppose it’s reptilian nature not to share.”
She needed to make as big an impact on the men as possible. Running across a lone hunter and relying on him to spread the word wasn’t going to be enough to secure the help she needed. She stepped up to Lefty’s massive shoulders and stood tall, hoping to look like a captain piloting her ship. “We’ll head straight toward the dock. Right now the rivermen are probably making the final checks of their lures. If we beat them back to the dock, not only will we command all of their attention, but we’ll also have them by the short hairs as they’ll be in a hurry to offload before sunset.”
Lefty followed the directions of her feet as if her words didn’t matter. She could hear the outboard motors from across the open grasslands. No ripples disturbed the water ahead of her, however. “Since this is the main tributary back to town, they probably put off checking these traps until last. They’re about to be wildly disappointed.”
Each line they came to became one more hunk of chicken for her gator navy or one more freed alligator recruit who’d bitten at the wrong piece of meat. Lefty rounded the final bend leading to the dock. Though the area along the river was still empty, the open-sided processing warehouse was filling with laborers and buyers preparing to weigh and measure the day’s catch.
“I want them to get a good look at you. Think you can climb up on the wharf?”
Lefty put his massive clawed foot on the back of the floating wood pier and rocked it hard to the side like a canoe being boarded from the water. When he managed to get his second front leg up on the structure, the far end lifted six feet off the river. The commotion emptied the warehouse as men came running to investigate.
Sere used Lefty’s scutes as footholds to maintain her standing position on his back as he climbed onto the rickety structure. The boards creaked and snapped under his massive frame. When he had finally hauled his body onto the wharf, it looked like a child’s air mattress in a pool that some fat uncle had commandeered. Only the pilings were still above the water line. The other alligators milled around him, filling up the small bay.
Men stood dumbstruck at the water’s edge. Sere kept her hand on the butt of her useless shotgun. “Everyone, just take it easy. We’re going to hang out here until all the hunters return from their day on the river. I don’t want to have to explain myself twice.”
A man pushed his way through the crowd. With his girth, he had to be the lead buyer. “Lady, I’ll give you a king’s ransom for that beast.”
She gripped the gun so hard the end of the holster pointed up from her leg like a teenage boy’s erection. “One more comment like that, and my friend here might get the wrong idea. He has quite the appetite, so we wouldn’t want things to turn ugly.”
The fat man backed away from the water’s edge. “I didn’t mean any disrespect, but that is quite the animal, as are the pack you’ve brought with him. I’ll bet not one of them is less than twelve feet in length. What are you, some sort of swamp witch?”
“I was raised by one, but I’m much more than that now.”
She turned back to the water as the first sounds of outboard motors echoed in from the trees. Finally. As the tired men caught sight of the estuary filled with alligators they started pulling out their rifles.
“First one of you to pull a trigger is going to be gator food,” she yelled.
“Goddamn you, scrawny-ass bitch!” Cody’s voice cut through the noise of the motors.
The smell of dead gator that emanated from each of the johnboats filled the air like swamp gas. Though Lefty remained on the dock, sunning himself in the last rays of daylight, the other gators grew restless to investigate the scents of their dead companions. The water started boiling from the action of their tails, mirroring the energy Sere sensed from the hunters. Things are about to get out of hand.
“I’m not here to start a war between humans and reptiles. Something far more dangerous is headed in from the deep swamp, and I’ll need all of your help to stop the demons before they make it to shore and raise holy hell.”
The johnboats drifted out of their dense pack—each bow aimed at a different circling gator. From her perch on top of Lefty, Sere saw the gleam of rifle barrels secretly being made ready for the slaughter. “If any of you make one more move against these gators, you’ll find your boats snapped in half.”
In spite of Sere’s show of feminine power and animal strength, the men’s attentions were fixed on the prize catches floating so close to their processing facility. She nudged Lefty in the side. “Time to get to work, my friend. Seems like these assholes aren’t going to listen without a demonstration of superiority.”
The giant creature arched his body to the side, snapping the pier pilings like matchsticks. His loud splash sent a wave of water across the estuary, forcing the gator navy away from the boats with their men and weapons. Lefty used his fifteen-foot tail to flip around and dart toward the lead bow. Whether out of fear, greed, or foolishness, the hunter rose up out of his crouched position and fired his rifle. The bullet harmlessly bounced off Lefty’s snout.
“Well, now, that was just plain stupid,” Sere said as Lefty opened his cavernous jaws. With one chomp he crushed the front of the boat into kindling.
The man fell on his butt and crab walked back to his partner at the outboard motor. As what was left of the hull filled with water, both men scampered over the back transom. Their catch of three good-sized carcasses slipped into the watery grave.
“If you’re quick, you just might be able to swim to shore before Lefty’s friends get any ideas about seeking revenge,” Sere said to the men in the water. Lefty took aim at the next nearest boat. “Now, would any of the rest of you like to test out your peashooters?”
Cody stood, put his foot on his boat’s thwart, and aimed his rifle at Sere’s head. “What if I just shoot you instead?”
“Try it, asshole. But before you do, ask yourself what my snakes might think of your threat. Do you really think the swamp’s creatures are going to take kindly to you hurting their mistress? You’re all outnumbered by the reptiles, fish, and bugs out here, and you know it. All it would take is a little organization by these critters, and none of you would be able to set foot in the swamp ever again.”
The boat floating precariously in front of Lefty’s razor-sharp teeth abruptly swung to the side, which positioned it between Cody and Sere. The hunter stood and held his hands out from his sides to show that he wasn’t holding a weapon. “What is it you want from us?”
“A temporary truce. You’re hunters, and I’m not going to tell you not to make a living. But you’re not to kill any alligator over twelve feet in length. I need these big boys to be my guardians in the deep swamp.”
“What exactly do you think is out there?” he asked.
“To you, they’ll look like city folk who got lost in the swamp.”
“Not this bullshit again,” Cody yelled from behind the lead boat. “Was that poor fat fuck you were hunting months ago some lover who dumped your bony ass? You can’t still be looking for revenge. Accept that he’s better off without you, and find some other poor sap to screw.” He laughed, but no one else joined in.
“Monty has been dealt with, no thanks to you, but he showed the escape route for others to follow. Of course, you already know that. After all, it was you who gave his kin a ride in from hell’s gate the other day.”
Cody shook his head in a show of disbelief. “Girly, I’ve met some people out here who don’t take kindly to strangers, but you take the cake. Not everyone who gets lost in the swamp is a serial killer.”
Well, he didn’t mention yesterday’s bar brawl decapitation. That’s something at least. Riley must be trying to keep the incident quiet. Either she’s worried about killings affecting her business, or she knows about the demons and has further use for them.
“And I’m hoping not every alligator hunter is as ignorant an asshole as you are,” Sere said. “I’m not asking you to confront every stranger you run across—quite the opposite. If one of them does survive his encounter with my reptilian friends in the deep swamp, you probably won’t want to approach the mangled remains anyway. Just get word to the bikers about what you see. They’ll relay the message to me.”
“And what do we get in return?” The man standing in the lead boat had barely taken his eyes off Lefty since they’d arrived.
Sere couldn’t see any point in hiding the truth. Either the men would be inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt now, or they would be convinced when the torn-to-shreds doppelgängers came after them like a zombie horde leading the apocalypse. She chose her words carefully. “If I can’t stop this invasion, your swamp is about to become the hellmouth. Right now, only humanlike creatures have figured out how to cross over, but once they start coming through in large numbers, you can bet other monsters will follow. If you think Lefty is impressive, wait until you meet his parents.”
The man nodded
toward Lefty’s massive snout. “If they’re anything like that pet of yours, I say let them through.”
Just like a man, she thought. He’d condemn the living to hell just to make a killing. “Even if you had a rifle big enough,” she said, “these creatures can’t be killed by your measly bullets. All you would do is piss them off.”
“I’ll take my chances. Now, if you don’t have anything else to offer other than empty threats, would you mind letting us deliver our catch? It’s getting late, and we’ve all still got to make our weigh-ins.”
“Fucking idiot assholes.” Sere stood on the shore and continued her line of mumbling expletives. Though there was little she could do, she chose to stay until Lefty had escorted his living brethren out of harm’s way. Without the prospect of gathering the last-minute hides, the gator hunters hardly gave her a second glance. They unloaded their boats on the makeshift gangway they’d set up to replace the dock.
She didn’t really care that the men probably wouldn’t survive the week. They’d been warned. The best she could hope for was that word of their slaughter would filter back to the bikers and, through them, to Bart.
She walked away from the facility, mumbling, “The loas of the dead will have their hands full processing so many spirits. That should buy me a little time before I have to face those soul-stealing bastards. At least the alligators are on my side. If they can manage the killings before the doppelfuckers, the loas won’t suspect anything out of the ordinary.”
How the loas had reacted to Monty’s killings, however, was still a mystery. Either those immortal pricks were dumber than she thought and didn’t realize the killings hadn’t happened in the normal way, or she had friends intervening somewhere. As for the swamp creatures, she feared her words hadn’t meant a damn thing. The doppelgängers weren’t after them. Lefty, however, would command the respect of even the most hardened of animals. They would follow him to the edge of hell—though if the remaining batch of doppelgängers went on a killing spree, relying on the alligators to stop all of hell’s new recruits seemed like a long shot.