Hard Case

by John Hook

  She just continued to look at me blankly. There wasn’t even an attempt to dissuade me from a plan that would earn them dreadful retaliation. Just emptiness. These were the perfect torture toys for the demons. Completely submissive, probably capable of enduring and feeling almost endless pain while continuing to act like nothing was wrong. I looked for even so much as a slight moistening of her eyes, an involuntary swallow, something to show that somewhere in there was a speck of self-reflection on the sadness and horror of such an existence. Nothing. So much for my revolution. There were no soldiers here. There were only traumatized victims.

  I reached over and brushed Anita’s hair gently. I buttoned up her blouse where it had loosened from the forced entry of my hand. I straightened the blouse so it fell right over her shoulders. I touched her cheek tenderly, wishing she could feel the deep sorrow I felt for her. “Well, Anita, you take care. I thank you both for putting up with me.”

  I turned and left via the door that was still open. I shut it behind me, making a quick scan of the street and then sprinted back towards the main part of town. I should have felt completely disheartened. If I was being pragmatic, I would have had to admit that there was no way for me to go forward, one man—ex-man—against a world where everything else was meaner and tougher. Luckily, I wasn’t suffering from pragmatism. What was the worst that could happen? I couldn’t die. The worst was that I’d become a proto, and my guess was I just wouldn’t care after that.

  I needed a place to stop and think before exploring the city more, maybe a place where I could watch the streets for awhile, look at the comings and goings of demons, look for patterns. I quickly jumped behind some trash containers in an alley. It was instinct. I had heard someone coming. A couple of demons entered the alley. They stopped as one looked around, sniffing the air, showing his teeth. They were sure ugly when they let their mouths hang open. I was afraid maybe the one had picked up human scent, but they both engaged in that screaming laugh and kept going, finally turning out of the alley at the other end.

  I took a desperate breath. I knew a place where I might be able to go, where they might not even expect me to show up again. Rox’s apartment. It would be hard if no one had cleaned up, but I was hoping it would be unoccupied. I was ignoring the fact that I wasn’t sure how much time had passed while I was recovering at Izzy’s and that they might turn over real estate here quickly. Nonetheless, it was better than any other option I could think of. Of course, that wasn’t saying much.

  I made my way back down the alley and followed a dark street that I was pretty sure curved back around behind the apartment buildings. I passed a few humans, but they were clearly not a risk. I was still some distance from the apartment buildings. I wanted to go all the way around, avoiding the main street and come at it from the other direction. I still wasn’t sure how I’d get in.

  I froze in mid-thought. Just ahead, in the shadows, two demons were standing together making soft gibberish sounds. Probably something like “Hey, Mac, how’s the kids?” There was another, even more dangerous experiment I wanted to try. I had just not wanted to do it so soon. However, I had to act fast and I wasn’t sure I could slip away without being noticed.

  I didn’t even think. One turned slightly away from the other. I was still not in their line of sight. I strode over swiftly, drawing the staff out. I whipped it with both hands over one demon’s head and wrenched the staff back, cutting off air to its throat, preventing it from making more sound than a wheeze. In the same motion, I slammed my knee at the base of the spine, still forcing the spine back by the neck. At least I hoped it had a spine. A sharp cracking sound told me it did.

  The other demon picked up the sound and turned swiftly. I had already dropped the staff and was in a spin. The dagger appeared in my hand and plunged into its neck. Any sound that might have come out was immediately silenced and replaced with a gurgle as the goo these things used for blood ran down its chest. It fell to the street.

  Both demons lay at my feet, dead. A mixture of luck and speed had given me a victory and further confirmation that they could be killed. It also showed that I was getting faster and stronger. But the real experiment was now, listening to the silence. How long would it take the others to find them?

  Previously, the demons had communicated with me crudely by putting thoughts in my head. Were they generally telepathic? Were they able to broadcast their distress? Apparently not, for there were no sounds in the darkness other than the distant sounds of Main Street.

  More information. I was going to learn everything I could about the demons. I was going to find their weaknesses and play to my strengths. I was going to find a way to drive them out of Rockvale. For that, I needed a safe haven. I needed Rox’s apartment.

  I listened one last time, and then continued on in the direction of the apartments, always careful to look ordinary, not in a rush, gray.

  9.

  I got into the apartment the old-fashioned way. I used the flat hardened stone of my dagger to pop the door open. I kept forgetting there was no metal or technology to speak of here, so things are pretty much on the honor system. When the demons weren’t around, when you didn’t dwell on that fact that you were dead, this place could begin to feel oddly normal. It was like moving to a tough neighborhood in New York City. Life wasn’t hard all the time, but it could get horrible if you weren’t careful. Maybe the analogy said more about New York than this place. I wondered if Frank Sinatra had a song about this place. “If you can make it here…” Here’s lookin’ at you, kid. I pushed my way through the door and closed it behind me.

  I don’t know what I was expecting inside. Blood stains? Wrecked furniture? A corpse? There couldn’t be a corpse. I knew that now, though I didn’t when I left her. She would be a proto now, unaware of her former identity, unaware of me. No memory. Maybe I could find her. Maybe I could revive her memory. I wasn’t sure she would want me to, not when I thought about what her last memories as Rox must have been like. I was feeling guilty, of course. I had no reason to be. I was a stranger in a very strange land. I didn’t know the rules and had acted on instinct. It wasn’t that I wasn’t attracted to her; I was. I still was, I realized. But that was part of her job, as I understood it from what Izzy had said. Had there been something genuine there? What would be genuine in this place?

  I paced around slowly, examining the room. It was the first time since I first landed that I was alone and not, as far as I knew, being hunted. I needed to stop, catch my breath, enjoy the luxury of still being me in this wretched place. The apartment was not much different than it had been when I was here last except it was unlit. Enough light came in from the street lamps. The apartment was modest, essentially a studio with a small kitchen in an alcove at one end and an area marked off by an archway at the other end where the bed was. There were two multi-paned windows in between the kitchen area and the bedroom area with long white mesh curtains. The furniture was unremarkable. Wooden chairs, a wooden table, and a green and beige fabric couch. There were shelves along the back that had various knickknacks of clay or wood. There was nothing sweet or cute or homey about it, like a museum exhibit put together by someone who knew what the objects were but had no idea how humans actually lived. There were no magazines or clutter or toys on the floor or any other evidence of the chaos of everyday living.

  There was also no evidence of what had happened here before. The floor was clean and the bed well made. I could even smell the scent she wore in the room, which was perversely electrifying. Nothing was collecting dust as if the maids came in a couple of times a week. I tore back the covers and the sheets on the bed. The mattress was made of a woven reed-like material. I had no idea what its absorbency was, but there was no sign of blood. Maybe they replaced the mattress. Maybe they were getting ready to rent the place out to someone new.

  I walked over to the big window with mesh curtains. The window looked out across the main street to the town square. People were out milling about, but they were a litt
le twitchier than I remembered. Then I saw why. Demons in large numbers were coming in from all alleys and streets. They were surrounding the human herd, forcing them towards the town square. Any humans who didn’t move fast enough were given a hard push if they were lucky, a rake with claws if they were not. One demon stood on a raised set of steps overlooking the crowd. From his body language I surmised he was in charge. He also had two human Shirks as attendants. A group of demons came through the crowd carrying the bodies of two bloodied, dead demons. I smiled. Although I still wasn’t that good at distinguishing one demon from another, I was pretty sure they were the two I had killed. Nice to know I had their attention. Now I could get to observe what they would do about this while they still had no idea where I was.

  The demon-in-chief had his hand on the shoulders of his attendant human while the human was speaking. Probably the demon was putting the words in the man’s head. This was interesting data. They could use telepathy, but broadcast telepathy was either too difficult or they just couldn’t do it. Unfortunately, I couldn’t hear what was being shouted at the crowd. Whatever the glass-like substance they used for windows was, it made a pretty good sound seal. At one point, the speaking human pointed his finger out and swept it over the crowd. They were looking for a witness to the killings, if not the killers themselves. Good luck getting information from this crowd. I chuckled. This is the way the demons wanted their humans… seen and not heard. Now it would work against them.

  Demons in front pulled two men from the crowd. They ripped at the men, tearing at their bodies, opening up their chest cavities and disemboweling them. It was horrible to watch. Then there were screams even I could hear and two protos rose up where the two men had been, lashing out at both demon and fellow human. The sea of demons parted and let the protos run off. The demons were clearly fearful of the protos. Despite that fear, their point had been made. People had better come up with information or it was going to be a city of protos. Suddenly one of the demons looked up. There was shuffling in the crowd. Out of the crowd of humans emerged a single woman. It was the woman I had walked in on earlier and taken advantage of, trying to get a rise.

  It didn’t occur to me to be more than surprised at first, but then the real threat sank in. I watched her speak to the demons, though it was hard from this distance to make out her expressions clearly. It was probably a detached reporting of my presence. The demon cuffed her hard, sending her to the floor, most likely out of frustration that I had been there undetected or punishing her for not reporting it earlier. They knew I was here. My behavior was clearly enough of an anomaly here that they would know it was specifically me. For some reason I still didn’t understand they really were after me. Here was the problem. Now that they knew it was me, while engaging in a general search, it might occur to them that there was one place I might return to. Unless they really were dumber than they looked. I had to get out and find someplace to hide until this blew over.

  There was a sound behind me. The door opened. I spun around, staff in hand. My body tightened. Then, just as suddenly, the air left my lungs. I dropped the staff.

  “Rox.”

  I stepped back not sure what to do or what this meant. She stood in the doorway, just as I remembered her, a black cloak drawn around her, carrying a cloth bag. She smiled, but her eyes didn’t join in. They were dark, worried. She set her bag down and ran over to the window, surveying the activity in every direction. She looked back at me.

  “You shouldn’t have come back.”

  “People kept telling me not to. Guess I just don’t listen enough.”

  I was looking for the right words.

  “Rox, you are still alive. You have your identity.”

  “They wouldn’t kill me, but it was better that you thought they had.”

  “You are all right, then?”

  She looked at me. Pain, deep and terrible, passed over her face like a shadow. “I am all right now, mostly. There are many things in this place that are worse than death.”

  She came over to me, touching my shoulder. There was always a comfort from her touch. Part of what made her an escort, as Izzy had explained it.

  “Quentin, I am an escort who has been attuned to you. I was aware you were somewhere near, but as long as they didn’t know it was ok. Even if it doesn’t occur to them that you would come here, they will come to me seeking to use my—connection—to find you.”

  I had to admit this was pretty grim. There was very little chance we’d be able to slip out on the streets and not be noticed.

  “You can… sense me?”

  “Yes, I am psychically tuned to your essence.”

  Boy, I had questions about that, but there wasn’t time now.

  “Can they sense humans by other than eyesight?”

  “No.”

  “Are there any empty apartments or buildings around here?”

  “There is one on the third floor, other end of the building.”

  “Come on.” I grabbed her, picking up my staff, and forced her out the door with me.

  “Wait, they’ll expect me to be…”

  “Forget it. I’m not leaving you for them this time.”

  “We can’t escape.”

  “When I don’t see a good choice, I take the one that keeps me moving.”

  “If I stay, maybe I can buy you time…”

  “Forget it! I’m taking you or I don’t go.” I pushed her ahead of me down the stairs to the third floor and then down the hallway. She was no longer resisting, but clearly fearful. Rox showed me the empty apartment door. It was locked, but I was able to blade my way in with the stone dagger. I shut the door and ran over to the window that looked out on the back of the building. I didn’t see any movement, so I threw the window open. I took a chair and propped it up against the door.

  “They’ll be able to break in, but it will slow them down.”

  “But where can we go? Everyone is looking for you. We’ll be spotted as soon as we hit the streets.”

  “That’s why we’re not going to go anywhere.”

  Rox looked at me, bewildered. “They are going to search every apartment.”

  “And we’ll be hiding in plain sight. When they come, we will hear them and hide in the closet. Hopefully they will see the open window and think we went out.”

  “That’s your plan?”

  “I’ve been hearing that question a lot lately.”

  “And if they aren’t that stupid?”

  “Then I kill the ones that came in here and hope the others don’t notice. I admit it. It’s not a great plan. I’m probably going to end up a proto, but maybe not. I feel the need to protect you as well as myself. This may not do either. I can’t force you to stay here to satisfy my rescue complex, and I don’t know what you meant by things being worse than dying or becoming a proto. If you need to, go back up and lead them here to me. You don’t owe me a thing.”

  Rox looked at me a moment and then her features warmed. Humor came back to her eyes. She was the gentling, subtle, seductive escort again.

  “My concern is for you. If you are going to do this, I will stay by you.”

  “Do you have any idea why they are so set on getting me? Seems to be a little more than one uncooperative dead human.”

  “You mean besides the fact that you escaped from them before and have killed and wounded several of them?”

  “There is that. They hold grudges?”

  “I don’t know, exactly. They are afraid of you, because of tribal legends among the demons. Legends of one who comes here…”

  “Some kind of messiah? For Hell?”

  She laughed. It was cute. And very human. She probably thought the same thing of my comment.

  “No. More like a disrupter. Demons don’t have grand ideas. They are basically lazy. They like the status quo and hate change.”

  “So they think I’m going to change things?”

  “You already have. The more they gnaw on not being able to contain you, the mo
re obsessed they become. Also, there is the regional manitor.”

  “What’s a manitor?”

  “Your experience of Hell is very parochial.”

  “Parochial. Nice word. Ok, I get it. I still have a lot to learn.”

  “Unfortunately for you, so do I. I work and live in a border town. It is all I know, the rest is just stuff I pick up.”

  “Back to this manitor.”

  “Hell is hierarchical like anyplace else. There are different types of beings and each occupies a separate class with powers over all classes below them. The demons are given mostly free reign to run roughshod over us because we are the ‘untouchables.’ But if they can’t handle their affairs and any human begins making too much trouble, they have to answer to the manitor.”

  “The manitor is an official of some sort?”

  “Yes, like a regional governor. However, that is too simple. The manitor is another sort of creature altogether. They are old beings with elemental magical powers. They have control over large regions.”

  “So, I misbehave and I have some bad-ass sorcerer to deal with?”

  “More likely his shade.”

  “Like the black shirts?”

  “Not exactly. The shirks work with demons. They have more privilege than power. A manitor’s shade has real powers and is much deadlier, more powerful.”

  I had many more questions about manitors and shades, but we heard sounds in the hallway. I pushed Rox with me into the closet. There were some old linens in there. I threw them over us. In the dark, the ambiguous shape the fabric created might give us a moment extra. Rox was behind me. I was poised, squatting on the floor like a coiled spring, my staff and dagger in hand. I found myself wishing I knew how many there were. There was a tentative jiggling of the doorknob, then the sound of a key. I wondered if it might have been smarter to leave the door unencumbered and the window shut—make everything look normal. But I needed to give them a false story of where I had gone.