“Someone’s coming,” Steven said in my ear. He was probably wishing he’d never tagged along; the bag he was in was bouncing around a whole lot more than the jeep did.
“We have to get out of the water,” I shouted ahead. She nodded and veered to the left, to the ladder on the side of a standalone building. It was small one-family in a neighborhood of identical buildings.
We were traveling through an area of the island consisting of housing for staff. All the places had been built at the same time. On the mainland, it would have been called projects, or public housing, or a Levittown, if that’s still a thing.
This unfortunately wasn’t one of those projects where the houses were really close together. That would have been great, because we could have traveled from roof to roof. As it was, all we had going for us was the ladder each house had on the side, so residents could clean the roof gutter traps and maybe sunbathe up there.
Mirella scrambled up, and I followed. No sooner had my feet left the water, when I heard the rush of something traveling past.
It was like dealing with an invisible shark.
“There were two of them,” Mirella said when I got to the top. “I don’t think they’re looking for us specifically.”
“What does it feel like,” I asked Steven. “Are you hearing them?”
“They’re talking under the water,” he said. “It’s like this weird hum. Feel it in my head and my gut, more than my ears. It’s like an electrical charge. Dunno if I’m turned on or if I’m gonna be sick.”
“I’d appreciate if neither of those happened while you’re in my bag.”
“I gotcha.”
“Let’s go,” Mirella said. “I can see the hospital.”
“I think that’s the library we’re looking at.”
“Are you sure?”
“No, but I can never keep them straight, they’re built the same. Where’s the general store?”
She scanned the skyline.
“Over there, I think.”
“I think you’re right. Let’s head there first, I have an idea.”
“An idea?”
“Well that and I know the way to the hospital from there. As much as I’d enjoy being trapped overnight in the library instead, maybe another time.”
We scampered back down and proceeded with the hop-running in a direction we thought put us on a path to the general store. Soon, we exited the projects and reconnected with one of the main roads, one I was pretty sure I drove down routinely on my way to the store’s parking area.
We nearly made it to that lot when Steven sounded out another warning, only this time we had no roof nearby.
“Quickly!” Mirella yelled, doubling her speed to get to the store. This was great for her, but I didn’t have another gear to shift up into, so I was stuck going the same speed I had been. Then something swam past my leg. I was already stopping when the merman rose up in front of me.
It was a weird thing to watch, somewhere between an umbrella closing and a person emerging from a swimming pool. Mostly, it looked like a special effect from a Terminator movie, which was jarring to see happen in real life.
I held the sword up.
“I don’t want to fight you,” I said as calmly as I knew how. I figured even if he couldn’t understand me he could understand tone of voice okay.
“Please fight him,” Steven said in my ear.
The merman roared, and raised his fist, so I went at him with the sword. That went pretty well.
I’m not as fancy with sharp things as a goblin, but I’m okay. Mirella already showed me the best way to do this, but I didn’t have a clean angle on his head because of his raised arm, so I took off part of the arm instead, spun around as he recoiled and used the power from the spin to propel the blade through his neck, and that was that.
Then, of course, there was another one coming. I got maybe ten paces before he was in my way.
Up ahead, meanwhile, it looked like two of them were facing off with Mirella. We were going to lose a game of numbers soon.
I slashed at the merman in front of me but didn’t wait around for an opening to make a kill. Instead I let him stumble aside in pain—from losing a hand, or a fin or whatever we’re calling this appendage on them—before continuing toward the store.
“Just wound them and keep moving!” I shouted.
Mirella understood the reasoning all right. She made a deep, slashing cut into the torso of one of them and buried a knife in the shoulder of a second, somersaulted over both, and kept running.
We made it to the lot. I knew this as much because of the crushed seashells under my bare feet as from the building itself.
Another merman materialized in front of the door, took a throwing knife to the face, and fell aside, and a second later we were in. A few seconds after that, the rushing water that followed us (it sure felt like we were being chased by the water itself) abated. They didn’t try to come into the building. Maybe they only did buildings after sundown.
I still locked the door. I wasn’t sure how rational that decision was, since the water was also inside the store. After what we’d just seen it was possible mermen physiology didn’t concern itself with things like doors. If that was the case we really were fighting sentient water.
There was not, however, as much water in the store. That was a little surprising. The floor was on the same level as the street outside.
Looking around, I saw why. Someone had been using a sump pump. It was sitting on the counter near the register, and looked like it had been employed recently.
“All right, we’re here,” Mirella said. “Now how do we get to the hospital without being overwhelmed?”
“Oh, right,” I said. I was still piecing together the pump thing. “Go to the paint aisle.”
“I’m confused,” she said.
“It’s right down there.”
“No, not about the location of the paint aisle. It’s clearly marked. This entire building was under water two days ago, but things are in their proper place and look relatively clean. Did the wave miss the building?”
“Someone cleaned up.”
“I see. And now we’re looking for paint?”
“Not paint, rubbing alcohol.”
She shot me a look that indicated she thought I took this detour for a beverage. I didn’t, but it was a fair assumption.
“They don’t like alcohol,” I said. “Steven said so.”
“I did, yeah,” the iffrit confirmed.
“We can load it in those insecticide sprayers.”
She nodded. “That’s… a clever idea.”
“Thanks. Did you hear that?”
I was looking up. Someone was above us.
“No, what did you hear?”
“Do you know if the store has a second floor to it?”
“Not a public one, surely.”
“I think somebody might live up there. Someone who hates water but came down here and cleaned up anyway, and doesn’t know any better than to try and get rid of an island-wide flood with a sump pump.”
I stepped around the front counter.
The store was owned by a talkative imp named Aloysius Carmichael Poe. The story of how Aloysius Poe ended up on the island selling goods was remarkable, probably about three quarters fictional, and much too long to tell here. Plus, I couldn’t do the story justice, because nobody but an imp could, not really. It’s the one thing they do really well.
Anyway, Mr. Poe wasn’t around. I didn’t know where he lived, but I did know that the place he lived was not atop the store. Someone else was up there.
There was a door behind the counter, only it didn’t look like a door because there were things—bits of metal encased in plastic and stuck on hooks—hanging on it. I found a doorknob, though, and pulled it open. This rattled the bits of metal, but nothing fell.
A staircase was on the other side.
I was pretty sure I knew who was up there, and it was the sort of creature one made an effort t
o not surprise.
“Hello?” I called. “It’s Adam. Come on down.”
Nothing, at first, and then the entire ceiling shook. A massive figure darkened the top of the stairs.
Across the room, Mirella—a second ago loading alcohol into a canister—put a hand on the grip of her sword.
I shook my head at her.
“Hey, Leonard,” I said. “How’s it going?”
“Hey Adam!” the demon greeted enthusiastically. “Is the water gone yet?”
“Not yet, no.”
“Okay, I’m’n’a stay up here. Hey, you want, come on up. I don’t get guests much but you’re all right, yeah?”
I took a look at Mirella, who shook her head violently.
“All right, sure,” I said.
I took off the backpack containing Steven and put him down next to the sump pump.
“Make yourself useful and help her out,” I said.
“Sure, sure,” he said. I think he heard the word alcohol and figured helping her was going to be more fun than it really was.
The stairs were terribly creaky and the way up surprisingly narrow. It was probably never intended for a demon’s use, but very few things in the world were.
The room at the top was a combination storage area and living space. In one corner was a large bedroll that looked like it was probably two or three sleeping bags zippered together. Next to the bed was a tall refrigerator attached to a portable generator. Next to that was a door leading to a toilet.
Everything else looked like extra products for downstairs, sitting in wet cardboard boxes. The windows on one side of the room were blown out, but the glass had all been cleaned up.
The whole room smelled like mildew and unwashed demon.
Lenny shook my hand and gave me a little hug, two things demons are known to be very bad at, generally.
“Great to see you!” he said. “Glad you made it!”
“Good to see you too. I… I have to admit, you’re probably the last one I expected to see make it through the flood. I thought demons couldn’t swim.”
“Yeah we can’t. I tried it once, but you know we just sink.”
“Did you just hold your breath or something?”
He laughed.
“I did! Saw the wave comin’ through the window there and took a real deep breath. I can hold for like an hour, maybe. Good thing the water didn’t knock me out though, I would’a been done. But I saw it comin’.”
“The water didn’t recede in an hour.”
“Naw, more like two, three hours before there was enough air at the top of the room to reach. Here, I’ll show ya.”
He walked me around to one corner of the room. There, tied to the wall, was a half-dozen oxygen tanks.
“They’re for the cutting torches construction guys use, I think. But, like, there’s air in ‘em.”
“That’s really clever, Lenny.”
“Hey, thanks! I appreciate it.”
Demons weren’t known to be dumb, certainly not as dumb as trolls were supposed to be. They did have a history of being governed by their emotions, though, and calmly assessing a situation in which a failure to do so would result in drowning was not the sort of even-handed behavior I expected from one of them.
Between Grundle and Leonard, I was beginning to think the problem was my preconceptions, and not their failure to line up with those preconceptions.
“So is anyone else alive?” he asked.
“Are we… am I the first person you’ve seen since the water came?”
“Yeah. I was thinkin’ I’d go look around once the ground was dry again, but it’s takin’ its time huh?”
“There are a lot of us still alive. There’s actually a rescue operation underway. We could use your help.”
“Sure! Sure, just as soon as it’s dry again.”
The first time a demon tried to kill me, I escaped by jumping in the nearest large body of water and swimming away. For a long time I assumed my success was due to demons not knowing how to swim or to being otherwise unable to swim. This was true, but it’s also accurate to say demons have a phobia. From that perspective, the last few days had to have been horrific for Leonard. And again, historically demons deal with complex emotions by hitting things. The fact that the store wasn’t a pile of rubble by now was amazing.
“We actually have to go pretty fast. Like, in the next ten minutes. We have to get to the hospital before the sun goes down.”
“Why’s that?”
“Have you heard the howling? They’re worse at night.”
“Yeah! And the glowy things and stuff, yeah! What the heck is all that?”
“Well, that’s why. We want to get to the hospital before they come out again.”
“Yeah… I mean, sure, yeah, I’d like to help, Adam. You’re a pal. But… I mean, water, right? What if it decides to come back? I gotta be near the tanks, you know? I mean, water will kill ya, and it don’t matter how hard you hit it.”
I laughed.
“Lenny, if you’re looking for punchable water, I have good news.”
* * *
It took a few more minutes to convince him to come with us, mainly because what I was saying didn’t make a ton of sense to anybody who hadn’t already experienced it first-hand. And he still wasn’t at all happy with the prospect of wading through any water that went past his ankles.
But he did come down. On this point, the other members of the party were less than overjoyed.
Steven, who was evidently unaware that a demon lived on the island, shrieked and ran off to hide in the plumbing aisle. This was an appropriate response, most of the time.
Mirella was on a first-name basis with Leonard, and had had multiple conversations with him, but she looked just about as happy.
“Mirelly!” he greeted. He walked over and gave her a hug, and if I could adequately describe the expression on her face I would.
I knew she never trusted him, because we’d had that conversation a couple of times, but these were always somewhat academic conversations, because we lived in an island paradise and didn’t imagine a circumstance in which we needed to concern ourselves with Lenny in a combat situation.
If she could have pulled me into a private chat to elaborate on exactly why this was a terrible idea, she would have. But we didn’t have that kind of time, and no privacy.
And I mean it was sort of a terrible idea. Trusting a demon to direct his rage—and in Lenny’s case, to unlock that rage in the first place—at only a certain subset of living things was always risky. When employing them in wars the best thing you could do was put them in the front of the army and make sure they continued to face away from your core troops. If they got turned around and their ardor was up, the odds were pretty decent they’d start killing the wrong people.
On the other hand, we were going to lose the sun very shortly, and we barely made it to the hardware store alone.
It was a calculated risk.
“All right, are we ready?” I asked. “Where’s Steven?”
Steven made a strangled noise from somewhere inside a pipe on the other side of the store. I hunted him down and coaxed him out.
“Oh hey, looka that. Hi, little naked guy,” Lenny said. Steven gulped and waved, but didn’t speak. Leonard, who was accustomed to people suddenly losing the ability to form words in front of him, didn’t appear to notice.
Mirella handed over a canister with a hose.
“You can have this,” she said. “I prefer using a sword. Not that I distrust your instincts regarding alcohol.”
A few minutes later, we exited the building, in exactly the wrong order: Mirella first; me with a sword in my hand and Steven hanging out of the backpack on my back, holding a spray canister of rubbing alcohol; and Lenny the water-phobic demon bringing up the rear. It was the wrong order for the reasons I already gave, i.e., always put the demon in front so he knows which direction to attack.
These were not normal circumstances, though.
“It’s not going to get any deeper,” I said instead. “I promise. The ground is right under it, just where it’s supposed to be.”
“Feels gross,” he said.
“On that we agree.”
He got past his discomfort enough for us to break into a jog. Soon after that, Steven relaxed and started talking again, which was important since we needed him to let us know when we were about to be attacked. Mostly, he wanted to discuss the suddenly-important question of whether demons bathed, and if so, how.
In some measure of irony, we made it only as far as The Fancy Mermaid before the first attack.
“Incoming!” Steven shouted, interrupting a rambling dissertation on the theory that demons perhaps don’t sweat and therefore don’t smell and thus do not bathe. It would have been a very interesting subject if we were both drunk and not facing imminent death.
Mirella stopped and did a quick 360.
“Where?” she asked.
“All around,” he said, which wasn’t helpful.
It was correct, though. The water erupted, and for the first time in my life I heard a demon shriek like a child. He composed himself enough to declare, “what the shit, you weren’t kidding, holy fuck,” and then he reconnected with his inner monster and started punching mermen.
I really, really wish I could have just sat back and watched the demon vs. mermen event unfold, but I had two of them right in front of me, so there was no time. I engaged one with the sword, turning my back to the second and hoping Steven wasn’t hiding in the bottom of the bag. A couple of seconds later I had my answer.
Most of the banshee screams I’d heard to this point had been a form of communication. I didn’t know this up until I heard the sound they make when they’re in significant pain. I didn’t even hear that when I was cutting off limbs. A whole different noise, the scream of pain was a lot higher, and conveyed real anguish, and it also didn’t make my eardrums want to explode, which was nice.
Immortal and the Island of Impossible Things (The Immortal Series Book 4) Page 28