Crane, R [ Southern Watch 03] Corrupted

by Robert J. Crane

  Mick felt a hard flare of pain in his own balls as someone hit him unmercifully in them while he was looking the other way. He turned in time to see Molly—or was it Mandy?—with that fucking demon hunter’s sword in her hands, the blade plunged right into his crotch.

  Mick screamed, lost the power of thought, and whatever grip he had left. He fell, sword still buried in his fucking cock and bollocks, and hit the dark, empty earth below. He could see that Molly whore above him, staring out of the door of the car—

  ***

  Lauren had a clear view when Mick came plummeting out of the car. She had a very clear, rage-filled view of her daughter stabbing him with a sword, and she watched him fall. I hope he’s dead, she thought, her mind filling in the blanks of what had happened above. It wasn’t like it was real difficult; her daughter’s screams coming from the car, her daughter’s panties lying on the grass, her daughter’s supposed love interest with a sword through his groin, put there by her daughter.

  A + B = Rapist motherfucker.

  It wasn’t exactly a casual stroll she took over to him. It was urgent, it was hurried, it was full of fury and wrath and all manner of righteous, hateful indignation. She found him clutching himself at the site of the wound.

  The cowboy fell right as she reached Mick, a shorter drop than the carnie had taken. She heard him land, heard him go, “OOF!” and gave him not a whit of attention.

  Lauren Ella Darlington stared down at the bastard who had hurt her daughter, made her scream, made her feel all manner of unpleasant and unsavory things—

  And she grabbed the hilt of that sword that was lodged in his nuts—visibly, obviously lodged in them, since his pants were nowhere to be found—and she plucked it out—

  And rammed back in again, a little higher. Turned that fucker into a falsetto in one.

  ***

  Hendricks watched the doctor—he was pretty sure it was her, the lady from the accident scene where Erin had gotten hurt—sever the demon’s genitalia with his sword. He would have cringed, but he didn’t really have any mercy left in his tank for the bastard, honestly.

  “Mom!” The cry came from above, from the car that he’d just dropped out of. The girl was standing, framed in there, on her feet again. Hendricks traced the line back to the dark-haired, avenging angel standing over the demon and put it together.

  “Get him in the heart,” Hendricks said, just loud enough for her to hear him, as he struggled to his feet. She glanced at him blankly. “The heart,” Hendricks repeated and mimed a stabbing motion.

  The doctor stared at him uncomprehendingly for just a second, and then he watched the determination cross her face, twist it, all that rage pooling—

  And she stabbed him in the heart, the motherfucker, and he glowed for a second before the black fire claimed him.

  ***

  Mick couldn’t believe it. It was the mother, the fucking mother. He couldn’t have seen that coming, not in a million years. He was ready to burn her, too, like that fucking bum, but then she pulled the sword out of his balls and slid it a couple inches higher. That was a new level of desire to scream.

  He was still too busy writhing from getting his junk severed to hear the conversation going on around him in anything other than muffled tones. He’d just about come out of it enough to hear the words “the heart!” when he felt a blade slip into his, and that was all she wrote.

  Mick had about two seconds to open his eyes, pack his essence’s metaphorical bags, and stare straight into the eyes of a pissed-off mother before the fires of hell dragged him down into a darkness the like of which he had never experienced.

  ***

  Arch saw it all from where he stood on the platform. Saw the demon fall, saw Hendricks fall, saw Dr. Darlington mosey over and stab the bastard dead—with a little coaxing from Hendricks.

  He took a quick look and found Reeve making his way up the platform on the far side. It was obvious to the crowd that something had happened on the far side, but the rush and the glut was making fast movement there well-nigh impossible. He made a quick gesture, something he hoped Duncan would see that Reeve wouldn’t. The OOC gave him a nod of acknowledgment and plunged off the platform on the far side, ducking through the moving spokes of the wheel as he jumped and dodged to get to Hendricks.

  “What the hell just happened?” Reeve called at him, stalking up the nearby ramp, only twenty feet or so away.

  “Almost got that car down,” Arch said, nodding at the one with the door open and flapping in the breeze. There was an outline of a girl in a dress, and he had his suspicions on exactly who it was, based on the good doctor’s reaction to the demon …

  “Who gives a fuck about the car, Arch?” Reeve yelled. “What the hell is going on here? Did you see who came out of it?”

  “Not really,” Arch said. He doubted his lying face had gotten any better, but at least it was getting easier to spit them out now.

  ***

  “Nicely done,” Hendricks said, eyeing the woman with the dark hair, who was staring at the spot in the grass where the demon had burned his way back to hell. “Can I have my sword back?” He tried to be neutral about it, as much as he could under the circumstances.

  The woman stared at the hilt of it like she could see through it and dropped her grip on it. The sword tilted toward the ground like some great tower falling to the earth, thudding gently in the wet grass.

  “Thanks,” Hendricks said, dodging past her to scoop it up. He brought the blade up in defense by pure instinct when he heard the thump of someone landing just in front of him—

  “Time to go,” Duncan said from where he’d just jumped off the platform. “We need to make an exit.”

  Hendricks looked left, then right, finding both ways starting to fill with people. Behind them, a ten-foot high fence cordoned them off from an empty baseball diamond, the red clay a pale shade of grey in the light of the Ferris wheel. “I’m not finding any exit signs.”

  “Aren’t you with the FBI or something?” the doctor asked. “I could have sworn you were from the FBI.”

  Duncan’s face twitched slightly as Hendricks stared at the OOC, wondering. “That’s not gonna hold up under this scrutiny,” Duncan said simply. “We need to motor.”

  “I’m open to suggestions,” Hendricks said, “since I’m guessing this little clusterfuck isn’t going to be easy to explain.”

  “Good,” Duncan said and started toward him, “I’m glad you’re open.”

  “To suggestions,” Hendricks said as the OOC wrapped an arm around his chest and started dragging him forward like he weighed about as much as an empty suit, “not to—what the hell are you doing?”

  Duncan jumped the softball field fence, just barely clearing it. Hendricks could hear the fence rattle, felt the heels of his boots click-clack the metal top of it as they passed. Duncan straightened him out after the landing, though, setting him back on his feet instead of just letting him drop. “Time to run, cowboy.”

  Hendricks blinked as the demon started off at a brisk run toward the nearest bleachers. Bereft of any other good suggestions, he tossed one last look back at the doctor, who just stood staring at him through the chain-link, and then he ran to follow the OOC.

  ***

  Alison bounced as the truck hit a rut, the whole cab jouncing her a good foot in the air. She fumbled for her seatbelt when she came down, the uneven ground of the hillside they were running not doing her any favors. Her daddy was at the wheel and the rifles were stowed not very ceremoniously in the back, which was worrying. They were plunging down the thinly tread trail that Ed Claskey used to reach this part of his property, going at a speed that Alison knew her father hoped would keep them ahead of Ernesto Reines until they got to the main road. That was safety, that was escape, but until then, she had a feeling it was going to be a rough ride. They hit another rut and she bounced again, the pickup’s shocks protesting the rough treatment.

  “You’d think this wasn’t your first time evading th
e law,” she said to her father as he jerked the wheel, following the old rutted trail.

  “That’s definitely a first,” her father said, his face screwed up in concentration, eyes darting to take in everything he saw ahead, “but it’s not exactly the first time I’ve driven off road in a hell of a hurry.” He spared her just a moment’s look, a little glint in his eyes before the road ahead got his attention once more. Alison just braced herself and held on as they went, keeping one eye fixed in her rearview mirror, hoping against hope not to see red and blue flashing lights there.

  ***

  Arch watched Duncan and Hendricks clear the fence in a jump just as Reeve got into view to see for himself. He didn’t know how much of that the sheriff caught, but he was pretty sure he saw them hoofing it off into the night. It wasn’t like a guy in a long black coat and cowboy hat was the sort of thing that just slipped the mind.

  Reeve wheeled on Arch with a look that suggested betrayal, fury, and a mingling of a hot mess of emotions that Arch didn’t even want to dip into. “What the fuck was that?”

  “Guy in a cowboy hat running off into the night,” Arch said coolly.

  “You just stood here and watched it happen,” Reeve said with a glacial reserve of his own.

  “I may be a decent athlete, but I’d have a hard time leaping that fence to pursue,” Arch offered.

  Reeve’s lips contorted long, like his jaw clenched. “You think I don’t recall your friend the cowboy? Who I met the night your apartment was broken into?”

  “I’m sure you recall my friend,” Arch said, feeling a surprising level of calm. “I’m sure you also saw him climb the Ferris wheel just now, and not shoot a rifle from the hillside, not cause screams from inside the car—”

  Reeve’s face contorted again, but somehow he held back his spitting rage. “You’re relieved of duty, Deputy Stan.”

  “For not pursuing someone who wasn’t committing any crime except climbing an apparatus not designed for climbing?” Arch didn’t even feel resentful; it wasn’t like this was unexpected. He snapped out a response anyway.

  “I’ll let the district attorney craft the official charges,” Reeve said with a rough satisfaction. “But I’m thinking aiding and abetting, obstruction of justice, some sort of corruption charge—”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Arch said with a surprising amount of calm.

  “I know a dirty cop when I see one,” Reeve replied.

  “You wouldn’t know your ass from a hole in the ground,” Arch said and just dismounted the platform right off the side, over the railing and Jesus help anyone below. Thankfully for their own sakes, they moved.

  “You better run, Arch,” Reeve shouted from somewhere above him. “I’m coming for you!”

  Arch just turned and looked up. “Why don’t you try and catch a glimpse of what’s really going on around here?” He met Reeve’s gaze for a split second to let the man know he was serious and then started shouldering his way through the crowd with a purpose.

  19.

  Lauren stood in the dark after she watched the cowboy and the FBI agent—or whatever he was—retreat over the fence and flee into the night. She turned back to the Ferris wheel to watch it descend, her eyes on Molly, but she started catching snatches of conversation from the platform. It was about five feet off the ground, clear as day in front of her on the lit, raised metal structure, just through the crossbars of the Ferris wheel. Impossible to miss. And so dramatic, she couldn’t help but look, even as she waited for Molly—thank God she looked all right, sweeping in a slow arc back toward the platform—to descend.

  “I know a dirty cop when I see one,” Reeve said to Archibald Stan, clear as if he’d just fired a gun.

  “You wouldn’t know your ass from a hole in the ground,” Arch replied, testier than he’d even been that afternoon at the mine. The man looked strained, and he’d—had he actually just cursed? Holier-than-the-Pope Archibald Stan? He disappeared over the far edge of the platform, and she caught a glimpse of his legs under the metal girders that held the platform aloft. He’d jumped. Just walked away from the sheriff. From his boss.

  “You better run, Arch! I’m coming for you!” Lauren listened to the words dully, blinking, and she looked down at her feet again.

  Where that man—that rapist—she’d meant to kill—meant to stab right through the heart—had disintegrated into nothingness, eaten by what looked like … black flames.

  Demons.

  She blinked and folded slightly again to see Arch Stan’s legs as the man disappeared into the crowd.

  He hadn’t lied.

  There were demons.

  “MOM!” Molly dropped from a height of about five feet as the Ferris wheel car swung around, her Chucks clunking against the metal as she hit the platform and then squirmed around, charging through the slow-turning spokes—and damned near giving her mother a heart attack—as she followed the path that FBI guy had to get to Lauren. Lauren opened her arms and Molly slammed into her amidships, rocking her back. She did not care. Not a bit.

  “Dr. Darlington,” came Sheriff Reeve’s voice from through the spokes of the wheel, his near-bald head looking almost as wrinkled as his forehead. “Are you all right?”

  Lauren felt the weight of Molly in her arms, her daughter in her grasp, the full significance of what had just happened causing her emotional mind to tremble even as the logical, careful, assessing, doctor part of her tried to assemble it into something rational. “I’m …” She didn’t take her eyes off of Molly, and she didn’t answer. She just didn’t have anything to say that made one damned lick of sense.

  ***

  “Will you hold the fuck up?” Hendricks said, gasping for breath and feeling like he’d been gasping most of the day. He didn’t feel much in the way of pain from the drop, which was fortunate; this was more from the flat-out, haul-ass run he’d done to try and keep up with Duncan. They’d skated the edge of the carnival, running the fence line, hiding behind cover as best they could, Hendricks wondering all the while exactly how this particular shitstorm was going to make landfall.

  “Now is not a good time for stopping,” Duncan said, slowing only a little. They were nearing the parking lot, and, Hendricks figured, some measure of safety.

  “When would be a good time to stop and die?” Hendricks asked, barely getting out his smart-assed reply.

  “When we’re safely in Moscow, I think.” Duncan ran on, leaving Hendricks cursing as they rounded the last curve in the fence and found themselves staring at the first row of parked cars.

  “Fuck that, I ain’t running that far,” Hendricks said, trying to avoid doubling over. “We still got business here, you know.”

  “Yeah, well, enjoy your stay in the local jail while this town and county get destroyed by the rising tide of demonic chaos,” Duncan said. “Should be a front row seat for the end of Midian.”

  Hendricks adjusted his hat on his head. It wasn’t that bad … was it?

  Of course it was. The signs were all there. They’d been watching the water level rising all along; now it was just a matter of when it would pour over.

  A car screeched to a stop in front of them, lights flaring. It took a second for him to work out that it was Arch’s Explorer, and the man himself was sitting in the front seat. Hendricks staggered forward a few steps behind Duncan, slipping through the passenger door that the demon graciously opened for him as the OOC slid into the back. Arch did not spare the horses once they were both in, putting pedal to metal in such a manner that Hendricks’s doubts about having to run were erased in an instant. “How bad is it?” he asked once they were out of the parking lot and streaking down a paved road toward town.

  “We’re gonna need to get as much of our stuff together as we can pack in ten minutes or less and vacate Midian proper,” Arch said. The tension was apparent in every facet of the man’s reply, from his form as he held the wheel with one hand to the slow delivery of each word with emphasis. “You get th
at, Alison?”

  ***

  “I heard you,” Alison said, the line still open. “Everybody made it out?”

  “We’re all clear,” Arch replied. “Meet us at the apartment; we’ll need to ditch the Explorer.”

  He hung up without another word, and Alison was left speechless anyhow. She did not look at her father as they slid down a back road. She didn’t need to; she watched him unspool the earphone out of his own ear after Arch hung up. Watched him and saw the expression on his face turn to fear, something she had never really seen there before.

  ***

  “So much for the town car,” Duncan said from the back seat.

  “That sucker would draw nothing but heat,” Hendricks said. Arch glanced at the cowboy in the passenger seat. He didn’t bother adding his chorus of assent. “Kind of like the Explorer now, I guess?”

  Arch didn’t take his eyes off the road. “You guess right.” He swerved slightly to avoid a pothole. The emotions were roiling inside of him, a thousand—no, a million of them, all warring for space to stretch out and express themselves.

  “I only need like five minutes at my place,” Hendricks said.

  “Same,” Duncan said. “Assuming you mean for me to come with you.”

  Arch glanced into the rearview mirror, saw on the demon’s face a cold, blunt look that wasn’t without a little rage etched in between the lines. “You got anywhere else to go?”

  “Depends on what you mean to do,” Duncan said. “If you’re just gonna hunker down and hide until this place slides off the map, I can think of other uses for my time.”

  “Oh, no,” Arch said, the answer coming out more playful than he intended. “No, no, no. See, we’re in it now. I just watched my career go up in smoke to save my hometown; if you think I’m gonna do that and just run so the next nasty thing that washes up on these shores can have free rein to finish the job? You got something else coming.”

  Hendricks was the first to speak up. “What do you got in mind, Arch?”