Rangers

by Chloe Garner

  “What in the world?” she said, standing. She had seen a man disappear behind the Cruiser, flailing for balance, as if he had been pulled. He didn’t reappear. She looked down at Sam and Jason, then grabbed her backpack and ran out into the parking lot.

  <><><>

  By the time they got there, the screams were already diminishing into whimpers. Samantha ran around to the far side of the Cruiser, and Jason and Sam followed, drawing their guns. They found a man in a white tee shirt and jeans laying over the curb. His stomach was a mess of ripped fabric, blood, and deep, black gashes. The large demon standing over him looked up at Samantha and growled, proper teeth showing. Sam and Jason opened fire, and it winced away.

  “Stay out of my business,” it said, turning back to Samantha. She stood mere feet from it, unflinching. It looked down and kicked at the man’s broken body at its feet, then looked up again, wincing under more gunfire. “I can find you, and I can end you.”

  She had the stiletto out of her boot in a clenched hand and she swung at him, but got nothing but air. She growled at the black, misty shape where the demon had been, and looked down at the poor man it had sent to his death. The man was still breathing, but his lips were blue, and his eyes kept rolling up into his head, just bobbing down long enough to establish consciousness, then wandering again.

  “You’re going to be okay,” Jason said, stepping around Samantha and kneeling. “Sam, go get help.”

  “I was just asking if he needed a jump,” the man murmured. His eyes fluttered again.

  “Samantha, are you going to help me here, or not?”

  “Hello, friend,” she said. Jason looked up. Her arms were relaxed, and she was looking just to her left, some distance away. She sounded sad. Jason looked back down at the man, grabbing his hand.

  “You’re going to be okay,” he said again.

  “He isn’t,” Samantha said. Jason looked up, and her face changed. She stepped over the man, walking up to the top of the little grassy ridge that divided the parking lot from the road.

  “Two minutes,” she said to the air. “Give me two minutes.”

  Jason looked at the man, trying not to notice the spreading blood on the ground.

  “Hold on, man,” he said. “Help is coming.”

  Sam returned.

  “They’re calling an ambulance,” Sam said. Jason nodded.

  “See. Help is coming.”

  The man’s grip was weakening.

  “Just… a jump…” he said.

  “You can listen, if you want. I know the rules,” Samantha said to the space of air, then turned.

  “Move,” she said to Jason. He shifted back, not letting go of the man’s hand. The man began to cry softly.

  “Over there,” she said, pointing to the far sidewalk. “You can’t be here.”

  “He’s going to be okay,” Jason said, almost a request this time. She shook her head.

  “He’s going to die, and I don’t have much time. Go.”

  Jason stood, seeing the man’s eyes attempting to follow him, and shuddered, his stomach feeling queasy. He looked at Sam, who shrugged.

  “She seems to know what she’s doing,” Sam offered. Jason turned to watch Samantha as he slowly backed across the parking lot. A small crowd of staff was gathering on the sidewalk, watching. Samantha bent over the man’s face.

  “Is she resuscitating him?” one waitress asked. Sam and Jason looked at each other silently, then turned to watch Samantha again. It was over long before the ambulance got there. Samantha sat back on her heels, then reached down and slid the man’s eyes closed. Several in the crowd gasped. Samantha stood over the body for a few seconds, then walked across the parking lot. As if released, a number of the onlookers scattered across the parking lot to go look. Samantha came and sat on the curb next to where Jason was standing.

  “What did you do?” Jason asked. He and Sam sat on either side of her.

  “Asked him a couple of questions. Helped him make a decision. Told him I would carry the memory of this day with me for the rest of my life,” she said. She looked exhausted. “He died redeemed, though.”

  “What does that mean?” Jason asked. She shook her head.

  “I can’t tell you,” she said, then rested her head on her arms. Sam rubbed her back.

  “Why was that demon here?” Jason asked.

  “It was a pit lord,” she said. “A pitiful one, but plenty to disembowel a man who never saw it coming, and enough to run a warren of squishy fire demons. They’re angry and territorial. He didn’t want to attack us directly, just scare us off.”

  “Why?”

  She shrugged.

  “Why does a pit lord do anything? To prove he can,” she said. Jason shook his head.

  “And who was that you were talking to?” he asked. “Abby?”

  “No. My friend.”

  “You friend who isn’t Abby,” Jason said. “How many of these people are there? Can we get a list?”

  She shook her head.

  “Not now, Jason.”

  “I want beer,” Jason said.

  “I’ll second that,” Sam said.

  “There was a guy standing over him when we got out here,” Jason said. “We shot at him, but he got away. Simple enough?”

  Sam nodded.

  “I don’t lie well,” Samantha said.

  “Could have fooled me,” Jason said.

  “I don’t lie. I just leave parts out. And let you believe what you were going to believe.”

  “So do that, now,” Sam said.

  “Don’t patronize me,” she said. “I’ve seen more in five years than you two have seen in your combined lives. Just give me a minute to grieve.”

  “Why are you grieving? You didn’t know him,” Sam said.

  “Because I told him I would. This is part of carrying his memory. Just leave me alone for a minute.”

  They stood as the ambulance arrived, followed closely by a police car. The officer followed the paramedics over to the Cruiser and watched as they checked the body, then he followed a sea of arms that pointed back at Sam and Jason.

  <><><>

  The interview went okay. The officer had taken the serial numbers off their guns to check their registration, but since a few of the staff had heard the screaming and followed Sam, Jason, and Samantha out of the restaurant, he didn’t look at them very suspiciously. Sam and Jason gave their stock strange-man description: five-foot-eight, maybe five-foot-ten, broad shoulders, a little heavy, wearing a hat. Sam said it was a ball cap, Jason said it was a cowboy hat. Dark skin, maybe. Hispanic, Sam said. Well-tanned anglo, said Jason. Jason gave him a mustache.

  Samantha described the demon.

  The officer had a paramedic look at her.

  “Could you pick him out of a lineup?” the officer asked.

  “No, probably not.” That hat.

  The officer took their phone numbers, disconnected recordings, then let them go.

  “Beer?” Jason asked.

  “Beer,” Sam answered.

  They glanced over at the paramedic, who was checking Samantha’s pulse. She looked up at them and took a deep breath, then nodded.

  “I think I’m okay,” she said. “Just a little over-excited. Thank you.”

  “You’re sure, miss?” the paramedic asked. She nodded.

  “I may have nightmares tonight, but…” she shuddered. “What a terrible way to die.”

  The paramedic looked over at the body being loaded onto a stretcher and nodded.

  “Yeah. You’re here with them?”

  She nodded. He walked over to Sam and Jason.

  “She’ll probably be fine, but if she acts strange after this, you may want to encourage her to see a counselor.”

  “We’ll be sure to watch her,” Jason said. “Anything weird at all.”

  The paramedic nodded at them and left.

  “Beer,” Jason said. She nodded and they picked her up off the sidewalk.

  “I’m going to kil
l that demon,” she said.

  “I’ll see if I can get Simon on it,” Sam said. She nodded, glancing back at the body once more, her eyes dark.

  “My vow,” she muttered, then she sighed and looked up at Sam.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked.

  “Hadn’t thought about it. Fine, I guess.”

  She nodded.

  “Have you decided what you want to happen next?” she asked. He frowned.

  “Hadn’t really thought about it.”

  “Let’s get lunch,” she said. “After that, it’s probably time.”

  They arrived back at the hotel quiet, the rush of the morning’s success worn off. Samantha took her backpack to the bathroom for a few minutes, then came back out.

  “I need you to be somewhere else for a while,” she said to Jason.

  “Why?” he asked.

  “Ceremonial magic and symbolic magic have certain rules. It’s complicated.” She paused and looked at him. “Do you trust me?”

  He looked at her for a long moment.

  “Yes.”

  “To do right by your brother, and by you?” she asked. He looked at Sam.

  “Yes.” There was no hesitation this time. She looked at Sam.

  “And do you trust me?” she asked. He nodded easily.

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you two need a minute?” she asked. “After this, it’s final.”

  Jason nodded after a minute.

  “Yeah.”

  She nodded.

  “I’ll finish getting ready. Let me know when you’re set.”

  She went back into the bathroom and closed the door. Jason sat down on the end of his bed and looked up at Sam.

  “You’re sure about this?” he asked. Sam took a breath and sat down on the other bed, cross-legged.

  “Yeah. I mean, I wish I had more time to decide, but this is the only decision I’ve got.”

  “After this, we probably don’t go back to being us, like we were,” Jason said. “I expect she sticks around for a while at least, and then…”

  Jason was right. The dynamic would change. Sam would know something, would do something, that Jason would never understand. Sam shrugged.

  “Could you turn it down?” he asked. He’d asked it before. Jason shook his head again.

  “No. If we can use it…”

  “We should.”

  “Did she say if this was dangerous?” Jason asked. Sam shook her head.

  “She didn’t.”

  Jason knocked on the bathroom door.

  “Is this, what you’re about to do, dangerous?” he called.

  “Not particularly,” she called through the door. “Shutting him down would be, but pushing him through to the next growth phase shouldn’t be.”

  Jason nodded.

  “Shouldn’t be,” he said. “I like your odds.”

  Sam smiled, looking down at his hands, then glancing up at Jason.

  “Are you stalling?” Sam asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Is it time to quit?”

  “Yes.”

  “Take the laptop and go let Simon know what happened today,” Sam said. “Leave out the part…”

  “The psychic thing? Sure.”

  Jason stood up, then paused. Sam stood and hugged him.

  “I’m in good hands. Anyone who can kill that many demons with a crowbar is on our good list.”

  “I was going for my machete, for the record,” Samantha called from the bathroom.

  “I thought we were having an alone minute,” Jason called back, then clapped Sam on the back. “Be careful.”

  “If I even know how,” Sam answered, then let his brother go. “We’ll come downstairs and find you… after.”

  “Yeah.”

  Jason left, and Sam stood, feeling slightly weird, in between the two beds. Samantha came back out of the bathroom in tiny athletic shorts and a halter top. Sam choked.

  “Yeah,” she said. “I wasn’t walking around like this in front of him,” she said. “Not in a million years.”

  She sat three bowls down on the nightstand, two full, one empty, and looked at him.

  “This gets weird, in a lot of ways,” she said. “Don’t…” She sighed. “Don’t get the wrong idea.”

  He raised his eyebrows. She screwed her eyes shut.

  “Just get through it,” she muttered. Sam’s stomach flopped, wondering what he had gotten himself into.

  “Is this going to hurt?” he asked. She considered.

  “The goblin bite from this morning is a lot worse. You just might be sore.” She closed her eyes again and growled. “Not like it sounds like.” She shook her hair out, then pulled it up in a rubber band. He caught himself watching her abs. She growled around the rubber band in her mouth, then, as she tied her hair up, “do not make this any worse. I swear, you two make me more self-conscious.”

  She sighed and looked at him, tipping her head to the side.

  “Please tell me that you are boxer briefs.”

  He licked his lips, his mouth suddenly dry, and raised his eyebrows at her. She motioned to her body.

  “No shirt, no pants. And if you tell Jason, I will stab you in the eye.”

  He watched her to be sure she was serious as he took his shirt off, then unbuttoned his pants.

  “Can you turn?” he asked. She closed her eyes. He dropped his pants on the floor and threw them with his shirt to the far side of his bed. He was boxer-briefs. “Okay.”

  She opened her eyes, keeping them at his eye level.

  “Sit,” she said, motioning to Jason’s bed. Sam frowned, leaning toward his own bed. “It’s because I’m left-handed,” she told him. As if that explained anything. He sat.

  “Back against the headboard, legs out,” she said. He readjusted, watching her.

  “You trust me,” she reminded him, walking over and climbing on to the bed.

  “Woah,” he said, raising his hands to push her away as she squatted over him.

  “Easy,” she said. “Wrong idea.”

  She put one foot on each of his thighs, balancing herself with her hands on his shoulders.

  “Can you take the weight?” she asked. He nodded, not even thinking about it. He wanted to get away.

  “Easy,” she said. “Worst part over.”

  She rolled her eyes up at the ceiling as though she were reconsidering.

  “Yeah, definitely the worst part.”

  Her knees were nearly against her shoulders as she watched him.

  “So, you trust me. I need you to close your eyes, and you don’t talk until I’m done. I won’t give you anything to drink that I wouldn’t drink, myself. I give you my word on it. Would it make you feel better if I did drink it, first?”

  He looked at the bowls. The first looked like oil of some kind, clean, and the other was water with a lot of debris in it. He bit his lip and nodded.

  “Just this one,” she said, she said touching the water one. She picked it up and swirled it to get the debris floating, then tipped it to her mouth for a large swallow, drinking fully half of it. She closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths as it would have hit her stomach. It looked pleasant. She smiled and looked at him.

  “You ready?”

  He nodded.

  “Okay. Eyes.”

  He closed his eyes, resting his head back against the headboard. The pressure on his thighs was more noticeable now. Samantha began to speak words that sounded like silk in water. His chest eased at the sound of it, and his breath evened. He felt her thumb across his forehead, the oil, then shapes on the fronts of both shoulders. The words stopped, and she ran two thumbs across his eyelids. He blinked, and pulled back, but he had nowhere to go, and he hadn’t meant it - it was just the surprise. She paused, then finished the pass over his eyes.

  “It’s okay,” she said. She resumed speaking in the soft language. He felt echoes of what he did when she put her hand on his chest.

  “Drink,” she said after a momen
t. He found a bowl against his lips and he split them, letting her pour the water into his mouth. The water was sweet, but the things in it were a little bitter and a little sour. Other than being unanticipated, there was nothing bad about it. He swallowed. He felt the liquid all the way down his throat as a spreading warmth, like strong alcohol without the bite. His stomach glowed.

  There was a stretch of silence, then he felt the heel of her palm on his chest, rolling flat through the fingers. She said four slow, clear words in the whispery language, then held her hand still for a moment. She pulled her hand away, leaving a cold, wet sensation - more oil? - then he felt her stand and let herself down off of the bed.

  “Give that another second,” she said softly, her voice coming from nearby. He breathed, too calmed by the warm peace in his chest to be bewildered.

  “Okay,” she said. “I guess I’m done.”

  He looked down to find a bloody handprint on his chest. He looked over to see her toweling off her hand.

  “What the hell?” he asked.

  “I have a lot of explaining to do,” she said, tossing the towel onto the nightstand.

  <><><>

  He stared at the mark on his chest.

  “First, the easy things,” she said. “How do you feel?”

  “Other than freaked out?” he asked. “Blood magic is bad stuff. Even I know that.”

  She shook her head.

  “It’s actually light magic. It’s my blood, shed by choice. But I meant the tonic.”

  He stared at the handprint.

  “Focus, Sam. Please.”

  He closed his eyes, recalling the feeling.

  “Warm, happy.”

  “Powerful?” she asked. He frowned.

  “Yeah.”

  She nodded.

  “Same as me.”

  “What was in that?” he asked.

  “Various symbols of light power. Ashes of a white dove’s wing, powered white rose petals, some other stuff.”

  “Okay…” he said, looking at his chest again.

  “Next, I marked you a psychic. The next phase of growth should come more easily. I didn’t push very hard, because I didn’t want to overstress your brain.”

  “Handprint, please,” he said. She sighed.

  “Right. That’s my pledge mark.”

  He sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed, waiting for the rest of the explanation. She scratched her scalp and frowned.