The Southern Watch Series, Books 1-3: Called, Depths and Corrupted

by Robert J. Crane

  ***

  The scream cracked through the air as Hendricks and Duncan were loitering just outside the ticket taker’s line. Hendricks didn’t hesitate; he pulled up on the guardrail, mounted the platform and ran straight for the Ferris wheel. When he got to the box that was on the bottom, he paused just long enough to hear the next scream from the car that was climbing up to the space between the ten and eleven o’clock positions on the wheel. He gripped hard on the metal frame and started to climb.

  ***

  “A frozen corn dog?” Reeve was chuckling at the end of her story. “Corn dog in the corn hole? Shiiit.”

  “That’s what he eventually had to do to get the rest out,” Lauren said with a smirk of her own, “though it wasn’t at all frozen by that time.”

  “I bet you see some crazy damned stuff,” Reeve said. “You know, other than corpses strewn randomly around your hometown.”

  Lauren blew air out through her lips and could feel the weariness settle over her. “Honestly, what I’ve seen these last few days trumps most of the stuff that comes through the ER.”

  There was a scream in the distance, echoing through the night as the crowd silenced abruptly. Lauren turned her head; it had come from the Ferris wheel and it was a thick, fearful one. A second one followed, and suddenly from below the lowest metal spoke of the wheel, she could see a man clad all in black, climbing the frame.

  A man with a black cowboy hat on his head.

  “What … the … fuck?” Reeve asked, staring up at the Ferris wheel from beside her. “I bet this shit doesn’t happen at the Renaissance Festival.” The way he said it reminded her of a plea for grace of the sort one heard in church. Minus the profanity. She started to respond, but the sheriff had already disappeared into the crowd, pushing his way toward the disturbance.

  Another shriek sounded, and Lauren realized she could place it as female … and young. It took only one leap of logic before she, too, was pushing her way through the crowd toward the wheel and whatever the hell was going on within it.

  ***

  “Hendricks is climbing the Ferris wheel,” Alison reported tensely, her rifle centered on the cowboy. She was trying to get some idea of what was going on, but the entire ride was closed off, each box providing only a thin viewing window a foot or so wide that stretched around the front of the cars. There wasn’t even a window in the side doors, which totally cockblocked her efforts to figure out if something was going on. One of the boxes was rocking pretty heavy, though, the one heading toward the midnight position. She couldn’t tell if Hendricks was heading that way yet, though, because he was just reaching the center of the wheel.

  “I’ve got carnies everywhere!” Duncan’s voice exploded in her ear. He sounded strained, and she lowered her scope to take in what was going on below. He did indeed have carnies everywhere: there were three surrounding him on the platform, anchored to each of his arms and one dragging him down by grabbing his legs. They appeared to be punching, kicking, and trying to tackle him.

  Alison frowned; she had little doubt Duncan was fully capable of dispatching all three of them with minimal difficulty. She doubted he could do it without causing serious injury, though, and that sounded like something that would be better off being avoided.

  “You’re assaulting a federal agent!” Duncan’s voice blasted through the microphone again, and she watched him shake one of them off with that. The other two clung stubbornly to him, however, leading Alison to believe they might not be the sorts that always complied with lawful commands. Or laws.

  “On my way,” Arch said tightly through the open channel, “but it’s a bit of a fight to get through this crowd now that y’all have everyone’s curiosity drawn.”

  A quick scan of the crowd, and Alison had to agree with her husband; there was a growing cluster around the base of the Ferris wheel, a swelling crowd of people watching the skirmish on the platform and Hendricks’s climb. It was growing all the time as people gravitated toward the ruckus, filling the tight channels around the wheel with an ever-expanding mass of humanity.

  ***

  “You led me on, you little slut!” Mick got out in a yell. He’d been struggling with her for a few minutes, lightly at first, but with ever-increasing force. She was resisting, and it was pissing him off more by the second.

  “Because I said I’d come here with you?” She grunted it out as she put a hand against his cheek and forced his face away from her. “What, that means I automatically have to have sex with you? FUCK YOU!” She finished it and trailed into another scream that lit his ears. He hadn’t hit her yet, just pushed and shoved a little. He was getting to the point he was about ready to backhand her into unconsciousness and just be on about his business.

  She raked fingernails across his cheek, and he felt the sting as she ripped through the first layer of flesh on his shell. His essence boiled within him, and he slapped her down, hard. Her head hit the side of the car, and she slumped against the door.

  “Finally,” he said, and knelt down, dragging her to the floor of the car. She fell in the confined space, her head thumping against the floor as she dropped. He wondered how this would work, with her unconscious, if it would be the same? This had been easier before, hadn’t it?

  ***

  Hendricks was climbing to the side now, working his way up a forty-five degree angle, his feet extended and his back bent as he shimmied up the arm toward the box that dangled at the end of it. This was, he had to concede, an immense pain in the ass. It was a lot more fun to fast-rope out of a helo than try and climb this damned thing.

  There was no screaming now, and the box dangled only ten feet above him. He could feel his sword hanging at his belt. His pistol was there, too, and he’d taken the time to reload it on the journey here. He was pretty clear about which of them he’d need more right now, though, and he doubted it’d be the 1911.

  The screaming of his muscles seemed to diminish in the last few upward steps. And they were steps. He was leaning most of his weight on his legs, using them and the resistance of the soles of his boots against the metal to climb. It was an age-old thing, something he’d applied to climbing drainpipes in his youth. This time if he fell, though, it wouldn’t just be a sore tailbone as a consequence.

  He kept climbing the arm to the extension point where it met the joint above the car. Even at his sideways angle, it was going to require either a small leap or some fancy footwork to transition to the little running board on the bottom of the car. He swung and heard a collective gasp from below at his stunt work. He tried not to reflect on the fact that there were a few hundred pairs of eyes watching him, because the consequences of that particular bit of business were a whole ’nother matter, one that would probably rock his skull clear off its shoulders if he gave it time to think.

  Instead, Hendricks positioned himself, anchored his hand inside the thin window of the box, and jerked the door open full force before freeing his hand to go for his sword.

  He hadn’t quite got it clear of the scabbard when the fucker inside—a demon with blazing eyes that shone through his facade—stood in surprise. The bastard probably hadn’t even remembered that his pants were around his ankles and his tiny pecker was hanging out like a pinky finger dangling all by its sad, skinny self in the middle of a tangled black forest of pubic hair.

  “Check out time,” Hendricks announced to the startled demon as he moved his body and coat to hide from the crowd the sword that he pointed into the car.

  ***

  Alison looked through the scope as Hendricks flung the door to the Ferris wheel’s car open, and she saw the glint of his blade as he drew it, but everything else was cut off by the billow of his coat.

  “I don’t have a shot,” she said into her microphone as she stared through the scope, willing Hendricks to move the hell out of the way. There was absolutely nothing behind the Ferris wheel except for an empty baseball field, red clay without so much as a soul on it visible even from here.

  �
�Me either,” her daddy said. She settled in to wait for the situation to change and was shocked at how fast it did.

  ***

  Mick had thrown her panties out the little window, a “Hell yeah, fuck you,” gesture to the girl who’d been such a pain in his dick. Not that it mattered to her now, but presumably she’d notice their absence later.

  After.

  He had gotten down on all fours and taken a deep whiff as he slid her dress up around her armpits. She smelled good, and he came up to his knees. The car wasn’t yet at the twelve o’clock, and he didn’t need that much time, he figured. He’d just dropped trow and slid his pants down around his ankles when he saw a set of fingers pop inside the window.

  If Mick had been human, he would have shit himself right there. Fingers didn’t just appear in the window of a moving Ferris wheel car at the top of its arc. The surprise made his stomach drop and he felt himself start to go limp, a feeling not aided a second later when that fucking demon hunter in the cowboy hat and black coat ripped the door open. Mick hadn’t heard what he’d said over the shock and fury mingling in his essence at the humiliation. The fear was the worst, that uncertainty of getting so damned close to what he wanted and having this guy—this fucking guy—show up at the last moment to yank it away.

  The cowboy had a sword in his hand, the point dangling just inches from Mick’s face, and Mick found himself swallowing hard, letting the fury take over. Fuck this. He was a greater for a reason, and even if the sword was a holy object, he wasn’t gonna let it matter. He reached out and grabbed it by the blade, felt it dig into his fingers, and ignored the pain. He shoved on it, hard, and watched the hilt hit the cowboy in the sternum. He fucked up his balance, tilting sideways, one of his boots losing footing and the other following suit.

  The demon hunter tumbled out, fingers gripping the window but letting go of his sword. Mick had it by the blade, and stood there surprised for only a second while the cowboy caught himself on the window, four little fingers sparing him from a hell of a fall. Four little piggies.

  Mick just smiled and stepped over the limp body of Molly—no, Mandy? Shit. Whatever. He stood at the door to the car and looked at the cowboy hanging there exposed, his fingers right there for the unfurling …

  ***

  Hendricks was hanging there, fingers in fucking agony, the only thing keeping his ass from splattering on the grass below. He heard the requisite “oohs” and “aahs” and “HOLY LIVING FUCKS” out of the crowd below, but it was all background noise. His arm was twisted, holding all his weight, and he knew he didn’t have an overabundance of time.

  Plus, his sword was gone. He’d liked to have held on to it, but being as he’d been getting shoved out the door by the demon holding onto the other end of it at the time, it had seemed like a real good idea to part ways with it lest it continue to be used in just that manner.

  Now he saw the demon reverse his grip on it, and suddenly Hendricks was staring down the blade. Not a sight he was used to seeing, but he had to reflect he might not have any more chances after this one to see it in this way.

  “You ever heard that old saying?” The demon asked, the fire muted, barely visible in his eyes as he stared down the blade at Hendricks. “You live by the sword, you die by the sword?”

  Hendricks just braced himself, and the blade rared back, ready to slide into him like a skewer to a pig.

  ***

  “I have a shot,” Alison said, “and I’m taking it.” She saw the skinny little bastard with the blade pointed at Hendricks, and she stroked the trigger as she blotted out all else, aiming for center mass and compensating for that slight breeze.

  ***

  Arch was in the crowd below when the roar of the big rifle belted out. A few ladies screamed—a few men, too, Arch reckoned. He’d heard Alison’s warning and used the opportunity to push his way through the crowd. He caught a few glares that softened the minute they saw his uniform.

  Duncan was still up on the platform, but all activity there had stopped; the demon and the two carnies that had been fighting him were all transfixed, staring up into the sky at the car above.

  ***

  The roar of the rifle reached Hendricks’s ears about a second after he watched the skinny little demon lose an arm at the shoulder. It took him a second to realize it had spun off, ricocheting on the frame of the door and twirling downward like a helicopter blade as it fell into the crowd below. Hendricks blinked and looked up to see the demon looking at him in muted astonishment. It hadn’t been the arm that held the sword, but he was in sheer disbelief, the blade sagging from where it had been pointed at Hendricks’s chest only a moment before.

  “What the hell was that?” the demon choked out.

  “Not a sword,” Hendricks said, and swung his feet up to kick the demon in the legs full force.

  ***

  Alison watched Hendricks swing back into the car after knocking the demon back. Once more, the black coat billowed as he stood framed in the entry, completely blocking her ability to see into the Ferris wheel’s car.

  “No shot, no shot!” she called into the microphone, trapping it between two fingers and bringing it closer to her mouth as she stared with one eye through the scope. “Duncan, get that wheel spinning! Hendricks needs to get his ass on the ground ASAP!”

  ***

  Arch could hear Alison speaking over the chaos in the crowd, but he could only make out every other word or so. He heard the part about getting Hendricks on the ground and agreed wholeheartedly, so much so that he shoved his way through the last few people in the crowd and vaulted up on the platform that supported the Ferris wheel. “You!” he snapped at the carnie that had broken off from Duncan the minute he’d announced himself as a federal agent. Arch flicked his badge with a finger, causing it to catch the light and draw the youth’s attention to it, snapping him out of his trance. “Get that car down here. Now.” He didn’t leave any room for argument, and the young man nodded, cowed, and headed toward the controls. The two that had been fighting with Duncan just stood back, still stunned, and stared up along with the OOC and the rest of the crowd.

  ***

  Lauren was within a hundred feet of the Ferris wheel when the cowboy swung back in. She was making slow progress through the throng, and had resorted to crowd surfing tactics, jumping up and placing weight on peoples’ shoulders to make them give way. She thought about just announcing herself as a doctor, but she somehow doubted that would impress in the middle of this spectacle of redneck theater. Gunshots, high-wire fighting and derring-do, oh my.

  This close to the Ferris wheel, the crowd had congealed; there was simply no more room to maneuver. These were hardly a panicked herd, which was a surprise given that everyone had heard the gunfire. But it was equally obvious to anyone with a pair of eyes that whoever was shooting had done so at the mostly naked guy in the car that had tried to attack the cowboy. It was a surprisingly illogical progression for a crowd to make, in Lauren’s estimation. They should have run like a herd of cattle, but apparently they were too busy watching the show.

  Whatever the case, Lauren knew she’d gone about as far as she could go in this direction without a tractor-trailer with which to plow through the crowd. She looked left and saw the density of people lighten off to the far side of the Ferris wheel. It was stationed right against the fence to the ball field, and there was no one in the small no man’s land behind it.

  Lauren started working her way around the edge of the crowd toward that space, hoping for a better look but doubting she’d get one. Still, approaching from that side and climbing onto the platform from behind would be a better bet than trying to fight her way through a crowd too drunk on what they were watching to move the fuck out of the way.

  ***

  Hendricks was balancing tentatively, his feet back on the solid ground of the running board but still painfully aware that this was not so solid as he might wish. The box rocked left to right, more than a sway, and Hendricks braced himself in
the door frame, taking the shift in weight by tensing his thighs. That fucking demon still had his sword, but the bastard was a touch off balance, and that was about all the advantage Hendricks had.

  He drew his pistol and fired from the hip, dimly aware that there was a body at his feet. The gunshot tore through the little car, the flash lighting everything up and the sound just about driving him backward from the force and recoil. It staggered the demon, though, so Hendricks pulled the trigger again. This time, when the flash lit the car, Hendricks realized there was a second door on the other side of the box, and he started wondering if there was a way to use this to his advantage.

  ***

  Lauren had made it to the other side of the Ferris wheel when the shooting started. This time it was painfully obvious where it was coming from, the muzzle flash lighting up the car that was currently at the midnight position and starting its descent around. She hadn’t heard a scream for a while, though, and part of that worried her in a distant sort of way as she crossed around the edge of the rail that sealed the Ferris wheel off from the grounds. A square of white cloth was lying on the dewy grass, discarded, and it took her eyes only a moment to realize they were cotton panties. She stooped to pick them up without thinking it through, and it was only a moment more before the size printed in the back gave her more reason than ever to be worried about what was happening above her.

  ***

  “You fucking animal,” Hendricks said, holding off on shooting the bastard again in favor of kicking him in the gut. The last two shots had made the fucker writhe, and Hendricks was highly in favor of more of that, but not at the expense of an ass-whooping. The sound of the box squeaking in its cradle at the end of the Ferris wheel arm was audible to him even over the ringing in his ears, and it sounded like that fucking buzz, that bee-like mechanical buzz, ringing in his ears like the crescendo of an orchestra. He rained another kick down on the one-armed demon’s gut, watched him flop against the far door, minding his footing so he didn’t trip over the girl. He braced himself and kicked the demon in the hand, heard the sword fall from his grasp. It was music, it was that buzzing, all in one, and it wasn’t until the demon caught his next kick with a shoulder and punched him in the balls that his thinking caught up with his instincts, and the words “Oh, shit” formed in his head.