Wight

by Dorien Vincent

  Gregory laughed, "Tset, I'm an old soldier. I'm not saying we're going to talk things over nicely with the undead or the demons or anyone. You're to be the hero of the hour and you act as you see fit and I'll advise you. Your penchant for artillery, while uncanny, is a definite plus."

  "And swords. Shit..."

  "I retrieved your sword. Tristram is a good friend. Keep him, yes?"

  Tset's black eyes lit up, "Really?"

  Gregory nodded, "He really is."

  "No, shut up, I mean the sword, you got 'er?"

  "Of course! A treasure like that, in the hands of some vagabond drifter? Never. It's yours and yours alone."

  "Excellent. Another question..."

  "The girl, Kate."

  Tset was surprised, but did not show it, "Yeah. What about her?" 'Kate...'

  "She's safe, for now - your enemies' attention is on finding you, which they won't, and so she's fallen into the background. She will need guardianship, however."

  Tset nodded once more. "Also-"

  Gregory cut him off with a sweep of his silken cape, "No, now we train you."

  Tset was not to be cut off. "Train? Look, Monsieur Demon, I've got a right to know some more shit, plus, look at me - " he tore open his shirt, there were no wounds. "... Right."

  Gregory chuckled, "Rest and fluids, the wonder drug - did you right."

  Tset felt the annoyance boil up again, "Okay, I still have at least one or two more questions."

  "Or two?" Gregory smiled.

  "Depending on how stingy you are with your definition of 'one question.'" Tset now found the annoyance opening up into an emotionally suppurating sore. This subject.

  "Go ahead then."

  "Who killed Don and Tyler?" Tset's face was dark and 'and' and Tyler's name came out clipped.

  "Vampires. You were there."

  Tset stood up, unappreciative of the answer, "Surely you know how I deal with interrogations."

  A heavy silence, which Gregory broke with a earth-shattering roar of a laugh. "Are you threatening me?"

  Tset's blood boiled. He didn't appreciate being laughed at, either.

  Gregory got a hold of himself and stopped laughing, "I'm sorry, but you're five foot ten. It's been a long gods damned time since I've seen anything like that."

  Tset crossed his arms, glowering. He looked deadly even to Gregory.

  The sigh was huge, "Tset, I don't know. You're still raw. That's what happens when you suppress emotion like you have been. Time's a charlatan."

  "Granted. Give me direction, though. I would enjoy venting or a hope of venting in the near future."

  "Vampires, like I'd said - but higher-ups. Honestly, given the situation, it was probably the same two who were hunting you."

  A growl: "What're their names?"

  "That we'll leave until you're ready to know and until I know more."

  "I am ready, dammit."

  "Maybe, but not ready to use the information. Give it time. I promise you'll have retribution and more answers than even I can give, without killing yourself. I know, only, that they are two. Not their names or their faces. If I get either, name or face, I can give the other."

  "Fine."

  "Now, let's go bleed off some of that heat." Gregory stepped towards the edge of the room and passed through a doorway that had not been there. Tset had to jog to catch up.

  "How so?"

  Training For War, Act I

  "You are to be a warrior, professional and effective. Deadly." Gregory explained as the pair walked down a long steel corridor.

  "And what am I now?"

  "Sloppy."

  Tset was incredulous, "Sloppy?"

  "Sloppy."

  "How so?"

  They came to another large doorway set with steel, toothed doors in either wall. On the other side was a huge, open vault. The vault was bare and the ceiling was almost lost in shadow.

  "You take far too much damage from your opponents."

  "So you're going to teach me to dodge, then."

  "No, we're going to show you how to fight and react properly."

  "I'm going to fight you?"

  "No." Gregory produced a small remote then and hit a button. Another door across the vault slid up and a bug-eyed horror stepped into the light. It snuffled.

  "This is a demon. I breed them for defense purposes and their insectile nature allows me to control them by remote." Gregory hit another button and the thing's head exploded. "They're disgusting and parasitic but I've had a nesting of them underneath my house ever since I cleared them out of Italy some four hundred years back."

  Tset was almost speechless, "You had remotes four hundred years ago?"

  "No, I kept them contained then. Radio technology has allowed me to make more use of them than a curiosity."

  "And no animal rights violations here, at all? You did just detonate its head."

  "Again, they are parasites, disgusting creatures. I was actually asked, again just last month through a pseudo-identity, to exterminate them. Right now I have them registered as a breeding and study project I'm working on."

  "Twisted."

  "It is so." Gregory hit the button and another snuffling, bug-eyed creature stepped into the ring.

  "I'm going to have it attack you, to point out your weaknesses to you."

  "It's going to discuss this with me?"

  "No." Gregory hit another button and the other demon fell into a rage, bucking and grasping its head for just a moment.

  It reared and spotted the pair, its compound eyes focusing singularly.

  Gregory stepped off a few feet just before it flew at them. Tset ran in the opposite direction - when it got close enough to smell, Tset realized how huge it was. Eight or nine feet in height, massive - furry arms ending in odd semi-tentacular fingers, a well-developed torso and powerful, long legs. This was a beast.

  He felt its grip and it crushed the air from him. He struggled and kicked but the thing held fast.

  Tset felt wet mouth parts on his back and screamed angrily, struggling all the more as he was squeezed.

  Then its head burst.

  Tset was laying on the steel deck, gasping.

  Gregory strolled over. "See? No defense. Why did you even let it get a hold of you?"

  "What the fuck am I supposed to do?"

  "You know you fight faster than you run. Anyway, would you like a minute to catch your breath before I bring out another?"

  Tset felt his stomach growl, "When do we eat?"

  This gave Gregory pause, and Tset did not like his smile, "Howabout after you kill one bare fisted? They're really quite soft - made for hunting in groups."

  Tset threw himself to his feet. "Let's do this."

  Gregory nodded humorously. "Alright." And pressed the two buttons to summon and enrage the next beast.

  Tset faced his opponent, glaring at it, feinting. It came warily - breaking its initial charge.

  It grabbed for him, and he feinted again. "Er, shit?" Tset did not feel confident in punching it in the wrist - hardly any damage to be done.

  It threw out another arm, Tset feinted in, and punched it in the stomach. This, apparently, was no better than the wrist - he simply angered it into grabbing his head.

  Tset's pained yelling was muffled. He bit down. The demonic roar was deafening and Tset was flying, up and down, up and down, as he was shook loose. He held on by his jaw alone.

  Tset, hands free, grabbed on and broke a finger off, then tore fur and flesh.

  He wasn't expecting its other fist and this knocked him free. A handspring and he was on his feet, ten yards off, but dazed.

  Tset was going to rush in, but relaxed, the demon couldn't work the arm he'd torn the flesh from. "That's right motherfucker!"

  It came, but carefully, adjusting its tactics - the other hand snaked in and gripped Tset by the leg.

  Tset tried to pull away, but it was useless; the creature immediately proceeded to viciously beat him against the floor.

&n
bsp; Tset blacked out repeatedly, but, on an upswing, grabbed a fistful of back fur. It tore, but the beast couldn't get him free, and was obviously in immense pain.

  Tset began kicking at the hand that held his leg and felt the grip weaken. Very soon, he was stuck fast to the back of the creature and holding on for dear life.

  This is when he noticed Gregory was no longer in the vault with him. He checked around, craning his neck and carefully avoiding blows from his new ride.

  No. No Gregory. He'd left him alone, come what may.

  Tset gritted his teeth - no guardian angel.

  He had to put this thing down, and soon, without giving himself enough time to slip up.

  His next punch landed on the back of the skull, knocking the creature off balance, it stumbled forward and almost went down on one knee, until Tset hit it again, and it did.

  It used its arm to steady itself and could not move its other.

  Tset's next attack landed in its mouth - it had turned its head around. Tset retrieved his fist and almost threw up on the ghastly face. The mouth parts and mandible jaws caused him a feeling of revulsion - like a fly and a man with a cleft palate all in one.

  The tentacular things whipped at his face and the thing breathed heavily on him, expecting the kill. The breath was acidic, and Tset's hand stung - he checked, huge boils had begun to spring up all over and it was reddening and swelling.

  "Oh is that right? You're a fucking fly?"

  Tset, unable to go for the mouth without risking digestion, it seemed as though the fluid flowed freely now, slammed it in the body with his palm, he felt a crack.

  He did it again, repeatedly, feeling the body soften. Then the spine snapped. The head rolled around and the thing screeched stridently. It became fearful, fell down, and tried to drag itself away - occasionally making a pathetic attempt to hit Tset or roll over on him. Its legs remained entirely inactive.

  Soon Tset had it opened up from the base of the muscled neck to the beginnings of its oddly formed pelvis, like some sort of blind coroner's mistake.

  It hadn't stopped moving and shuddering until Tset was kneeling in the middle of a ten by ten pool of blue internal fluids.

  He looked like a man who'd fought an airplane toilet and had a go of it.

  He stood up and wiped his face with his hand. This did absolutely nothing for his situation.

  Tset regarded his surroundings - light flowed in from under an arch. Maybe this is the one he'd come through?

  Tset found the hallway to be familiar. He slogged his way up it and came to another, familiar door.

  The door slid up. The room on the other side was not familiar in the slightest - a huge den with wooden furniture, shag carpeting and plants growing in the windows.

  Tset's shoes squelched through the carpet as he sought Gregory.

  He heard a cup smash to his right and affixed himself to a wooden wall panel - his fingers digging in and holding him solidly in place, allowing him the stability necessary to make flight.

  The smashed cup had been Gregory's. It had been full of tea. He stood in a huge kitchenette and stared from Tset, to the stains in the carpet, to the stains on the tomes and wall Tset was climbing on.

  Tset let himself down. "I killed it. Can I eat now?"

  "What happened?"

  "I killed it."

  Gregory indicated the streaks and Tset's solid blue coloration. "I mean that. Did you climb inside it?

  "It didn't die."

  "Even after you decapitated it?"

  "I couldn't."

  "What do you mean, 'couldn't'?"

  "It bit my hand when I tried to hit it in the face."

  "That's why you get on its back when it does that."

  "I did."

  Gregory remained silent, pondering.

  "Can I eat now?"

  "Sure."

  After a meal and getting Tset a fresh shirt and jeans, the two went back down to the training room. "Let's try this again. Give it everything you've got."

  "They're fucking eight feet tall, Greg."

  "Charge it."

  "Fine."

  Gregory pressed both buttons. The next demon to come into the light on the attack never saw Tset coming. He jumped off of its stomach and broke its neck with a kick to the face.

  "Good. Another." Gregory pushed the buttons and Tset was instantly grasped.

  He spun and struggled, his adrenals coming fully on like wildfire. The thing's grip slipped and a palmstrike across the jaw loosed blue blood and digestive fluids.

  Tset was on his feet.

  "Use its size and your strength to your advantage."

  It lunged, Tset ducked and tossed the thing onto its back. He fell and drove his knee into its forehead. It was unmoving.

  "Good. Two now."

  The two attacked Tset in a pincer movement. He bailed out.

  "Wait." Gregory hit another button and his pets stopped moving. They stood and drooled acid. "With two targets, one's going to have to go first but the other can't be ready to back him up, how would you accomplish this?"

  "Uh."

  "Try it again, use your imagination." He hit the button.

  The beasts were feet apart when Tset dropped a flying boot on one's chest and used the jump to kick the other in the eye.

  "Good. Now finish the job."

  The eyeless one had a broken knee and collapsed ribcage and was dead before it landed - the springboard had recovered already.

  "Use your hands."

  The beast reached, Tset broke the elbow and drove his own into its ribs. Then he swept it off its feet and drove his fist into its neck.

  "Good, you're getting better."

  "Too many Kung Fu movies."

  "Like a child, imprinting on their parents' actions."

  Tset stared at him. "Yeah, sure thing."

  "Now, Tset."

  "Yeah?"

  "You're taking them like they're toys, what do you think it is?"

  "The food. And some confidence."

  Gregory nodded knowingly, "Hmm."

  "You're keeping something back, aren't you?"

  "I'm not an expert on these things. We'll see if you ever meet the... thing... I know is. I have my theories."

  "Thing?"

  "He isn't a man, and the word he uses to describe himself, you wouldn't understand. But he drops in from time to time to say hello."

  "Another big fucker like you?"

  "No, he's only a bit taller than you are."

  "So he's an intellectual little guy."

  Gregory chuckled and half turned his head. "That's for another time, until then, we continue your training."

  After the first week of training, and at Gregory's polite reminder, Tset got it into his head to call Tristram to get all of his equipment.

  He'd assured Tristram he was fine, but was laying low and going through a sort of AA program.

  "That's good. You were drinking like a fuckin' race horse."

  Tset had laughed, softly, not the sharp bark he'd attuned himself to before Gregory's arrival as a new distraction.

  "You sound good, though, dude. So just keep on whatever, yeah?"

  "Yeah."

  Tset had the shipment sent to an odd address well on the outskirts of The City.

  He thanked the UPS guy, then dragged the box into a motel, broke into an empty room, twelve feet by six, and opened it up. There was his equipment.

  He noticed that there was a letter inside.

  I hope you've called me since you told me to pack up your shit, you bastard.

  Anyway, I included a gift from Hal.

  They hope yoar doing cool.

  Starlet says hi. She remembers you but don't make any fuckin' moves, youhear?

  I know Liz went all premenstrual on yo ass, but this is my territory.

  Enjoy the yakket.

  -T

  Tset dug through the box and found what Tristram was talking about - it was a black leather motorcycle jacket with a snap collar and double
inch-thick white stripes down the arms and sides. Grey polyfiber lining and lots of inner pockets.

  The material was cool after having been in the UPS truck, but felt a little off.

  Tset put it on. It was heavy, but reassuringly so, with steel-reinforced sleeves. Tset liked it like he liked the kick of an Enfield. He hmmed.

  He checked the pockets, another letter. "You'd think I just got out the hospital or something, Jesus."

  Tset,

  I hope this finds you well.

  This jacket is a prototype but you're already familiar with its properties.

  Yonotan said you might like it.

  Tset looked himself over in the murky mirror. It didn't quite match his usual choice of attire, however Gregory was trying to get him to dress more sensibly for his line of work - so the jacket went perfectly with the jeans and engineer boots Gregory insisted he wore to train in, replacing his dress shoes and pinstripes. "If you're going to war, pretend like you're dressed for it at least. Not a cocktail party."

  The faded reddish shirt proclaiming Tset's favorite chaser and mixer also fit well with the new addition, and the little initiation cross he'd received from Hal hung in shadow, the silver angles reflecting prominently.

  And to perfect the image, Tset's mirrored sunglasses, and his high, fair forehead bordered from above by his straight, dark hair.

  He'd ask Greg about it. Gregory probably wanted less of a greaser to be his prodigy, but Tset found his sharp, ivory smile befitting.

  After this, Tset went back into training, now using his rifles and pistols. He'd also picked up an S&W .357 magnum.

  The carbine was effective against the demons, but too big. Same with the sniper rifle and the Enfield. The .357 was also bulky, but Tset always kept it in a holster right above Papillion.

  Tset found, in fighting waves of enemies, as Gregory was capable of calling forth, that his .45s and their fast action and Papillion and hers were his best weapons.

  Gregory had twice mentioned the fact that the demons he bred were good practice for Tset because, while slower than Masters, they fought in the same style as vampires, though maybe with more holds.

  Tset didn't much care - he was up to taking seventy-five to a hundred demons dead to the ground without sweat.