Doom Comes for a Sold Soul

by M. K. Theodoratus

  #

  The former economist stared out a large window at the end of a hallway, listing against the arm of his wheelchair, his head angled up into the trees. Outside the sky had turned gloomy. Dr. Allsdipp sat alone at the end of a dim corridor. A flock of small, squabbling birds fed at a battery of feeders, bouncing back and forth from the bare branches hanging over the open patio surrounded by four walls. Allsdipp’s head bobbled on his unsteady neck when one bird or another landed on the feeder pegs. Highgrim noted he had the strength to move his chair so he got the best view.

  As he came to the end of the hall, Highgrim shuddered. The man had shriveled so much his skin looked like a cornhusk. But his eyes were as hard as jet when he glanced Highgrim’s way.

  A wave of relief relaxed Highgrim’s muscles. With those eyes, someone’s still at home.

  Stella tapped his shoulder. “Hank, the nice reporter from the paper is here to talk to you.”

  The old man ignored the touch. His voice rasped. “Wanna watch the birds.”

  “You can watch the birds after you talk to Mr. Highgrim. Remember it’s your ten year anniversary of being the oldest man alive.”

  After a quick glance at the few bugs crawling on the patio flagstones outside, Stella took a deep breath and jerked the wheelchair around before flouncing across the room to a stack of magazines by a recliner.

  Stella gave the old man a parting shot. “The sooner you talk to him, the sooner you get rid of him.”

  The old man glared at Highgrim. “Just tell him to go away. Stella, you know I don’t like to talk to anyone.”

  “Remember, you promised to give us some badly needed publicity.”

  Highgrim settled on a stained love seat near the wheelchair where he could watch Allsdipp better. He grew uncomfortable when he noticed more creepy crawlers emerging from the border plantings onto the pavers outside. Other pests skittered down the tree trunk to join the others. Allsdipp focused on the bugs, ignoring the agitated birds. Highgrim sat forward, but resisted the urge to wipe the spittle from Allsdipp’s chin with his handkerchief.

  “I came to talk about how you’ve lived to such an impressive old age, Dr. Allsdipp.”

  “Name’s Hank. Go away. I don’t wanna talk to you after all.”

  “Don’t you want to gain acclaim for your achievement?”

  With a snort, Allsdipp turned towards Highgrim. “Acclaim? Gave it up with all that doctor crap years ago. Caused me more trouble than it was worth.”

  Sensing a secret, the reporter leaned forward, sensing a hidden story.

  The old man turned back to the patio. Blue veins in his hands traveled through a maze of brown spots. More drool threatened to dribble out of his mouth, but the cranky geezer sucked his teeth until it disappeared. Highgrim steeled himself. The man was once an honored scholar. Allsdipp deserved a better fate than spending his life staring at a bunch of birds in an ill-kept nursing home where the staff hadn’t bothered to remove the layer of white debris piled against the picture window. Highgrim swallowed hard as he turned on his recorder and laid it on his thigh.

  “Okay, Hank.” Highgrim tried another tactic. “Did you know you were just certified the oldest human alive and will be in the record books? Our readers would like to know what tricks let you live so long.”

  “Persistent little bugger, aren’t you.” The old man sat straighter in his chair, considering, and continued with an impish expression. “No one beat my record, you say? You mean they didn’t find some woman lurking in the bushes, trying to get in the last word?”

  “Not that I know of, sir. The feather’s stuck in your cap.” Highgrim checked the volume of the recorder. “Err, tell me, what tips do you have for living a long life?”

  More bugs appeared, and the squabbling birds disappeared in a flutter of wings. Highgrim enjoyed the moment of quiet, but Allsdipp straightened in the chair. He leaned forward, and his beady eyes bored into the reporter, after long glance out the window.

  A sly smile lit Allsdipp’s face. “Your readers want to live as long as me? Tell ‘em to get scared shitless.”

  The strange answered puzzled Highgrim. “I don’t understand.”

  Highgrim bit the inside of his cheek to remind himself to be respectful. Pulling pertinent words out of the geezer, for all his babble, was so hard he began to wonder if the fossil had Alzheimer’s in spite of his sharp gaze. Allsdipp leaned forward, leaning his elbows on the chair’s arms to track the vermin without disturbing the white grains mounded inside the glass of the picture window.

  “Watcha think, young man? I remain in this disgusting husk for the pleasure of it?”

  Highgrim blinked, remembering the file pictures of a tall, handsome, Dr. Henry J. Allsdipp accepting the Nobel Prize in economics for his algorithmic parameters of decision-making patterns that turned advertising on its head, making it easier for the corporations to make money. The extent of the old man’s deterioration troubled Highgrim, even though his brain knew the man had lived 150 years. Highgrim hoped he’d die before he ever decayed into a similar mess.

  Rot attacks everyone in the end in spite of medical science’s efforts. Look at Allsdipp.

  With a sigh, Highgrim admitted to himself he’d never make it on electronic media with his looks. “You mean, you’re afraid to die?”

  “Thought I just told you that.”

  Allsdipp glared at the reporter as if Highgrim was the one with a wet spot on the front of his trousers, not him. A squirrel invaded from the other side of the patio and jumped down into the path of the bugs near a feeder. The animal shook its tail and then skittered away when the bugs spit something at it. The old man swiveled his head to watch the squirrel flee.

  “What’s there to be afraid of?” asked Highgrim, focusing on his interview and trying to ignore the increasing number of over-sized pests crowding onto the patio.

  “The Devil, of course. The Prince of Demons.”

  One glance told the reporter the Nobel Prize winner was serious, almost defiant. His mind balked at making the connection, but he leaped. “What does the Devil have to do with your hierarchical deviation algorithms that turned advertising into a hard, predictable science? The Nobel academy awarded you for your discovery.”

  “Hell of a lot they or you know.” The geezer harrumphed. “The formulas were a booby trap, and afterwards everything went to hell in a hand basket. Surely, you could tell the difference? Or, maybe you’re too young?”

  “Your formulas had a glitch?” Highgrim shifted forward in the chair, controlling a jump as the story’s possibilities dawned on him. “I don’t think anyone’s discovered it yet. Perhaps you can explain it to me in simple language since I didn’t take much math in college.”

  Allsdipp’s lip curled. “Just took the minimum math requirements to graduate, heh? Or are any students willing to learn the principles of higher mathematics now days?”

  Highgrim glanced around, wondering how he was going to get a 750-word feature out of the duffer, even if he cribbed from the state archives. “Tell me how your formulas went wrong.”

  “Just told you.” Allsdipp’s hands flapped up and down. “Didn’t learn to listen either, did ya?”

  “I’m listening, sir. I just don’t understand.”

  “Everything’s gone to hell. No more free will. The manipulation of wants has become as sure as demonic temptations, except for the 30% of natural nonconformists to any action or idea.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Who the hell you think gave me the formulas in the first place?” shouted Allsdipp.

  Stella jumped to her feet, running to soothe him. “Now, Hank. Don’t get excited. You know what excitement does to your heart.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Hank took a deep breath and smoothed the afghan over his knees before glaring at Highgrim. “Who would benefit if it was easier to lead people into temptation, especially if the tempters looked like normal human beings? Can you tell me that?”

  “Temptation has been part of human e
xistence for eons.”

  Allsdipp snorted in exasperation. “Dim, damn dumb.”

  Highgrim mulled over the problem without finding an answer. “Satisfaction from breaking rules is a universal. For more than just your 30 percent of dissenters.”

  “Just as every religion has its version of the Prince of Darkness. And the cows head for where the grass is sweetest.”

  “Are you saying the Devil gave you the equations?” asked Highgrim softly.

  “Yeah.” Allsdipp turned in his chair and fixed Highgrim with an icy stare. “Making him them wait for his damn payment, too.” Waving at the gathering outside the window,

  Allsdipp added, “He’s always sending his minions to collect me. Look at them crawling all over the patio, trying to get in.”

  Stella looked up from her tablet and shrieked. “Oh, Hank, the bugs’re crawling onto the window sill again. Only there’re a lot more of them this time, and they’re bigger.”

  Highgrim almost vomited as lines of chitinous, six-legged vermin with long snouts marched over the windowsill and scrabbled against the glass. The hordes didn’t stop but crawled up and over each other. Feet and claws soon scraped against the window. Highgrim trembled as he stared into the creatures’ red eyes, glowing as if they contained the flames of hell. Spikes of fear chilled his soul. The scuffling grew louder as more of the demonic creatures crowded onto the sill. A high-note whine pierced the air, and Highgrim tightened his sphincters, fearing the malevolent intelligence behind the bug swarm.

  Allsdipp frowned. “Get the salt out of my carry-pack, Stella, and reinforce the line before we go back to the station. It may keep them back. With luck, we’ll stop them again.”

  “The attackers’ve never been this big before,” said Stella, pulling a whistle out from under her dress. She blew three short bursts, three long ones, and three more short.

  “Or so many of the infernal things at one time. Yeah, it’s best to man the battle stations.”

  What? They have a battle plan? He’s not totally crazy.

  The beetle-things pushed against the ones in front of them until there was a pile of writhing insects along the windowsill. Highgrim gulped. He’d never seen so many vermin at one time in his life.

  “We gotta leave now, Hank.” Stella dropped the empty bag on the floor. “I can hear them boring through the wood.”

  Allsdipp kicked Highgrim in the shins. “Don’t stand there staring at the little demons. Get your arse in gear if you want to save it.” White-faced, the duffer yanked the chair around as Stella grabbed the handles.

  The smell of charred wood invaded the room. The pane of glass wobbled as it gave way under the assault of the creatures. Wriggling antennae began to poke inside through the gaps where the salt and carcasses had been pushed away.

  “I told you to get out of here, dimwit.”

  In the moment Highgrim paused, the salt began to fall over the inside sill. At first, carcasses of dead beetle-things fell on the floor with the white grains as the bugs behind them pushed their dead comrades forward. Soon the heads of red-eyed creatures with writhing antennae emerged through the runnels in the salt. Highgrim ran after the wheelchair, leaving his recorder behind.

  I don’t believe this. Highgrim analyzed their tactics and found them lacking. Figured his odds of surviving. They should’ve used bug spray. Something sticky that’d keep working as they moved forward.

  Stella yelled back over her shoulder. “To the nurses station.” Turning back, she screamed as she ran ahead, “Bug invasion. Get the demon repellant. Alert. Alert.” Her voice cracked on high notes an opera soprano couldn’t reach.

  Highgrim huffed as he ran down the hall, following the nurse. The glass shattered behind him. “Why don’t you use a pesticide?” He called between gasps.

  “Don’t work,” Allsdipp called back. “No preternatural power behind it. Just chemicals.” Stella left Allsdipp to rush towards a desk partly blocking the hall. Highgrim, his throat raw from the acid churning in his gut, grabbed the chair handles and slowed to wheezing a trot, the scrabbling of the claws growing louder behind him. Three nurses or aides had drawn battle lines by two desks turned on their side, though they provided little cover. Each employee had a small canister flung over their shoulders, the nozzles on the hoses pointed down as they pushed another desk across the gap. As soon as Highgrim pushed Allsdipp through the gap, the aides closed it.

  The reporter learned against the wall, gasping for breath, as the staff readied their weapons. Even Allsdipp had grabbed one of the contraptions that looked like small flamethrowers, but Highgrim couldn’t smell any accelerants. His heart pounding, Highgrim watched the creatures gather to march forward.

  A pleasant-smelling spray arced towards the legion of beetles from the nozzles. The smaller bugs curled up and burned. The sulfurous smell rising from the charred bugs seared Highgrim’s nostrils, but the larger beetle-things continued to march forward. Highgrim wasn’t comforted by the fact the injured vermin moved more slowly. He searched for a weapon.

  “Oh, Master, save us,” cried one of the aides.

  He dropped the nozzle and pulled a prayer wheel from his belt, but its soft prayer code was lost in the scrabbling din of the marching beetles.

  Stella and the other aide kept firing, sweeping the spray back and forth across the Hall. “Get back in line and fire, you dim wit.”

  Allsdipp puttered with extra canisters and handed them to the staff. More bugs charred, but too many of the creatures advanced. Allsdipp sat in his chair, lifting another sprayers onto his lap, but couldn’t fire over the desk. When everyone had a new flame thrower, he moved around the edge of the desk with a canister of his own.

  “What’s in the sprayers?” Highgrim, trying to control his shaking body, yelled to be heard over the squeals of more dying vermin.

  “My own special welcome for the devilish creatures.” Allsdipp flashed a soldier’s grin, displaying his missing teeth. “Not so old I can’t learn a thing or two.”

  The larger beetles slowed, pushing carcasses out of their way, but kept advancing. Highgrim heard clacking mandibles as the beetles struggled forward. The advance guard had almost reached the desk. His heart pounding, he searched for a weapon of any kind that would save him. His gaze landed on the fire extinguisher snug in its wall compartment.

  Four words pounded into his brain. Foam. Beetles are insects.

  Highgrim broke the glass of the fire extinguisher and began pumping. Soon a layer of foam covered the beetle-things. He swept the nozzle back and forth until no heads poked through the white barrier in front of the desk. The aides grabbed other extinguishers from down the hall and covered all the beetles back to the windows and beyond.

  When it was over, Allsdipp squinted up at Highgrim. “What made you get the extinguisher? Weren’t no flames to put out.”

  “But the foam cut off the air to their spiracles.” Highgrim gasped for air. “They suffocated. I guess you get to live to fight another invasion.”

  As the aides began the sweep-up, Stella marched back down the hall, wielding a new fire extinguisher at any bugs showing any signs of life. Highgrim leaned against a wall, struggling to catch his breath. His damp pant legs clung to his legs. Balancing, he shook the flecks of foam off only for his face to heat with embarrassment. Not all the wet was from the fire retardant.

  Allsdipp cackled. “Guess you ain’t so useless after all, boy.”

  Highgrim grinned back, relief flowing over him. But his need to interview Allsdipp still clawed at him. “When can I interview you? Sooner would be better than later. I’ve a deadline to meet.”

  Pausing to catch his breath, Allsdipp waved at the scene on the other side of the desk. “You think your readers’ll believe the truth? People don’t believe demons have made themselves at home in our world, and these pests aren’t the worst of the things you might find.”

  A grim parade of anecdotes stared Highgrim in the face, each one more implausible than the last. He swallowed, feel
ing like a five-year-old about to bawl.

  “How long do you think the sprayers’ll stop your pursuers?” asked Highgrim, his curiosity getting the better of him, in spite of his struggles to breathe.

  Allsdipp peered at the reporter. “Thing is demons are stupid. Once they think something’s a fact, they don’t change their minds.”

  “What are you trying to say?”

  “When I made my bargain, a flying beetle almost landed in my mouth. Startled me. The demon making the bargain thought I was phobic about beetles and has been using them to collect my soul ever since.”

  “I still need to interview you.” Feeling scummy for stating the obvious, Highgrim added between gasps, “You owe me. I did save your hide.”

  “There is that.” Allsdipp folded his hands on his lap. “But I don’t think anyone’s going to believe you if you tell the truth.”

  Highgrim searched his mind for a story line. “You could tell the expected fairy tale…”

  As Allsdipp absorbed the idea, his eyes glowed with mischief. “You suggesting I inhale ten cigars a day and drink a gallon of rot gut?” The codger turned the wheelchair, hitting Highgrim in the gut.

  Can…you think…of sometime… more original?” he asked between gasps.

  A grin crossed the codger’s face. “Hey. You ain’t such a bad sort after all.” With a cackle, Allsdipp patted Highgrim’s arm. “I’ll do it, but you supply the Jack Daniels.” He wheeled his chair into a room near the nurse’s station.

  A ray of sunshine broke through empty window frame at the end of the hall, but Highgrim didn’t notice. His mind busied itself sorting through his few belongings for something he could hock to buy two bottles of good booze.

  Allsdipp’s head appeared around the doorframe to his room. “Hey, boy. I was kidding. Got my own bottle.”

  Highgrim stood in a sunbeam, scratching his chin.

  “Come on, and share it.”

  ~~#~~

  Acknowledgements

  No writer works alone. So, thanks to my mentors, especially my critique group who keeps at me until I get the story right. Then, there are my beta readers who point out the stupid stuff I left in. Thanks to their suggestions, this story is a better story. Thanks also goes to my editors and all the other people who helped me put this publication together.

  If you enjoyed the story, would you mind leaving a review? Book reviews are like candy to authors, and it only takes a sentence or two to tell others what you liked about the story. If there are enough reviews, I might even fell guilty enough to finish another of the Highgrim and Allsdipp stories in my computer. [How’s that for blackmail.]

  ~~~#~~~

  About the Author

  M. K. Theodoratus, Fantasy Writer, has enjoyed four or five writing “careers". She now writes fantasy set in the alternative worlds of Andor and Far Isles Half-Elven.

  You can learn more about her work at her author website: https://www.mktheodoratus.com. Plus, Theodoratus writes a book blog: Lessons from My Reading: https://kaytheod.blogspot.com, where she often responds to comments.

  You can find her on the following social media:

  GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5478544-m-k-theodoratus

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