Demon Squad 7: Exit Wounds

by Tim Marquitz

  “En-enjoy-ing you-yourself?” I asked, barely able to push the words out.

  “A little,” he answered.

  A great shudder set my body to shaking, my eyelids slamming shut, and then it was gone. The rigor mortis of my borrowed body relaxed, and I fell back against the wall and Karra’s welcoming hands. I opened my eyes to see her staring at me.

  “You okay?”

  I drew in a deep, entirely unnecessary breath, and realized that I actually was, giving her an answering nod. My gaze went to my busted arm, but it wasn’t there. The healthy and completely un-crispy limb that hung there at my behest was a glorious sight to see. I flexed my fingers, and they moved without hesitation, the pain and stiffness entirely gone. The flesh, while slightly grayed, move with fluid ease. I scanned the rest of Hobbs’ body—still unwilling to admit that it wasn’t his any longer, but mine—and reveled in the sight of seeing strong muscle and flawless skin where char and pus had ruled just moments before. The transformation had been nothing like a soul transfer, its ecstasy and pleasure replace by raw and consuming pain, but the result was the same. I was whole.

  I glanced over to Katon, who’d gotten to his feet and stood over us. “Is that how it is with you each time?”

  He shrugged. “Sometimes, but not normally, no. Your host was nearly destroyed. Had it been any worse…”

  He let his statement hang there unfinished, but the meaning was clear. “Thank you,” I told him, and truly meant it.

  He just nodded and walked away, leaving Karra and I as alone as we could be. The bridges I’d burned might well still be smoldering, but it seemed there might be a few planks left unsinged.

  Rala, clearly not getting the hint, came over and sat beside me, holding Chatterbox so he could eyeball me.

  “Boooobbbsss?” he asked.

  I patted him on his head. “We’re as boobs as we can be, buddy.” His maggots did animated somersaults in his eyes, which got me to thinking. “Why are you still alive…uh, undead, uh…you know what I mean?”

  “I empowered him a while back,” Karra answered, giving him a wink. “He’s his own person now.”

  Chatterbox gave me a toothy grin. “Soooo, tiiimme tooo goo hoooommeee noooww?”

  “Soon, buddy. Soon,” I said without looking directly at him, but I didn’t need a mirror to know my face showed my lack of confidence.

  Rala looked at me over his head, her expression not remotely convinced by my bullshit. My guilt ramped up at seeing it.

  “Any idea as to how we’re gonna get out of here,” I asked Rahim, looking for some good news.

  “The answer has to be in there somewhere.” He pointed to the book set beside Rala’s leg. “Can I see it, please?”

  Rala passed it over as the wizard reached for it. He rested it against his stump, and everyone looked away while he worked to balance it, finally getting it to sit still as he opened it. His eyes went from focused to disappointed in an instant. He flipped through a few pages, and then handed it back to Rala.

  “I can’t read it,” he said, the frustration clear in his voice. “The language is beyond me. What do you know of it?”

  “Nothing really.” I didn’t want to mention how Lucifer had handed it to me to watch over because that would open up a whole new can of worms I wasn’t ready to deal with.

  “Azrael kept the specifics to himself,” Veronica chimed in, saving me the effort of having to make something up. “He kept Rala focused on practicing the invocation rather than on the specific spell that opened the portal until he needed it open. He would keep her working on what he wanted her to do—through you,” she said, pointing at me, “making sure she didn’t explore any further than that.”

  “Then maybe there’s more to it,” Karra ventured.

  “It’s possible, but Azrael told me this was only the key to open God’s secret dimension from the outside.”

  “Why would there be a separate key to open the same lock from each side?” Rahim asked, picking up on her wording. “That doesn’t make sense.”

  “You believe Azrael was telling the truth?” I asked Veronica. We’d spent so much time together over the course of our lives, catching me bullshitting more times than I can count, that I wondered if that ability had extended to Azrael while he was using my body.

  She let out a weary breath and shrugged. “He—you—seemed sincere, but I wasn’t really my most observant once he introduced his real self to me.” She motioned to the still healing black eye he’d given her in his effort to dominate her.

  “I’m sorry,” I said again, getting really tired of hearing those words fall out of my mouth.

  “It wasn’t you,” she answered, but there was no mistaking the subtle insinuation that hung in the air. It really was me, no matter how hard I tried to disown it.

  Rahim gratefully gave me an out. “You think you can try and open it again, Rala?”

  The little alien groaned and glared at the book in her hand, its spine resting against Chatterbox’s cheek. “I’m not really sure I want to,” she said, casting a furtive glance my way.

  I raised my hands—still marveling at their wholeness—and conceded her point. “This is on you,” I told her. “While I wouldn’t stand out at a prick convention, I’m free of Azrael’s influence.” I pointed up at Veronica’s eye, though I couldn’t for the life of me remembering doing that to her face. “As often as she inspires me to beat her, that wasn’t me. I don’t remember any of it, and I don’t remember ever laying a hand on you, but I swear, if it happened, it wasn’t me.” I met her misty eyes. “I’m truly, truly sorry for all the pain I’ve caused you.”

  “I—” she hesitated a moment before continuing, “I know.” Rala glanced down at the book, running absent fingers over its leathered face before glancing over at Chatterbox. “What do you think?”

  In true CB fashion, he answered her in song, breaking into the chorus of Metallica’s “The Shortest Straw,” which wasn’t exactly the confirmation I’d been looking for.

  Rala, however, hadn’t been introduced to that particular song in her short time on Earth so she took his singing as agreement. “Fine. What do we have to lose?”

  Our lives, souls, and whatever borrowed nuts we’d brought into the realm with us, but I kept all that to myself. Azrael had plenty of reason to lie to the women, but he was too arrogant to bother, which didn’t give me much hope. As powerful as he was with Longinus’ power at his beck and call, he didn’t need to lie. He was in charge, and he knew it. So did everyone else.

  “Yeah, exactly,” I answered, expecting a dramatic failure but happy to try anything at that point.

  Rahim glanced over to Katon, who’d resumed his position at the entrance. “Still clear?”

  He nodded. “So far.”

  The wizard looked back to Rala. “Shall we?”

  She muttered a curt yes and peeled the book open, moving CB to the side, out of the way. Without preamble, she started in with the singsong chant I’d heard way too often since Azrael had foisted his obsession with Lucifer’s book off on me. I hadn’t even wanted the damn thing and was more than happy letting it rot in the God proof room in Hell until Lucifer found his way back to claim it.

  I still had no clue as to what the hell he wanted with the thing. The Big Guy’s new flunky, why would he need access to a prison full of reject creations that God had no use for and squirreled away, out of sight of the rest of His worlds? It made no sense to me, but then again, there wasn’t a whole bunch that did make sense lately.

  Rala’s voice rose as the alien words danced along her tongue. Nervous eyes stared at her, clearly wishing she’d be quieter but that wasn’t gonna happen. Loud at the best of times, I knew she needed to emote the spell or it would fail. That confident recitation had been part of what Azrael had passed on to help her open the rift that sent us here. She’d taken that bit to heart.

  Her voice set the leaves to rattling, and soon after, there was the dull sense of energy building. I felt it press aga
inst my senses despite them being even duller in Hobbs body than my own. Rahim nodded his head in rhythm to the alien serenade, obviously feeling its power as well. I pressed harder to catch a sense of the magic being unleashed, to search for a break in the dimensional wall, but there was nothing. The deadened essence of the world seemed to absorb its energies, muting them into impotence.

  Turned out, I was wrong about that last part.

  Katon hissed and dove into the depths of the crevice, knocking the book from Rala. It thumped against the hard earth as the enforcer covered the alien’s mouth with a hand. Her eyes went wide. Karra reached out to stop him, but the cold determination in his eyes stopped her.

  “The dragons,” he whispered, the warning throwing a graveyard pall over everyone.

  The resonating shriek of the creatures cut through the silence, sending chills down my vampiric spine. We huddled in a mass, Rahim and Veronica joining us, all of our eyes scanning the invisible sky. The whip snap of wings sounded above us, their passage setting the braches of our roof to swaying. I wondered for a moment if vampires needed to pee because I felt the distinct tingle of pissing myself as the dragons circled somewhere out of our sight. The anticipation could have fueled a million Heinz ketchup commercials.

  We hunkered in the crevice, our collective breaths held for several minutes while the dragons cruised over the forest. It wasn’t until the sound of their wings and the adrenaline-inducing reverberations of their cries disappeared into the distance that we separated, everyone realizing just how close they were to a vampire’s naked junk.

  “They’re gone again,” Katon muttered from his post at the lip of the ditch.

  Rahim lifted the book with reverence and handed it to Rala. “Whatever you do, young lady, do not read from this again no matter how insistently we ask.” He forced a smile.

  Rala grunted as she took possession of the tome once more, clearly disinterested in having to be its bearer.

  “You think the dragons were drawn to the spell?” I asked.

  The wizard nodded. “Just like they were drawn to the portal that left us stranded here. The energy must be a lure to them.”

  “It’s likely worse than that,” Katon added.

  Everyone looked to the enforcer.

  “The dragons came from the same direction both times.” He gestured that way. “The mountains.”

  “How is that an issue?” I asked, not understanding his point. “Dragons live in caves, right?” I resisted the urge to glance at Rala when I asked that.

  Karra clearly wasn’t as dense as me, however. “Are you sure?” she asked Katon.

  “As sure as I can be,” he answered.

  “What am I missing?”

  “The dragons are here to keep us in, Frank,” Veronica said, rolling her eyes when I looked to her.

  “They’re the prison guards?”

  “Would appear so,” Katon answered. “Why else would they seek out the energy signatures of a dimensional spell in a world apparently devoid of magic?”

  There were a million reasons I could think of for why they would, but none of them made as much sense as Katon’s explanation. Who the fuck would mess with dragons, I wondered, then realized that was pretty much the point. Able to fly and mean as shit, they would be able to cover territory way quicker than anyone stuck on the ground among the massive trees and rocky terrain. They were the perfect predator.

  “So what do we do now?”

  “Follow them?” Rahim and Katon said at the same time.

  “Whhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaattttttt?”

  “Yeah, what the head said,” I told them. “Why the hell would we do that?”

  “Who in the prison holds the keys, Frankie,” Karra asked.

  I sighed as the reasoning sunk into my gut like bad sushi. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “What other choice do we have?” Katon asked. “We certainly can’t just wait here until the monkey tribe returns with their big brothers, can we?” The enforcer smiled at me.

  “So we chase death in hopes of avoiding dying?”

  “I wouldn’t have worded it that way, but…”

  I tried to think of another way, any way that made more sense, but I came up blank. We were screwed no matter what we did, but at least we were choosing what was doing the fucking. That was positive, right?

  I got to my feet, helping Karra up with me, running an errant hand across the slight swell of her stomach in hopes of finding some encouragement. She grinned in response. “Yeah, okay. Let’s do this.” I tried to sound inspirational, but the slight squeak of my voice shot the hell out of that.

  Veronica offered a hand to Rala, going out of her way to avoid getting anywhere near Chatterbox—the two had a history—and guided the alien toward the forest above, the rest of us shuffling along beside them, Katon taking the lead.

  “We’re off…”

  “Toooooo seeeeeeee thhhhhheeeee wiiiizzzzzzaaarrd.”

  Six

  The spirit of adventure lasted as long as a windswept fart. We’d left the corpses of the monkey things behind and made our way into the wild frontier of the alien forest. There wasn’t a yellow brick road anywhere to be found.

  The leaves hung heavy over our head, the canopy almost smothering despite the gigantic trees. It was just so thick as to swallow the light except for rare beams that navigated the labyrinthine maze of branches to offer up a weak glow that turned the black dirt gold.

  Now healed, my nose clear of ash, I could smell the earthen freshness of untilled soil and the fecund stink of nature in its natural element, or however the hell you explain that smell. Being a city boy—well, cavern boy mostly—all this flora was a strange shift of gears for me. The place didn’t smell like the brimstone, shit, or dirt I was used to. Old Town and El Paseo had a distinct funk that lingered in the air, the result of atmospheric conditions of being yards from a foreign country where the EPA wasn’t allowed to police the skies. It made for interesting mornings. Septic is the word.

  The silence here was also a huge difference. We knew from unfortunate experience that this world held life, but the total quiet that surrounded us was unnerving. It was as if we were under the constant threat of a tornado warning, everyone holding their breath and waiting for the worst to happen. It was only a matter of time until something zoned in on us since we were the only idiots in the whole forest making noise.

  And sure enough, after a couple of hours, Katon fell back alongside Rahim and whispered something to him. The wizard stiffened, his posture doing nothing to keep the secret. Katon dropped back to us right after.

  “We’re being followed,” he said, gesturing with a subtle nod behind and off to the right of us.

  Karra’s hand inched to her sword, and I found myself wanting something to fight with beside my slapping vampire dick. Unfortunately, there was nothing nearby except for a few, small broken branches hardly worth snatching up. I sighed, realizing now was not the time to be a size queen. It was how you handled it that mattered, right? Right?

  Though we slowed a little, Katon kept us marching along, likely looking for better ground to take a stand on, but ever since he’d pointed out our pursuers I could hear them slathering at our heels. We walked on for a good half hour to the slight snap and crinkle of their footsteps before I lost my patience.

  “We know you’re there, assholes!” I called out, turning to give our unknown enemy the full Monty. I heard Katon groan as the group came to a sudden halt. Our pursuers went still, but there was no doubting they were still there.

  “Really, Frank?” the enforcer asked.

  I shrugged. “Ever think they’re herding us someplace rather than us leading them? Not like we know the terrain. They’ve got home turf advantage.”

  “He has a point,” Rahim said with quiet acceptance of our fate, which I really didn’t like hearing. Without Longinus’ power to fall back on, anything we got into would be medieval style, our fight with the monkeys a perfect example of how limited we truly were.<
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  Katon didn’t bother responding to his friend, his eyes scanning the forest to find all our erstwhile foes and to make sure they didn’t creep up behind us.

  I figured I’d make it easier on all of us. “Come on, you damn pansies. Come out and get some.”

  “Vaaaaagggginnnnnnaaaassssss.”

  “Pussies,” I corrected.

  “Yeeeesssssss, plllleeeeaaasseee.”

  “I wasn’t offering…” I started, but gave up trying to explain it when Chatterbox’s maggots went still with disappointment. “Oh, never mind.”

  It was then that our shadowy followers chose to show themselves. They moved in like an army of gimpy elephants once they’d given up pretending to be stealthy, trying to worry us with their racket. More than two dozen strange figures spilled out from behind the cover of pink trunks, ready for battle.

  I heard Veronica sigh. “Way to go, Frank. Any other armies you’d like to challenge?”

  “One’s probably enough, for now.”

  Dressed in raggedy, blackened fur loincloths held together—and on—by strips of gray leather, our pursuers looked as if they’d escaped a barbaric reenactment of Cirque du Soleil, the Quest for Fire edition. Long, colorful strips of cloth jutted from their wild hair in rainbowed furls. The group was closely split between male and female, the distinction made obvious by a complete lack of shirts. A dozen pairs of boobs met my stare as though I were lined up before a perky firing squad. Despite the mossy green hue of them, I would happily set my gun upon those racks.

  Chatterbox agreed. “Faaaaapp, faaaappp, faaaaapppp, uuhhhhhh…” I could only presume he was having a seizure, grateful it couldn’t possibly be the other, less sanitary alternative that came along with that sound.