The Demon Collector

by Erik Lynd

  There was nothing inside the shack except for the elevator. Part of him knew the shack was just cover for the elevator. It wasn't supposed to be here and was hidden. He didn't know how he knew this, and he was beginning to suspect he wasn't supposed to.

  He stepped through the doorway and into a narrow hall, also striped with streaks of sunlight through gaping slats. He tripped as he went through as though stumbling on a stone or concrete riser, but when he looked down he saw nothing, just dirt. Down the hallway was a door hanging from bent hinges.

  He pushed opened the door, squinting at the intense light. It felt like the sun was resting on the earth itself, it was so bright. He wanted to let his eyes adjust, but the heat inside was too intense. He needed to get out. He stumbled out with his eyes scrunched shut.

  He felt gravel and dirt grind under his feet, and as his eyes adjusted to the light he understood why. He was in the middle of nowhere. Scrub brush, rock, and dirt stretched off into the distance in all directions. The only manmade object in sight was the shack. Nothing else but desert.

  He spun in a circle several times. Nothing.

  Not even a dirt road. How had he gotten here? Did they fly him in? He couldn't remember.

  And it was flat, no hills or mountains in the distance, just unending flat desert.

  He tasted salt and while he was sweating profusely, it was tears he was tasting. He was crying. He didn't know why exactly. He was confused, scared maybe? But not sad. It was something deeper inside of him he thought, something that somehow understood a little of what was happening, and it was sad. This scared him even more.

  Through shimmering heat waves and tears he saw something moving. A man, from nowhere, coming out of the distance. He hadn't been there a moment ago, and Juan had no idea where he could have possibly come from. The world tilted, and for a brief moment he was surrounded by buildings: small, squat things that looked abandoned. He thought he recognized it briefly, graffiti, corrugated metal, chipped plaster and brick. It was some sort of slum. He knew this place he thought. And he knew at some level this was the truth.

  Then it was gone. Then the sun and desert were back and the buildings were gone. Even the memory of what he had seen was slowly fading. It was all sun and heat and dust. This was the new truth.

  As the man drew closer Juan could see it was the same short, slim man with deep black sunglasses and slicked back hair who had recruited him.

  "Juan," he said, "How goes it in the trenches? How goes the good fight?"

  He had a grin from ear to ear, as though his face was splitting apart, that showed a lot of teeth.

  "Um," tried Juan. His thoughts were growing murky again. Any clarity he was experiencing was slowly draining away.

  "You guys getting everything you need?" The man asked as he put his arm around Juan; he had to stretch his arm out to reach his shoulder. He turned Juan back towards the shack. They slowly started walking back.

  "I don't... I'm not sure why I'm here," Juan said.

  "What? Why, the same reason we’re all here. We want to change the world, cleanse it by fire, purify it."

  "But I'm not sure I want to be here..."

  "Of course you do, Juan," the man said; his words seemed to take on a serpentine quality. They snaked their way into his head, twisting and turning through his thoughts. Jumbling them up in their wake.

  "We will bring down the oppressor, those who think they are better than the rest of us. Those that rule for the sake of lining their own pockets. Those that stand on the broken backs of the workers. You are here my boy, because you are a hero."

  The man was right of course, part of him wanted to think it wasn't that simple, but the thought-snakes quickly jumbled that up. They were on the forefront of the revolution. His kind were leading the way into the new world. Already his mind was working on how they could leverage the systems he and his brothers had infiltrated. How they could usher in the downfall of the corrupt world government.

  As they stepped into the building with its gleaming metal and glass walls, its coffee shop with the fresh baked pastries, its beautiful paintings and sculptures in the lobby and most importantly the welcoming air conditioning—Juan had no idea why he had been so hot—he grew excited to get back to his beautiful office and his PC.

  The lobby was full of people and alive with hustle and bustle. They were all on the same team working together to bring down the... the...

  "Corruption that is destroying the humanity in us," the man said as the elevator arrived. Juan stepped on, but the slim man held back. "We are so close Juan, the work you have done and will do is a tribute to your love of our cause. You must now go back to your desk and help lead us to victory."

  "What about you? Are you not coming?"

  "Alas, I don't get to do the fun, exciting stuff you guys get to. I just don't have your talents. My task is the boring one, somewhat bureaucratic it seems. I go to meet one of our benefactors. The fight costs money, at least until we throw off the yoke of capitalism, and my job is to keep it flowing."

  Juan nodded vaguely, that made sense. The doors started to close and the man's hand shot out, catching one side. The door slid back open and a small piece of paper appeared in the man's hand.

  "One small task for you Juan. Please send this message to the email address also on the note."

  "What is it?" He took the small slip of paper. It contained a series of numbers and letters. Coordinates it looked like.

  "Just a little something to add some excitement, up the stakes a little. Don't worry, it is all for the cause."

  The doors closed on that grinning, toothy smile. Juan pressed the button. There was only one, which was odd, but not really important. He had to get back to his desk. There was work to do, important work and everybody in this building—no, the entire world—was counting on him to do it.

  He looked down at the simple message. It seemed important, something about it, the odd request. Then he slipped it into his pocket. Important work, very important work.

  8

  The man smiled until the elevator door closed. Then the smile dropped, replaced by a scowl. The glamour had weakened on this one, he would have to watch that. None of the others had come out of it, this boy was special. He would have to watch him. He would have killed him outright, but he was their most talented and the man needed him. Sort of.

  The man left the abandon house. He wasn't worried he'd be seen; the area around the black house was deserted. The slums were full of vermin, but not this area. The buildings here were owned by Golyat and his kind. The boy had seen a desert landscape, an extra layer of glamour wrapped around him as a safety precaution, and the man had briefly entered the glamour. Now he used a handkerchief to dab at the sweat forming on his brow as though it had been real.

  It was time that was a nuisance, time lost dealing with the pawns. Then he smiled, he had a meeting to attend. It would be a fun one; he liked playing pretend.

  The man opened a hole in space there in the street and stepped into the Currents. With one step he disappeared from the world and passed through the wall that separates everything from nothing. He was surrounded by the ebb and flow of energy. He could see nothing in this place, he could feel everything. Energy and power swirled by, sending him spinning off. He was nothing at the moment, at least nothing physical, just one of many flows of energy.

  He flowed into a current of energy and within seconds—although there was no such thing as time here—he was where he needed to be. He opened another door in the wall between the nothing and the something and stepped out.

  He was in a room—an office bathroom to be exact—and he was alone, although he glanced under the stalls to be sure. All the better, he didn't have to explain his sudden arrival. He glanced in the mirror and took a moment to straighten his suit. His skin rippled slightly as he made some adjustments. He was not fond of this body, but it would do for now.

  Outside of the bathroom was a small lobby, ornate but not ostentatious. Very neat and clean,
just how the man liked it. It was not his building, of course; he was the visitor here. And that was also just how the man liked it.

  The lobby was like the building: new, modern. Lots of metals with a tasteful splash of wood here and there. And it smelled new. New and fresh. The man knew it was mostly just chemicals, but he loved that smell. Too bad it would all be gone soon. A pile of rubble to be gazed upon. That thought soured him; now all he saw was what was to be, the destruction. It wouldn't be as new then.

  It was also empty, the receptionist gone for the evening and all the employees for the cover business also gone, at least on this floor. The janitors would not be here for at least another couple of hours. This was as planned; it would not do for prying eyes to see who was meeting here.

  The man pushed open both double doors—he liked to make an entrance—to the conference room across the lobby and strode inside. Golyat, his enormous human form taking up much of the window, turned from the view outside.

  The man glanced out the window behind Golyat, but all he saw in his mind was the destruction of this city. The buildings beyond razed, bodies everywhere bloated with rot, the survivors fighting each other, the small petty wars as mankind chose to either fade away or rebuild itself, starting from the ground up.

  This is what the man saw when he looked at the world.

  "That was an awfully long time to take a piss," Golyat said.

  "Sorry, lots of coffee. The fuel of the productive," the man said.

  Golyat grunted and then turned back to the window. "Are your teams ready? Have they infiltrated all the systems?"

  "Almost. And we will be all set in time for day one as planned."

  "You'll forgive me Mr... Stone. While I can appreciate your confidence, too much is riding on this for me to blindly take your word. I will need details."

  "But you hired me to handle the details, Mr. Smith. Building up multiple hacker groups distributed globally takes time. We are on track. The teams in Europe, Asia, the US and Africa are set up and almost in control of the necessary infrastructure. I just got back from the Mexico City installation a couple of days ago and they will be ready in two days when we start."

  "And the ground teams?"

  "That was much easier. Set up websites in the deep web so they think they’re on to something, some real conspiracy. Spread some fake news. Rile up the bleeding snowflakes with talk of injustice and taking back the establishment. On the other side: groom the racism, feed the fear of immigrants, threaten to take their guns away. Mix in a little drugs and anti-racism and you have yourself a riot waiting to happen. Just point it at something and down it goes."

  "The key is that the two groups are in sync. The protesters by themselves are a bonfire if directed correctly; coordinate that with the failure of vital infrastructure and my own... special forces…and the whole world burns."

  "Our goals are the same, Mr. Smith," the man said.

  Golyat grunted again. "I doubt that, Mr. Stone. You want money and material power built from the wreckage of the world. I have other goals. Goals you would never understand."

  The man kept his face still, but inside he smiled. He understood Golyat. He understood him very well.

  "Speaking of money," The man said. He didn't really care about the money, but he had to keep up appearances. "We will need more. Just another five million."

  Golyat laughed. "Is that all? Done. I do find it odd though, that you are so concerned with money when you know it will be useless as the Days progress. We aren't talking total destruction of civilization, but extreme economic disruption is unavoidable. It will take a long time to stabilize again. Do you have your doubts? Something I should be worried about?"

  But 'Mr. Stone' was thinking of total destruction.

  "Not at all Mr. Smith. I have my uses for the funds, as long as they are timely. In the future to come, trade goods will be just as valuable as cash. My people and I still have a few days left to stock our warehouse. Besides, I bought some servers on credit. Dell and HP don't know the world is going to end soon.

  "My only concern, and I don't even know if it is founded, is regarding this hero of the Bronx Zoo everybody is buzzing about. You had mentioned him before, but I dismissed it as urban myth until I saw the other videos. I don't know what he is, but will he be a problem?"

  "No, he is nothing more than a boy with a few talents and some gimmicky special effects. I am in the process of dealing with him as we speak. Besides, he has no reason to believe that the Days of Chaos isn't just some ordinary protest. He is fed through the news like the rest of the world. And now we control the news."

  The man nodded dutifully again. All the while knowing Golyat was wrong. In fact, he was counting on it. Christopher was a threat to Golyat, fortunately he could be manipulated just as easily as the big man. That's what made this game so fun.

  "The end of the world," Golyat mused. "Rebirth, really. I hope for your sake your teams are ready, that the unrest is sown and will reach fever pitch at the right time. Because my people are ready, and if you fail they will just as easily deal with you."

  The man tried to look properly scared, but he was thankful for the sunglasses. It was hard to fake something you have never felt. Golyat had no understanding of who he was talking to. To him, the man was just another mortal looking to make a buck and maybe end up in a position of power in Golyat's new world. And Golyat's people did not worry him at all. They weren't a threat worth acknowledging.

  In the end it did not matter whether the world burned or not. All that mattered to the man was that he won. And he would win, of that he was sure. He had seen it.

  9

  Hamlin, Eris, and Christopher stood in the cube room in the lair. Hellcat trotted by Christopher's side. The soft blue light radiating from the carved lines on the wall gave some illumination, but it was still murky and the strange lighting made everything seem slightly off.

  It was a large room; a pedestal with a cube on it and a stone frame, similar to what might be used to hold a mirror, were the only objects in it. The walls were covered with an intricate carving of a map of the world, which was in turn covered by lines connecting cities, seemingly random areas of the world. Christopher still thought it looked like a stone version of the airline map you find in the back of airline magazines.

  The pedestal holding the cube was a plain narrow platform. As far as they could tell, the cube was the main catalyst to activate the door to other places. For all Christopher knew it could be the only thing needed and the room and frame were just for convenience. It the end Christopher had no idea how it worked at all.

  The plan was to only be in Mexico City for a few days then after confirming there was nothing mysterious about these Days of Chaos, enjoy the beach for the long weekend before heading back. It was December and even the resort areas would be a little bit chillier than normal, but anything would beat New York in winter.

  They had all brought bags, one each, except for Eris. She was carrying two, but Christopher wasn't sure if she needed extra stuff or if it counted as one for each Eris. All he knew was that he wasn't going to say anything. Hamlin had also brought a bird.

  "Really? Were you a miner in a previous life?" Eris asked.

  Hamlin held up the small cage. "I'm not about to step through any magic door without checking it first. I'm the only, you know, normal human in this group. Taking risks like this might be cool for you supernatural folks, but I ain't taking any chances."

  "What are you gonna do with the bird after?" Christopher asked.

  "I'm gonna let it go. I made sure at the pet store that it was a species native to Mexico. I may be an asshole sometimes, but I ain't that cruel."

  Christopher shrugged. "Let’s get started."

  He grabbed the smooth cube by the top and felt the Hellpower inside of him reach out to it. Instantly the room darkened and seem to come alive with the hum of power. On the wall, the path from New York to Mexico City started to glow brighter. Christopher released the cube and it beg
an to spin, floating into the air and jerking in random directions before pausing in the middle. The floating crystal began to glow with an internal light. The darkness within the stone picture frame started to move as though black liquid was rippling across the surface of a mirror.

  "We'll do the bird thing. You guys will have to go first. It closes right after me," Christopher said.

  Hamlin held the bird cage out on the end of a mop handle he had borrowed from a zoo janitor’s closet. Carefully, he let it pass through the shimmering surface. With a squawk the bird went through. Hamlin held it there for moment and then pulled it back.

  The bird was unharmed, although it did flutter about in irritation. It squawked a few more times to make sure they knew how pissed it was before finally calming down.

  "Well, that's that. Seems like it’s okay for non-employees of hell to travel by cube," Christopher said. "Who goes first?"

  Brushing up against him with a smile that let him know who was in charge, Dark Eris grabbed her bags and stepped through the portal as though she had done it a thousand times.

  "Well, I can't let the girl show me up. There better be one hell of a strong margarita waiting for me on the other side," Hamlin said then picked up his bag and stepped through, not quite as confidently as Dark Eris.

  The others safely through, Christopher picked up his bag and nodded to Hellcat. She padded up to his side. He scratched her head and together they stepped through.

  The room on the other side looked the same. Carved in the cement above the door was the word Mexico.

  "Anybody dead?" asked Christopher.

  "Yeah, yeah. I got it. It worked," said Hamlin.

  "Well let's see where we are exactly," Christopher opened the door. The room beyond was similar to the one they had just left, but about half the size. There was a small computer station, a kitchen, and a few other doors that probably led to bedrooms and a bathroom. The air was stale and old-smelling, but not as bad as it would be if it had been closed up for a few years. There must have been some sort of ventilation. The appliances and PC were only a few years old.