Turns out I was a bit of a troublemaker. Apparently, my nuanced approach to the job had ruffled some feathers in the great beyond and consequences had now come home to roost. I had a feeling that the Organization didn’t just like me for my strength, but rather my novel and unflappable ability to take everything in my stride. They didn’t need a blunt tool to crush the demons. They had many more Hunters that could do the job for a while before burning out. What they needed was a human fox in the demon fox house.

“I guess I shook a few branches there and knocked something untoward loose?” I resigned to sitting on the floor against the washing machine as the portal powered down.

“Just reading the briefing now…” the Blank responded.

[Power imbalance.]

Sure, I had killed whatever the big asshole demon was. He seemed to enjoy bullying the more pleasant small ones, and I wasn’t a huge fan of others punching down. I allowed myself to do it because it was demons… but…

Hmm. Lost my train of thought there amongst all the bullshit. The lines between friend and foe had become blurred, just as I knew they would. I had thought it would be something further down the line to wrangle with. In the Mids, where the difference between myself and demon was cultural. It was easy to think of them as monsters when they looked like nightmare creatures and didn’t cook you pancakes.

Maybe I shouldn’t have started the Quest on an empty stomach.

[Are you recovering, Eric? I apologize for the damage.]

“Had a lot worse.” I smiled at him. “Mostly just aches now, recovering from the trauma.”

He tilted his head in response, as if he was trying to observe something within me. It was a look that made him appear even more bird-like.

[You are recovering faster than previously.]

“Thanks for noticing.” I deflated and tried to stretch out my neck. If I could regenerate a new hand in less than a day, then some dislocated limbs and torn muscles should take a few hours at most.

[It is better you do it by yourself rather than rely on… drugs.]

His eyes briefly went over to the stash of meds - both Org and demonic. I knew he was probably wondering about some of the same things as I had. Were all Org meds tainted in some manner? Would taking them mute or increase my divine strength? Would the H-Max pin more of his power within me, or risk ruining my mortal form?

“The longer I can go without a last chance attempt to save my life, the better, I think.” I gave him a smile, despite the fact that such situations had been where I had grown most.

[Your continued existence is a boon to us all, Eric.]

My patron looked back at me, his face hard to read. Certainly I had been the focal point for all of us, gathering and forming some kind of happy life even against the odds of our jobs and natures. What would they do without me? More to the point, what would I do without them? At first I had wanted to spend less time in Hell because it was terrible, but I did so anyway because I thought I deserved the punishment and horror.

Even now, though, my reason for being was closely tied to that forsaken plane. The portals, and whatever powers that had determined I was an appropriate vessel for various boons, all led me to spending more time in the amber heat.

“Right, so it’s actually somewhat vague.” Rodney scratched at his messy hair. “Those helper demons you ‘set free’ have now formed an army or something, and you have to go and sort it.”

“Diplomatically or… with gunshots?” I felt the energy draining from me already. The Org was getting predictable, and I was growing tired of playing their games. They were seeing how I handled different situations - and I wondered at which point this started, or if my entire career had literally been a test of my capabilities.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“They did not specify - so I guess for you it’d just be one before the other.”

A grin spread across my face. Sounded like me. The demons had seemed pleasant when they were under the oversized thumb of the gargantuan one - but who knew how they’d be now that they were freed and had a power of their own? I would try to talk to them at first, see what their intentions were.

[Are your hopes that they will remember you and see you as their savior?]

“The first part, sure.” I had not committed the act out of a need for being worshipped or even given a pat on the back. Savior was not a particularly apt word to describe me. In truth, I had fired the shot as a selfish act of feeling good about myself. I didn’t consider the consequences - some demons just needed to die. All of them, mostly.

“Well, they want you back in the field as soon as you are able.” Rodney shrugged. “But don’t push yourself.”

Field, I rolled my eyes. They had passed right on through the part where the last Quest was a failure - possibly because it wasn’t entirely my fault. The Hunter looked to have created a portal to somewhere with a skill, and then was gone.

“Wight, do you have any idea where Max might have gone?”

[I do not. The ability he used was… beyond our portal capacities.]

“Similar to those pockets of things outside the three planes?” I scratched at the side of my head.

[In some ways, I believe.]

That was far beyond my understanding. The Hells and Heavens were enough for Eric Redd - I barely could deal with the mortal plane I lived on. Thinking about alternate realities or bubbles of distinct realities out in the nether of… existence was something far beyond my pay grade.

Rodney shuffled in his chair and put his tech to the side to get comfortable. “Your Rat God spoken to you again recently? Let you know his thoughts on what you’re up to?”

“Not since the meditation.” I shook my head. “I don’t think a direct connection with my brain is as easy from where he is.” As much as I appreciated the gifts I had received, having a little talking rat to go with my talking bird-person might injure the sharks currently being leaped over. “You have any other ominous dreams?”

“No, not really. Nothing, you know…” he waved his hands around to signify all the occult bullshit we had going on. “Plenty of conscious panic about the Org meeting, though.”

“They want you there after our next descent into the Lowers, I take it?” I shuffled up to my feet, the washer now becoming too unyielding to my body craving comfort. My leg was still sensitive to walk on - but was a lot better than when the pigman had fractured it.

“Yeah. Perhaps these ones are for testing me, too?” He scrunched up his face and stared down at his hands.

[How so, the Rodney?]

“The tech has some limitations. Like it can only detect less than one-hundred hostiles on the screen. There was no indication of the power level of the pigmen, and I couldn’t track Max as well as I wanted with everything going on.”

“They’re trying to frustrate you into making the decision, then?” I crossed my arms. Unsurprising for the Org to try to tip the scales to get what they wanted. At the least, it wasn’t putting Rodney in danger, even if was a bit rough on me. That made me wonder if the next Quest was intended to be a test for the both of us too, rather than just one held over my head.

“It’s not like I hadn’t already made up my mind,” he nodded, “but I guess they’re really heavy-handed about this stuff, huh?”

Wight and I exchanged a glance. We knew well enough. The fact that they hadn’t asked to see us yet told me they probably hadn’t seen my new skills - but that didn’t really seem like a sure enough answer to hold close and warm me as I slept.

Couldn’t trust the Org. But had to. A spark of intrigue popped into the back of my newly minted noir detective brain.

“You ever finish that research into the Church stuff?”

“Ah. No.” He looked a little ashamed. “Between my mom and everything that happened with you after, I kind of put it aside.”

I nodded enthusiastically as my rolling thoughts kept coming up with new points. Church, Org, portals, Heaven, and Hell. Patrons. All of these were familiar words - some of them a little too friendly, and a connection paired a lot of them, but I was yet to understand it. It seemed beyond the pale for me to ask, but I’d like to use Detect at Rodney’s house to see if anything came up.

“I’ll get back on that, once things with… later are settled.”

“Thanks, Rodney.” I smiled and pushed my glasses up, activating Detect on instinct.

[You know if you do that too much, your eyeballs will explode.]

I turned to my patron, his black feathered form now a shadow against the muted grays behind him, his crimson eyes the only color in my vision.

“Define ‘too much’.”

Rodney groaned from his chair. “Do not come back through the portal with empty and bloody eye sockets anytime in the future where I have to sit here and witness it.”

[That’s not very compassionate, the Rodney.]

Intrusive thoughts thankfully didn’t win out this time, and as my vision returned to normal, I turned back to him with hands clasped behind my back.

A wide grin spread across my face as the light reflected from my spectacles. “You’re sure to see much worse than that, don’t you worry.”