I feel like I had something for this at some point. Uh, darkness was… looming like… no, something wasn’t right. Even my introspective forethought couldn’t quite keep up with the current danger. My psyche had been worn so thin you could see through it, the Eric underneath just playing things by ear in the hopes that the rollercoaster had an end, even if it meant flying off the tracks into oblivion.

My boots struck dusty concrete half pasted by demonic blood slowly burning away from this plane. Light was ahead, amongst the darkness. The flash of abilities illuminating the gray walls as impassive amber eyes shone through the pitch black beyond.

//Two friendlies, five hostiles ahead.

I ran up to join the other Hunters. Hating at least half of everything that entailed. Wight padded along beside me. Org would have their noses on all three of us down here, and I couldn’t Private Eye them away since I needed the help too. That just meant no fancy tricks for now.

“Reinforcements,” I called out, biting my tongue in not saying ‘cavalry’ but also wanting them to be aware I wasn’t some demon sneaking up and getting a… oh cool, that Hunter had a machine gun.

“About time,” said the commando-esque figure with a grunt. Almost a mirror image of Partridge, but a little younger and more tan, a deep red beret sat atop dark hair cut short. “We’ve hit a stalemate. Can’t kill’em quicker than they spawn from the portal.”

I nodded, noting the blue sheen that waved around his weapon. Not that it put mine to shame or anything. I’m sure my smaller capacity hit harder. Taking my eyes away from him, I looked over at the other Hunter, who hadn’t acknowledged my presence yet.

A woman in a long dress, bright blue and reflective, with a white flower design on one side. Her dark hair was tied up and a light blue dragon swirled around her head in a figure eight. From her hands, a bright blue orb shot out, crackling lighting along the way and illuminating the rough corridor towards the peering eyes.

There was a flash of power as it struck the nearest Fiend, their large ruddy body lit up briefly by the attack. It didn’t seem to slow them much.

“I feel like I clash,” I awkwardly grinned, their blue powers differing from my red. “Eric Redd.”

“Josh Finn,” the older man said, “and this is Heidi Carmine. She doesn’t talk much, thank fuck.”

I nodded slowly, unsure as to whether he didn’t like other Hunters very much, or was being misogynistic. The edge of corruption looming at the back of my mind wasn’t opposed to putting a bullet in his head for either reason. Maybe both of the Hunters, so I could take all the glory.

I licked my lips. “Anything I should know, or shall I just go shoot them?”

Josh looked at me again, perhaps trying to work out if I was simple. Or a liability. “Go wild, kid.” His eyes met Wight and then he turned back to the approaching demons with his weapons raised. “Show us up, if you’re such hot shit.”

The woman raised an eyebrow at me, her eyes glowing a faint blue.

Well, they did give me permission; I supposed. I shrugged to Wight and walked forward, not having quite the range these two did. Of course, there was always the possibility my attacks would leave nothing but a dirty mark of the Deep Fiends, and I’d never live that down. I’d have to kill them for sure.

I stood in the middle of the passage, the occasional attack over my head illuminating the three large figures in front of me. They had gouged at sections of the wall and floor, their own amateur excavation turning the tunnel into an uneven battleground. For the most part, their dozen or so feet of height and almost half that in width made it awkward for all three of them to traverse the space without being hindered.

“What do you think, Wight? I don’t want to look inept.”

[I do not care for your peers. Their presence is inconsequential.]

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Good ol’ Wight, always knew what to say to cheer me up. I spun up the revolver and got within range of the demons. Their eyes slowly turned toward me, even as they took blue flares of damage. Why weren’t they really progressing?

zipped through the gloom, striking the first demon in the chest. Dark blood ran down from the wound, his heart pierced.

I grinned. Not silly now, was I-

As the Fiend began to drop, his toothed maw opened widely. A blazing orb of red light sprung into being and grew within a second. I dove to the side by instinct as a beam of crimson light shot forth from the mouth, scouring through the concrete, trying to track me down. After two seconds of the attack, the demon collapsed, and the light faded from their eyes.

I stood and looked at the fist-wide trail that had dug through the concrete floor - almost a foot deep in places.

“Okay, so they do that when they die. I don’t want to get hit by that.” The revolver spun around and I glanced back at the other Hunters. “I also don’t want to not get hit by that, if you get my meaning.”

[I do.]

//One neutralized. Two close, four closing in.

Now the issue wasn’t could I kill them, but could I do it in a way that I didn’t inadvertently get laser beamed in the process?

“Don’t get hit by that,” Josh jeered from a distance away.

I rolled my eyes, wondering if they were really helping or not. It didn’t look like they could one-tap the demons. The answer was simple, though…

The next two had picked up some speed, seemingly interested in getting their large mitts on me. Revolver went up again. .

I scoured a large hole, almost destroying the whole head of the monster. It staggered, and then the beamed pulse shot straight upward from its neck-hole, before slumping forward and drawing a deep indent along the ceiling before it spluttered out.

“Better.” I rubbed the barrel of the gun against my beard. “Not quite though.”

There was the feeling that this was meant to stall me from getting into something greater. Maybe that was my ego talking - that I had grown to the point where I had to be the key pivotal character in every big event. I’m sure they had other Hunters that would be better suited to this. .

Another head exploded, and the body fell backwards, the beam of energy cutting through the demon behind. This collateral demon died and sprayed a laser forwards, scouring a wide arc across the hallway just in front of me.

“Interesting.” Dust fell down from the ceiling where my shot had erased a bit of gray rock. “Speeding up to the portal would be a bad idea, as there might be a domino effect that I can’t jump out of if I want to get rid of all the demons after.”

[You don’t usually think this much, Eric.]

“I feel there is more at stake in the real world. Is that unfair when Hell is like… your home?”

[I do not see it that way. The house in which we live is my home.]

A smile crossed my face, as my obsidian mask rose up, leaving crimson eyes and a toothed grin to shine out against the gloom.

//More approaching, another… seven hostiles.

I could see points of amber swaying in the distance as figures approached in the darkness. This would never end as long as the portal was open, and I would just end up rolling the dice over and over until one of the beams finally hit me. Not a risk I was willing to take.

“Chances of getting through them all to reach the portal in one piece?”

[Very likely.]

//The portal is making it hard to fully scan, and it’s not showing up on my system.

Chances were it was down the hallway somewhere - that’s where the demons were coming from. I turned back to the useless Hunters.

“Any idea where the portal is?”

Josh shrugged, and Heidi shook her head. “This is as far as we’ve gotten,” he yelled, “had to push the bastards down from the surface.”

Blah blah. If they had just sent me in sooner, they wouldn’t need these two. One man problem solver, that was me. I looked back at the lumbering demons and pushed my glasses up to Detect. Definitely a group of demons in the dark, but nothing that looked like a portal.

“Well, no time like the present.” I allowed the cooling power of Wight to flood into me for so that he could increase my strength and agility. After catching his knife from the air, I pocketed it, to the gasp of at least one of the other Hunters. Possession still being a rarity, some would never dare let their patron do such a thing.

It was an ego boost, for sure.

Boots digging into the loose gravel on the floor, I sprinted forward toward the demons. Although they had seemed slow and cumbersome from a distance, as soon as I was within melee range, their arms lashed out at me. I jumped into the air, firing off three shots of red light into the offending arm. As soon as I landed, I kept going, not wanting to finish them off and risk getting beamed.

The next two brought their arms down, and Wight assisted me into a quick roll. As they struck the floor, I felt the vibration through the ground. Back on my feet, I stumbled, uneasy. No, it wasn’t my balance, it was-

A crack and sense of vertigo flooded me as the floor collapsed.

I had found the portal - my first thought in seeing the glowing oval in the gloom ahead as I fell in slow motion. The second thought was to the forty or so pairs of eyes now looking up at me as I fell alongside the three closest demons from the upper floor.

//Seventy-eight hostiles, and the… portal.

Shit. I had been close.