A lot of the time, my brain felt like soup. Lumps of my past bobbed up and down as I just let the warmth of it try to comfort me. Even with all the training and things I had become numb to, the flashing images of my wife and child being killed by a demon were enough to make the wheels seize up and halt my progress. A memory etched into the bowl that would still remain after all the contents in my head had long been emptied.

The refrigerator door opened to reveal the sorry state within. Cooking was not my strong suit. It was more like that white shirt that gets grubby with grease and oil, but you keep it around just in case. I wasn’t much for eating either unless it came in some styrofoam casing, moderately warm, and caked with all those bad things nutritionists warn you about. It was hard to worry about carbohydrates when you had demonic assassins for pudding.

Two of the three shelves were empty, yet the failing light attempted to illuminate the interior as if to reveal the grand prize that you might win - if what you were wishing for was a plastic container of congealed chicken blood. As it so happened, that is what I wanted. Rodney looked less enthused, however, as I slid the container across the counter and shut the fridge door. It would probably need to be thinned or at least warm up a bit before we began.

The Blank had found a stool from somewhere - apparently one of the faded green cupboards in here was a cubby for storing a pair of stools. I was impressed, the kid was on a roll so far.

“So,” I leaned on the counter and exhaled slowly. “There are several layers of Hell, right?”

Rodney nodded his understanding.

“Great, once you get that internalized, the rest is a piece of cake.”

[Eric, you are not a very good teacher.]

“Morally, or do you mean I’m not teaching well?” I felt what brief life-giving energy from the caffeine slowly drain from my face. So soon, too.

[Yes.]

I cleared my throat. “I’m not much for monologues, so feel free to interject with any questions to break up the monotony. We are currently planning on taking a short jaunt into what is known as the Lower Hells. Despite the name, it is the place closer to our reality.”

“Closer how?”

“In terms of taking less energy to reach there. The barrier between, uh, planes is weaker to the Lower Hells. Down there, you have all the mutant-looking demons. Pigmen, Insect-people, mostly all kinds of mismatched beasts like the creator forgot how to make proper animals and discarded them like broken toys into a pit of unending misery.”

“Are we currently in the Lower Hells?” Rodney gave the apartment a slow once-over with his eyes again. He was a smart-ass, which made him both annoying and hard to dislike.

“If only. The demons down there are driven by their vices, whether gluttony, anger, or lust - they have a singular base focus that keeps them weak.”

Rodney nodded again, hopefully mentally taking this information down.

[That is more sufficiently informative.]

I mocked tipping a hat towards my patron. “Speaking of which, the layer above the filth is called the Formless Layer. Lower Demons who gain enough power eventually become formless entities, comprised of their sins and misgivings. An unholy Christmas present - and would you look at who is the lucky receiver?” I leveled a thumb toward myself.

“That’s where patrons come from. Powerful enough to lend abilities to a mere mortal, yet still able to be controlled and bound with a pact.”

Wight said nothing, his singular eye slowly moving between me and the Blank.

“Any questions so far, Rod? May I call you Rod? Rodders?”

“Rodney is fine, Mr Redd.” The withheld smirk at the corner of his mouth would have been invisible if the struggling light bulb hanging above us had been just a few more lumens into the grave. He was prodding me just as I was him. “No questions, so far.”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

“Excellent.” I stood up straight to stretch my back out. Leaning at odd angles had a small chance of becoming a crippling event now that I was in my early thirties. “Should the Formless reach a point of concentrated effort - they reform and join the Middle Hells. I didn’t name these.” I shrugged. “Middle Level is like how you could imagine middle-level management in a company. You get your bog standard Demons that have a more ‘normal’ humanoid form. Now demons can originate from this Level, born into it - if you will. They do not all have to ascend from the Formless.”

“How do they procreate?”

“Frequently and violently, I assume.” Pearl briefly flashed across my mind before I shelved that away. “I’m not a demonologist, so I don’t know where new ones come from. Powerful enough in the Mids and they gain the ability to reform on their plane unless they are destroyed with their true name.”

I took a deep breath. Perhaps not a great idea in my health hazard of an apartment - however, my whole day was about to be five times worse. “Demons can then go Formless again in what is called the Ascended plane. Ranking up from this plane is even more difficult - but to do so, you end up in Higher Hell. This is where the most powerful of Demons reside, including the Demon Royalty itself.”

“Huh.” The Blank shuffled on his chair, idly tapping his fingers on the near-empty coffee mug.

“Just ‘huh’?”

“There’s a lot more to it than I thought. We are just going to the weak area, though, right?”

[That is correct. Eric would die otherwise.]

My right eye twitched. There was a good reason why I wasn’t the biggest fan of working with others. Even Wight was a drain on my social energy. I could understand it if the blasted demon had anger issues or some other manner of abrasive personality - but until I was literally blasting holes in demons, he would be polite as a peach.

“Well, school’s out - I’m glad I could be somewhat informative.” This part wasn’t such a lie, despite my shit-eating grin. They did not teach initiates enough in the Organization. How could you really? There was a fifty percent mortality rate on the first portal dive. The cynic in me thought they fed the pigmen on purpose to keep them interested - keep them as a constant threat. It was all a business at the end of the day.

“You okay, Mr. Redd? You look like you just ate a lemon.”

My eyes switched to the Blank. I hadn’t realized I had glazed over as I ruminated about my time in the Org. It was not something I would wish on anyone, death wish or not. “How’d they treat you at the Org, Rodney?”

“It was okay. I mean - I am betting they treat us pure souls with more kid gloves than you Hunters. We don’t have to, you know…” He nodded towards the clear pot of blood and then the mostly clear flooring.

“Yeah.” There was nothing I could really say further that wouldn’t make me feel like an asshole. Neither of us really picked our lots in life. We just had to work with what we had.

[Eric has never had a Communicator before]

Rodney raised his eyebrows at me, perhaps deciding on what amusing barb he could come up with.

“I don’t play well with others.” With a shrug I grunted as I grabbed the pot from the counter. “I’ve partnered with Hunters before, don’t get me wrong, but then it’s more of a clash of egos. I’m sure we won’t have that issue.”

“I dunno, Mr. Redd. I do think pretty highly of myself.”

My humorless smile matched his. “And low of me?”

“We will see how you perform in the Lower Hells, Mr. Redd.”

That we would. I gave him a nod. The banter was appreciated. If I was about to die today, then at least a moderately normal human connection was a better way to go than just having Wight politely chastise me for the failure. I opened one of the counter cupboard doors, which immediately fell from the hinges. It found a new home placed against the wall, and instead, I withdrew a metal tray from a cobwebbed shelf.

It was perhaps the third most reflective surface that I owned - excluding the medicine cabinet, which I quite preferred to stay atop the wall for now. “Here, you need something like this, right?”

“Perfect, almost.” He nodded and rubbed the flat side with a balled-up amount of his hooded top. “At least this way, I’ll be able to see you, not just hear.”

“When I speak, you’ll be able to hear me - how does this work?”

He gave me a look like he was tired of explaining the latest technology to his grandparents. I wasn’t that old yet.

“I can form a connection with you. Don’t ask the specifics. I will see you through the tray and can hear everything that goes on around you. You will be able to hear my voice in your head.”

“Creepy.” I popped the lid from the blood container. As if I needed something else to make me feel like I was slipping away from my dearly held sanity. Now I would have someone watch and dribble mouthfuls of unwarranted advice straight into my tired gray-stuff.

“It only works when you’re in Hell. I can’t watch people in our reality.”

I raised an eyebrow. That was not even a consideration in my head at present… but I could see the practical use of being able to spy on people, teenage hormones aside. The question of whether it could spy on demons left my mind as quickly as it entered, dragging behind it the visage of Pearl like one of those banner-laden planes.

A paintbrush was plucked from the sink - one thing I had the foresight to keep clean. There was no fun in trying to paint with a brush caked through with dried blood. I grabbed the paper of Infernal instructions from the cupboard and sighed, looking at the floor. Art was something alien to me, the grand irony of this being my own hell - now being observed as I engaged in the effort by both someone my junior and someone I owed my power to.

“Where’d you get that from?”

I kneeled down and looked up at the young man. “Demon Hunter skills.” The paintbrush dipped into the pot of blood. I hadn’t thinned it enough, but I chose to power through to save face.

[He is not wrong.]

“I see,” the Blank said and shrugged, looming over me as I painted the first sigil incorrectly.