“Why the fuck haven’t you brought me the boy yet?”
Lucifer stood tall over Jack as he knelt before him, the servant trying to hide his trembling. He knew it was highly likely that the Dark Lord would not think his new plan was a good idea. Actually, he was quite certain of it.
“Well, my lord, things have gotten a bit complicated as of late.”
“I do not want to hear those words!”
“I’m sorry.”
“Sorry means nothing to me! Is it the angel? Is she your ‘complication’?”
“A bit, yes. We’ve only just recently been able to convince her to leave the boy with us, without her supervision. He’ll now be with us every day while she’s at work. For tutoring.”
“Fine. What else is complicating things then? Is the boy being difficult?”
“Not exactly, my lord. He’s very trusting of me. Unfortunately we discovered he has the ability to read minds. Direct reading of thoughts. It’s proven hard to keep secrets from him.”
Lucifer narrowed his eyes. “Are you telling me that he knows what you are? He knows the plan?”
“Yes and no.”
“For fuck’s sake!” The booming voice echoed in the throne room and Jack could not hide his terror. “What does he know?”
Jack swallowed hard. “He found out we’re demons. It was an accident. But—”
“An accident? You just happened to let it slip? Or did he read your mind? Do not lie to me.”
“He read my mind.”
“And why do I get the sense that you’re lying to me?”
For a moment Jack wondered if Lucifer was able to actually sense his lie. He hesitated too long, however.
“Never mind. I’ll find out for myself.” Lucifer bent down and grabbed Jack’s hair, placing his other hand on the top of his head, gripping his skull. “Tell me exactly when it happened or I’ll analyze every moment of the past week.”
Jack’s heart pounded, knowing exactly what was coming. It didn’t surprise him that Lucifer could analyze memories, but he was angry at himself for not thinking of it. “Friday morning. Two days ago.”
There was no warning. Immediately Lucifer’s grip tightened and power went into his brain, searching through it for the right time since it was far enough in the past to be buried by recent events. Jack screamed the entire time, the pain increasing when the memories were found and pulled out quickly. It felt like part of his skull had been removed with it and he collapsed.
Lucifer sat on his throne, reclining as he tossed the orb in front of him to watch. Jack watched too, grateful there was no sound, but it didn’t matter. Everything was there to see: Joey arriving at their house, his immediate questioning of his past, the argument with Dorian, and the conversation that spilled everything. Though Lucifer could not hear what Jack said, he could clearly read the response from Joey. The Dark Lord sat up, waved away the orb, and glared at Jack.
“You told him. You sat there and told him everything.” He stood from his throne and approached the kneeling demon, bringing him to his feet by his hair, sending him flying against the wall, and slamming his fist into the middle of his chest.
Jack felt every rib shattering into tiny pieces as if the power from the hit had spread through each one. He fell back to his knees, clutching his chest, every breath agony. “I can explain, my lord,” he croaked.
“I know what I saw. I ought to bring 0192 and 1301 here for punishment too, showing their powers like fools. But that’s no excuse to tell him everything.” Lucifer paused a moment. “Though he didn’t react when you explained the plan. To bring him to me. Why not?”
“Because I didn’t tell him that. I came up with another idea. His trust was waning, I had to.” Jack had to stop between every sentence to take a slower breath.
“What did you tell him then? Do. Not. Lie!”
“I told him we were looking for Buriel and that we needed his help to take him down. He has access to information that can help us. We can use him.”
“What information? The angel?”
“Yes. I already have some, and he’s promised to get more.”
Lucifer looked at him curiously. “Tell me what you know.”
Jack explained how Annabelle had been adopted as a baby, that she had healing powers and could sense danger, and that she was in denial about being an angel. He told of how Joey only knew his mother had been attacked by a demon and nothing more, and confirmed that the angel was related to her. “I’m hoping he’ll bring good news tomorrow, something to help us start a search. With your blessing, of course, my lord.”
With a snort, Lucifer began to pace. “With my blessing, you say. You apparently think it’s okay to just change up what I’ve been planning for years. The boy is in the palm of your hand, and you do the exact opposite of what I told you to do. Blatantly defying my orders. Do you know what happens to those who defy my orders?”
Jack knew he was about to find out. “They’re punished.”
“Indeed. Which you shall receive. However, I will allow this new plan to commence. Buriel has been free for far too long, and I’m tired of listening to Beelzebub and the kings whining about it. Use the boy as long as his and your powers remain secret from all others, especially the angel. There will be dire consequences if you screw that up. What I’m about to do to you will be nothing in comparison. Do you understand?”
There was no preventing his severe trembling. “Yes, my lord.”
Lucifer approached, and Jack could not look at him. “Oh,” the Dark Lord said, “I’d also like you to write some new music, and I’ll be sure Caleos pushes it more. Additional bait for Buriel.”
Jack was picked up by his throat and tossed onto his back. The supreme leader knelt and placed his hand on Jack’s broken chest, extreme heat flashing from it and into his heart. Instantly the blood within it was replaced with something that felt like lava, pumping through his body to fill every vessel, every artery, every vein with the boiling liquid. Without blood everything stopped, his lungs no longer able to breathe, his heart no longer beating, his brain sensing nothing but the pain of everything inside melting. He could see nothing, hear nothing, only existing as a pile of agony.
* * *
Jack woke up to see faces he didn’t recognize, three shirtless males expressionless. Servants looking down on him as he lay on a stone slab. In moments they were joined by someone he did recognize. The leopard head peered down at him, his black eyes scrutinizing, his furry brow furrowed.
President Osé put his front paws on Jack’s chest and pushed down in various places. The ribs were solid once again. Though he didn’t have opposable thumbs, he was able to pick up Jack’s arms and legs with both paws to examine them. He walked around the table, upright just like Amdusias, his black robe flowing behind him. After a look into his eyes, Osé said, “You’re good. A lucky one. Or should I say unlucky.” The chuckle came out like a hoarse purr. “That was a new one for me. Dealt with things like boiling water or gasoline or other chemicals for blood, but lava? Count on Lucifer to come up with something like that. What did you do to piss him off so much?”
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Sitting up, Jack could still feel a tingle of pain all over. “It’s complicated,” he said.
Another chuckle purr. “Well, off with you. The Dark Lord insisted you return to Earth immediately once you’re awake whether you can walk or not.”
Jack fell to the ground upon trying to stand up, two of the servants having to pick him up and handing him over to guards that assisted him toward Gaap’s seal to Earth. He was eventually steady enough to slowly hobble down the tunnel and through the portal. But once back in the kitchen of his house, he had to lean against the wall to keep upright.
“You’re back!” Miles jumped from his chair where he sat with the others around the table and put his hands on Jack’s shoulders. “You’ve been gone for hours.”
“Hours?” Jack mumbled. “Felt like years.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t want to talk about it. I need to sit down.”
He took his chair and reluctantly looked at the other two demons at the table. Cameron’s eyes were wide as he bit his lip, and Dorian simply stared, waiting. Jack was in no mood to try to read him. Instead, he sighed and rested his aching head on his hand.
“You gotta tell us what happened,” Miles said. “It obviously didn’t go well.”
“I’ll put it this way: I needed a long visit to Osé afterwards.”
“I knew he wouldn’t like your plan,” Dorian said.
Jack glared at him. “You’re real fucking lucky he didn’t call you back for the same treatment. He analyzed me and saw what you did. Saw it all. But I got all the punishment. So fuck you to Hell and back a hundred times, asshole.”
There was silence in the room, Dorian looking down at his hands on the table.
Cameron finally spoke. “He saw me too, then.”
“Yeah. You’re welcome.”
“I’m sorry, man. Didn’t even think about him analyzing you.”
Jack sighed again. “What’s done is done. He agreed to it in the end. We’re going after Buriel. And he wants us to write new music, too.” He stood and walked toward the door to the upstairs apartment. “I’m going to lay down.”
When he reached the top of the stairs he heard footsteps behind him and knew it was Miles without even looking. He allowed his friend to follow him in and down the hall to his room.
“Jack. Talk to me.”
“No.”
“Please.”
“No.”
“We’re absolutely fucked. I can feel it. You’re…disconnected. I don’t know how else to describe it. You don’t have to tell me what he did to you, but I just know that something is missing now, and we’re fucked if you don’t…well, reconnect or something. You got more soul power than any of us realized. You gotta fix it. Do some soul power shit or something.”
Jack knew Miles was right. The disconnection, the spilling of emotions all around them that had happened when they first arrived had occurred yet again, but worse. Music had been the remedy for it. But now he had little motivation to do it, or even be in the same room with his bandmates. Except Miles. His friend had felt the connection too. That was one he wanted to fix.
“I can fix us,” he said. “You and me. The others…”
“I know you’re pissed. You should be. But Cameron is legitimately remorseful. And I know you’re the kind of guy that can easily forgive, something no demon is really capable of doing. I think we’re the odd ones out, considering I never thought I’d say something like that. You’re turning me into a nice guy. And yeah, Dorian is a piece of shit, but as much as I wish we didn’t need him, we do.” Miles shook Jack gently by the shoulders. “You gotta fix this. Only you can.”
Jack nodded. “One at a time. Let me rest for a while, then you and I go downstairs and jam. Just us, okay?”
“Deal.”
* * *
The connection with Miles was repaired within minutes as they improvised together, coming up with random riffs and melodies and dueling solos. Jack kept thinking about Miles’s comments regarding his “soul power” and how only he could fix their broken team. Indeed, without the strength pumping through from Miles, and surely the other two, he would not be able to take down Buriel and his dukes.
When Cameron came down the stairs, unable to hide his desire to join them, Jack invited him to jam. The happiness that exuded from the drummer proved that his earlier apology had been sincere. Jack wondered if he felt the missing connection too, but decided not to ask.
It soon became a powerful triangle, the music holding the repaired connections tightly together. Soul power. As much as he wanted it to be enough, he knew it wasn’t. The missing piece was on his mind, fighting with the grudge that had seemed to peak. He buried it, wanting to enjoy what he had already put back together.
After hours of putting pieces of songs together, a sound came from the stairs. Dorian stood there, hands in his pockets, watching them. The rest stared back, and Jack expected him to make a snarky comment about what they had written, that he could make it better. But no such words came.
Miles and Cameron looked at Jack. Only one person could take in the missing piece. Only one could fix the broken connection that spread across the room between them.
“If you have something constructive to add, you can join us,” he said at last.
Dorian nodded and took one of his basses. He asked them to play something they’d written, and as they did, he listened intently as if calculating in detail. “Again,” he said when they’d finished, and he began to play along, whatever he had put together in his head coming together in the mix.
The connection was slow to repair, and Jack knew it was as much because of his own hesitancy to allow it as it was Dorian. But it had to be done. He finally lifted the barrier entirely, leaving it up to the bassist, who soon released his own tension and the connection was back.
The room was clear again, and as Jack looked at each of his bandmates in turn, there was no doubt they all felt it too.
Their power was back.
* * *
Cameron had made a fifth chair from another nightstand so they could all sit with Joey at the dining table. There was no question what their first order of business would be.
“She actually saw it happen,” Joey said. “The attack at least. She said one of the guys pulled an axe out of literally nowhere, and the other guy set the trees on fire when she sneak-attacked them.”
“Wait, Annabelle attacked them?” Jack asked, everyone’s eyes wide. “I thought she just had healing powers.”
“I did too. But she said some weird random powers of throwing invisible things just came out, and that she hasn’t been able to do it again. It got them to leave, though. It saved my mom.”
Dorian sat back in his chair and rubbed his chin. “I’d say it’s likely that she was the angel’s original assignment.”
“God knew this would happen?” Miles asked. “She’d get attacked by a demon someday so here’s an angel for later?”
“No. God knows a lot, but nothing that specific. If he knew that sort of thing, he’d send millions of angels to take down every demon working on Earth. There’s got to be more to it than that.” Dorian suddenly sat up again and leaned on the table. “It’s my understanding that angels ‘die’ or go back to Heaven when their assigned human dies. She didn’t.”
“She almost did,” Joey said. “She told me she pretty much dropped dead when I was born and my mom died. But then she came back to life or something and it transferred to me for some reason. Her power of protection and all that.”
“Now that’s bizarre. A guaranteed Heavenly decision there. Wow.”
Jack found it fascinating, but mostly by watching Dorian get blown away by things that went against everything he knew.
“Well, I’m going to need to ponder that one for a bit. In the meantime, what did you learn about the attackers? Did she know them?”
“No. Never seen them before. She described them as all having long hair, looking like they were in their twenties. The guy that raped my mom had dark hair, the others had lighter hair. But they were too far away to get a good look at their faces.”
“Just like all their victims described,” Jack said.
“Victims?” Joey raised his eyebrows.
Jack explained his time working at the intake of Hell, analyzing the auras of every human that arrived and questioning those he discovered had been murdered by Buriel and his dukes. “Mind control, sharp weapons, and fire. Their specialties.”
Pointing at Jack, Miles said, “I don’t suppose you could ask Lucifer to let you see any analysis of those memories. Get an exact look.”
Jack snorted. “Yeah, right. After yesterday’s lovely torture session I doubt he’d be willing to share something so confidential.”
“If they even still have it,” Dorian added. “Correct me if I’m wrong, Cameron, but all memories removed when demonized are kept among the northern rulers, not general analysis.”
Cameron shrugged. “I worked for Zagan, dude. He didn’t do that stuff. How would I know?”
Dorian sighed, muttering something about “useless.” “Your Great King is Balam, is it not?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you know what he does?”
“He knows a lot. Super witty apparently.” Cameron chuckled. “At least that’s what Zagan says. Never met the guy.”
“Yes. But what does he know?”
“Random shit.”
Dorian covered his face with his hands.
“You’re saying you don’t know?” Miles asked Dorian.
With a glare, Dorian sat up straight again. “I’m just getting the Great Kings mixed up. I’m not from the north, I don’t have an interest in their hierarchies.”
“Oh! You’re thinking of Purson,” Cameron said. “His whole hierarchy is about knowing secrets and stuff. If our memories are ‘secret’ from us, bet he has all that. As for analysis, no clue, man.”
“My guess is not. I’d say it wouldn’t hurt to ask, but…”
Jack stared at him through narrowed eyes, but Dorian did not look at him.
Joey looked around the table, face full of fascination. “Wow. There’s different parts with different rulers and stuff in Hell? Where was Buriel from?”
“Nowhere,” Dorian said. “He’s a wandering prince, so he’s not tied to any Great King. Goes all around Hell slaughtering servants for fun. He has twelve dukes under him usually, but apparently he only kept his two favorites for his Earthly adventure. Merosiel and Drusiel.”
“Where would I go?” Joey’s fascination included fear.
Dorian did not answer, instead glancing at Jack.
“You’re a pretty special case,” Jack said. “Maybe you won’t go there at all.” He ignored the glare from across the table.
“Anyway,” Dorian said at last, “we can try some searches for missing persons that match the descriptions we know. Try to get names or possible sightings. Then if you want, Jack, you can ask Lucifer this weekend if he has details on Buriel’s human form.”
“We need to give him something, show him we’re actually trying on our own.”
“Tell him about the angel. What we just learned.”
Joey gasped. “You’re gonna tell Lucifer about Annie? He’ll want to hurt her!”
“No, he won’t,” Jack said, hoping his reassurance came through. “Hurting her would ruin the mission anyway. She’ll be fine.”
I promise. I’ll make sure of it.
Getting his mind read was really coming in handy.