Enclave

by Brandon Varnell

  Samantha opened the latches to the long, black case on table, revealing her sword, Zaphkiel, residing in its sheath. Both blade and sheath were unique weapons. The blade was shaped like a standard Japanese katana, but the hilt and guard were designed more along the lines of a fencer’s sword. The guard was made from a series of long, interweaving metal strings that came together and curved around the handle, protecting Samantha’s hand and fingers. The sheath was red and black, inlaid with golden crosses. Much like her sword, it, too, was made of Orichalcum.

  “Are we going to try driving out of the barrier?” asked Leon, frowning. “That doesn’t seem like the smartest idea. We’ll be sitting ducks in a vehicle.”

  “We’re not going to be driving out,” Samantha said, grabbing her weapon by the sheath. “You can’t drive out of a barrier anyway. However, your Sandalphon is in the car. We need to grab it so that you have a weapon to defend yourself with.”

  “Ah. Gotcha.”

  “I’m ready,” Sif said, standing up and holding up her hands to reveal her clawed gauntlets attached. The gauntlets were actually small, only covering her hand and a bit of her wrist. Four long, thick blades extended outwards from the gloves’ fronts. The clawed extensions were at least half a foot in length and looked more than capable of tearing any known material to shreds. Known as Daniel and Gladreel, the gauntlets were made from Orichalcum just like every other weapon used by the XIII. Tristin shivered, no doubt remembering what she’d done to the marionettes with those claws.

  Samantha nodded at the other woman. “Good. Let’s go then.”

  The group of four left the room and hurried down the hall. There were a few people walking around the hall, but their forms were indistinct, blurry and smoky, like they weren’t really there, like they were some type of hologram that kept flickering in and out.

  Which made sense. Limbo was not a place that could generally sustain human life. It was a border world, the dimension in between earth and hell. Only those who were dead, or those who had taken a special vaccination created by the Science Division of the Executioners, could enter limbo and retain physical form.

  Samantha turned to look at Tristin as they ran. “Tristin, how is it that you have managed to retain physical form? I know you have not taken the vaccination, as you are not one of those who deal with slaying demons or slaying anything.”

  “Oh, you know me.” Tristin grinned at her as he panted for breath. “I’m just awesome like that.”

  “Tristin...”

  “Urk!” Tristin looked away. “I-Is now really the time for this? Shouldn’t we be more focused on getting to the car, grabbing that big hammer of Leon’s, and then finding the demon creating this barrier and killing it?”

  “He’s right,” Leon said. “We need to bring this barrier down before thinking of anything else.”

  “Very well,” Samantha relented. Tristin’s sigh of relieve was cut off, however, when she pinioned him with another glare. “But, you and I will be talking about this, and soon. Do you understand?”

  “Y-yes ma’am!”

  The group rushed down the hall, feet pounding along the carpet. They took a right at the T-junction, then found themselves in the lobby, or at least the front entrance. It couldn’t really be considered a lobby. It looked more like a waiting room. A sofa and two chairs sat off to one side, surrounding a table. Near the “back” of the room was a desk, where a reception could be seen sitting down, his brown hair just barely peeking over the table. The entrance was a single push door made of glass. There was truly nothing about this place that most people would consider worth giving it the title of lobby.

  It’s not like I was expecting a 5-star hotel, though. Samantha sighed.

  They ran outside. Their entire world became locked in a haze of red as they left the hotel. Everything about this world looked just as it would have if they were still in the human world. The buildings looked the same, cars still drove across the streets. There were even still people out and walking around. The difference lay not in the type of architecture, nor in the way the world moved, but rather, it lay in the haze of red, like the world had been engulfed in a layer of mist. Blood mist. All the buildings and objects, from the streets and sidewalks to the flora and fauna, was dyed crimson.

  The parking lot did not have a lot of cars, about six all told; a red Ford, a green Torus, a Silverado truck, a dark blue minivan, a Ram with large tires, and a red Chevy pickup. That was it. Most of the people who were staying at Supercedes were truckers. Fitting one of those large, semi-trucks into a little lot like that was impossible, thus, most of the vehicles belonging to the people staying there were in parking garages located across the street.

  Several demons were already there. Their bodies, moving with a sort of mechanical slowness, their joints cracking and snapping, swiveled about to face the group as they entered the parking lot.

  “Ah, man! They’re already here! And I don’t even have my Sandalphon yet!”

  “Oh, crap! This is really not good!”

  “Sif!” Samantha shouted while Leon complained, and Tristin whined.

  “I’m with you!”

  Moving with a swift grace, Samantha and Sif rushed forward. Raven hair whipping out behind her, lashing with jerky movements, Samantha placed her right hand on the hilt of Zaphkiel.

  The demons, a group of low-class entities called marionettes, began moving toward them on stiff joints. They were far too slow, however, and Samantha reached the first one, her blade flickering with a flash of red light as she smoothly pulled the weapon from its sheath at super-sonic speeds. It was re-sheathed a second later, as she was running past the first of her enemies, a resounding click echoing around them. Six slashes appeared on the marionette’s body, which then fell apart and clattered to the ground.

  Not one to be outdone, Sif leapt into the air, her body spinning around like an out of control dreidel. She fell upon her enemy, sinking her claws into the creature’s face and tearing it apart. The demon landed on its back, and Sif used it as a springboard to launch herself into another flip. Her next target, a marionette that looked like a puppet with human flesh stretched over wooden body parts, was sliced apart when she cut into the thing with lightning quick slashes.

  Her blue eyes narrowing, Samantha crouched down low as she found herself surrounded by six marionettes. They all clattered around her, their limbs moving with the kind of controlled, if spasmodic, movements of something being manipulated by someone else.

  With her hand on the hilt of her blade, she took in a deep breath before, with speeds that made her blade appear to be nothing more than a long, graceful arc around her body, she unsheathed the sword and spun about in a full circle, and then re-sheathed it just as quickly. There was a moment pause. A gentle click echoed around her. Then all of the marionettes around her fell, their upper bodies soaring in one direction, while their lower halves clattered to the ground.

  A quick glance around the lot showed that Sif was taking care of the last few. Her left arm swung up, slicing deep furrows into one marionette. The other arm came in, the gauntlet covered hand raised to block a dagger slash aimed at gouging her eye out. The tiny blade was caught between two of her claws, which she twisted, snapping the dagger in half. That same claw then penetrated the marionette’s face when Sif thrust it forward. As she proceeded to yank the claws out of the head, she moved to the side, allowing the marionette she’d drawn deep lines into to shoot its fellow puppet. While bullet holes perforated the already defeated doll, Sif ran up, slicing her two claws in an X pattern across her body, destroying the marionette with the gun.

  As the many ships and wooden party parts fell, Sif stood back up, her body relaxing.

  “Looks like that’s the last of them,” Samantha commented. “Let’s move.”

  With their enemies gone, Samantha, Sif, Tristin, and Leon ran over to the Ford F-150, a truck with a decent amount of power to it. It was an older model, a 2005, and looked a little used. Some of the paint was ruste
d and dull. There were scratches along the hood. The leather seats appeared worn, like they had been out in the sun for too long and the luster had begun to fade. Despite its beat-up appearance, it still ran just fine and didn’t look like it would be giving out on them any time soon. That was the whole reason Samantha had bought it.

  Leon was the first to reach the truck, his large, lumbering steps pounding the pavement as he raced to the back. Sandalphon was in the back of the truck, lying down where a large sheet of gray fabric was thrown over it. Upon grabbing the giant hammer, the big man began cuddling the weapon to him like it was a favorite pet instead of a 150-pound weapon capable of turning bodies into a fine paste.

  “Oh, how I missed you, Sandalphon! You and I shall never be parted again!”

  “Could you please stop that?” asked Sif, deadpanning. “Seriously, it’s freaky.”

  “Say that after you’ve been parted with Daniel and Gladreel.”

  “Alright you three, listen up!” Samantha snapped, cutting off anymore extraneous conversations. “We’re going to have to split up. Two of us need to go and find the demon upholding the barrier, while the other two stays here and guard our vehicle. Because Tristin is useless in a battle―”

  “Don’t say that about me in such a blasé manner!”

  “―He’s going to stay here.”

  “I mean, sure, it may be true, but it’s still not nice.”

  “I’ll stay here and keep Tristin from getting killed.”

  “Oh, my dear, sweet, beautiful boss lady! I knew you cared about me!”

  “I don’t care about you,” Samantha scowled at the man. “I merely have need of your talents, and it would be a shame if you got yourself killed before I could use them.”

  “H-how cruel!” Tristin’s hands grasped at his chest, clenching fistfuls of his shirt, pretending to suffer heartbreak.

  Samantha ignored him.

  “Sif and Leon, because you two have worked together on a number of missions and possess such superb teamwork, I want you to find this demon and destroy it. I’m not sure what kind of demon you’ll be facing,” she added. “All upper-class demons are capable of creating barriers like this that separate our world for limbo. Be careful.”

  “Hahahaha!” Leon laughed, a hearty, earth-shattering laugh. The lion of a man hefted Sandalphon over his shoulder, grinning like a loon. “Don’t worry about us, Samantha! No demon is a match for me and Sif. We’ll send that demon back to hell before you know it!”

  “While my partner should temper his enthusiasm, I agree with him,” Sif added in her own emotionless tone. “Upper-class demons are troublesome opponents, but any member of the XIII should be more than capable of vanquishing them. Just leave this to us.”

  “Right.” Samantha nodded. “May God be with you both.”

  “And with you.”

  ***

  The silent streets were unsettling, more so because Leon could see the cars drive past but not hear them. Limbo was always a freaky place like that. You could be right next to a person, their wispy form just barely visible as they stood on the other side of the boundary, yet never hear them, never touch them. The cars ran on silent wheels, their engines inaudible. It was like watching those old black and white films before they got audio... except this was black and red.

  Yes. Limbo was definitely disconcerting.

  “It looks like the barrier is several kilometers across. How are we supposed to find this demon in such a big space?” asked Leon.

  “I suspect when we run into the area with the highest concentration of demons, we will find the one controlling this barrier,” Sif answered. She walked alongside Leon, her movements far more graceful than her companions. Likewise, unlike Leon, who appeared not be paying any attention to their surroundings, she was surveying everything with her hawk-like stare.

  “Well, yeah, obviously,” Leon said, rolling his eyes. “What I meant was, how are we going to find it? I don’t know how far this barrier extends, but it looks like it goes out quite a way. We could be walking around for quite some time before we run into anything that will lead us to the demon who created it.”

  “Hmm... you make a good point.” Sif frowned, her expressionless face seeming to gain some creases on her brow as she began to think. She looked down, then found herself staring at her chest. The frown grew before she shook her head and looked back up. “We should find a high vantage point with which to observe the city from, a tall building should suffice.” She turned her head and looked around before finding what she was looking for and pointing at it. “I believe that building will work best.”

  Leon turned his head to look at the structure Sif had selected. A large, square-shaped building that was built upwards instead of outwards, not as big as a skyscraper, but taller than anything else in this area. There were seven windows, so it was seven stories high. They would get a clear view of the small city from up there.

  “Yeah, I think that’ll do,” he admitted.

  “Of course it will. Now come.”

  “Aye!”

  Sif and Leon made their way up the building, taking the stairs and climbing to the top. There were several low-level demons that stood in their way, but all were easily dealt with.

  “Man, more marionettes. These things aren’t even a challenge.”

  “I would not worry about challenges. When we find the demon controlling the barrier, you will have the challenge you crave.”

  The roof of the building was a mass work of large metal boxes, cooling units and electric power boxes. Pipes ran along the structure, casting dark red shadows along the ground. The red-colored cement, shaped as large squares, was surrounded by a small wall that would not do a single thing to keep someone from falling off.

  Their footsteps echoed loudly as they walked around. There was a strange quality to the echo. It was not a natural sound, but more like the kind you would hear when walking down a long tunnel. The reverberating of noise was a natural phenomenon in limbo. It probably had something to do with the dense atmosphere, which almost felt like they were wading through some kind of smoky substance that was thick enough to actually hinder them.

  Gliding over to the ledge with swift, graceful steps, Sif looked out over the mass of buildings, her eyes narrowed, and her face set in a mien of single-minded focus. Leon lumbered after her, setting one foot up on the rise of the wall and placing his left hand over his head like a visor to block out the blood red sun.

  “I’m not really the scouting type,” Leon said, “What are we looking for?”

  “We’re looking for an anomaly,” Sif answered. Leon glance out of the corner of his eye to see the woman glaring into the distance. Was she trying to burn a hole through the barrier or something? “You can usually see the energy being emitted by a demon when they are maintaining a barrier like this. It should be something like―found it! Over there!”

  Leon followed Sif’s finger until he, too, saw what she was talking about. Behind what looked like a shopping center was what almost looked like a large, red flame, a conflagration that rose into the sky, licking at the barrier, threatening to consume the world in its infinite inferno. Yet nothing burned. The “flames” did not move from their location, merely opting to stay in that one spot.

  “I judge that to be about one... two miles out,” Sif determined, nodding to herself. She then spun about and began moving back to the door that would lead them to the stairwell. “Come, Leon!”

  “Right, right.”

  Leon turned around and made to follow Sif back down the stairs, but before either of them could even reach the door, the cement around them cracked right before several large, black somethings burst from the floor. When the creatures landed on the cement, standing crouched on all fours, Sif and Leon reacted by getting into their respective combats stances.

  As Leon eyed the monsters surrounding him, he summed up his thoughts in two words.

  “Ah, hell!”

  ***

  Samantha barely found hersel
f restraining a curse. It hadn’t even been fifteen minutes, and already she and Tristin found themselves surrounded by several demons. While some might not be so hasty to jump to conclusions, it was clear to Samantha that whoever oversaw the demons in this sector of limbo had been waiting for their group to split up before sending anyone in to attack.

  She eyed the creatures that had besieged them, trapping them in a small ring. They were quadrupedal beings. Large, sharp teeth revealed themselves behind the peeled back lips of an ugly muzzle. Greyish, decaying skin clung to the demon’s thin body. Samantha could see their ribs. Each one had several patches of fur randomly populating their skin, but most of them looked like it had all been burnt off. Small, pointed ears sat atop their heads, swiveling each time they heard a new sound, and bloody, glowing orbs were situated in their eye sockets.

  Hellhounds. An unoriginal name, but one that suit these creatures best. They were low-level dog demons. Individually weak, these beasts were often used to track enemies and wear them down with numbers. Many of the Casteless had lost their lives to hordes of hellhounds out on the field. They were the largest cause of death among rookies.

  Crouching low, one hand on the hilt of her sword, the other on the sheath, Samantha shifted her feet across the ground. The hellhounds growled and barked, their snarling visage a mask of animalistic savagery. These creatures were nothing more than mindless beasts, relying on their instinct and lust for blood to get them through.

  Samantha would have no trouble putting them down.

  It happened in an instant. The crunch of gravel was what first alerted Samantha to the impending charge. With an out crying of howls, the hellhounds bound towards her and the car with long, loping strides.

  “Oh, shit! Oh, shit! These things are coming!”

  Samantha ignored Tristin as he cried out behind her, sitting within the trunk of the vehicle. She inhaled a calming breath, and then she released it all in one go, unleashing Zaphkiel at the same time. The blade sang as it was released from its sheath. The polished surface gleamed red in the light as it moved in an elegant arc that combined equal amounts of speed and power. It moved so fast that the blade appeared to be nothing more than a blur.