Soul Catchers

by Tony Moyle

  Nash’s smile evaporated, his face hit the carpet and all other senses went on standby.

  - CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR -

  ME AND MY SHADOWS

  “I really don’t know what you’re complaining about. I like it here,” said Mr. Aqua.

  “I’m complaining because this is where I live,” replied Primordial.

  “But you’ve got loads of room. You’ll barely notice we’re here,” said Mr. Virus from somewhere unspecified.

  The trapdoor had been tightly sealed above them and reinforced with what Mr. Bitumen called his ‘best shit’. Everyone hoped he wasn’t being literal. Whatever was going on up above, it was definitely safer down here. Only one of them didn’t agree.

  “When I find out who’s behind this,” grumbled Asmodeus, “they’re going to wish they’d never…died.”

  “We could ask the ox,” said Mr. Fungus, who was still having a whale of a time.

  “Or me. After all, I go where I want.”

  “Mr. Noir, my old friend. You are one of our finest, I’ve always said so,” replied Asmodeus with a bow.

  “Earlier you were having difficulty ‘assuming’ I was here,” it replied.

  “All forgotten now. Of course we ‘assume’ you’re there. Who wouldn’t?”

  “I’m still struggling with the concept if I’m honest,” said Mr. Gold with a scorched hand in the air.

  “Pretend you didn’t hear that,” added Asmodeus.

  “I could tell you what I know but I’d hate to think I was a figment of your imaginations,” he huffed. “It does get a little lonely when everyone ignores you.”

  “I’m sure I speak for all of us.” He looked around and Mr. Gold shook his head. “Almost all of us. We won’t ignore you again. Tell us what you know.”

  “It’s all going on at the Soul Catcher. There’s a purple pigeon and a bunch of disgruntled-looking former dictators.”

  “Well, can’t you do something?” asked Asmodeus.

  “You can assume that I do.”

  “But will that make any difference?”

  “Not really,” said Mr. Noir. “I don’t really interact. It’s my thing.”

  *****

  Mr. Brimstone was confronted with a new set of circumstances. A rabble of clearly malfunctioning plastic animals he could deal with. Fending off the contents of an A-level history lesson, a group of brainwashed lesser demons, a number of mutilated shadows, and a rather power-crazy bird would be more of a challenge. There were so many questions he wanted to ask but they seemed to converge into a rather impressive puff of sulphurous smoke that came out of a very specific place.

  “Sandy…butt cheese…help me,” cried John, his soul forever searching for survival.

  “John has made a deal. He can’t go back on it,” said Brimstone.

  “Why ever not, you sweaty little man?” said Sandy confidently.

  “Man! How dare you? My name is Mr. Brimstone and you have no idea what I am capable of. Deals with demons are binding.”

  “And not worth the handshake, I hear. What happens if he breaks it?”

  “Punishment.”

  “I think John has received all the punishment he can take. Besides, he’s not breaking his deal, I am breaking it for him,” replied Sandy.

  “You can’t scare a demon. When this is through I will personally ensure that your sins are judged and punished by the highest authority in this realm.”

  “But that’s just the point, isn’t it?” said Sandy. “This is my realm now.”

  “No, it isn’t, you buffoon.”

  “Oh but it is.”

  “Is everyone in your family a prick?”

  “What are you on about?” asked Sandy.

  “It’s just that I heard your family tree was actually a cactus!”

  “A funny demon, there’s a thing. Feel free to test my claims if you want.”

  Brimstone’s craggy face glowed with anger and the cracks in his rocky frame oozed their molten ores. The ground started to shake underfoot as pressure rose through the stone floor slabs. As the energy increased, several of the slabs burst out of position to allow red-hot liquid material to seep through the gaps. John had never seen Brimstone in this frame of mind. He’d always thought of him as such a placid character compared to other demons.

  Not only was Brimstone outnumbered, he was also trying to protect the only part of Hell that he really cared for, the machine that slowly pulsed in the background.

  Sandy flew above the rising smoke to avoid the lava creeping along the floor. “Get him.”

  The first wave of attack against the three-foot volcano came courtesy of a number of shadow-possessed dictators. Imelda Marcos took a rather nasty blow across the face with an accurately directed lump of andesite. Saddam Hussein was even less fortunate, as an erupting paving slab went off right underneath him. They never did find out where he landed. It did prove that steroid-taking psychopaths were no match for a crazed dwarfish demon.

  Unclear as to the tactics Sandy was adopting, the other animals retreated to the safety of a nearby tunnel and watched the fight with interest. All apart from Roger. The lion strode around the room giving both foe and ally detailed critique as to how they might have completed a parry, kick or punch more successfully. Astonishingly, and to the disappointment of combatants and spectators on both sides, no lethal or maim-inducing accident stopped his unwelcome coaching.

  “It’s not working,” shouted Sandy from the air, as a series of evil historical figures were dispatched with ease. “Phase two.”

  The sand shadow, who had been sitting expectantly in the background, moved towards Brimstone, holding a glass vase in front of him like a lump of weapons-grade plutonium.

  “You know who this is, don’t you?” squawked Sandy.

  Brimstone analysed the small, sandy figure emitting sparks in every direction, “Mr. Silica?”

  “What’s left of him. We have the shadows. I have already let several loose on each of the levels above us. Those vessols are being consumed as we speak. They will never pass on again. The lesser demons have had enough of Satan’s tyranny. They want a quiet life. The senior demons are confined to level zero. You are the last line of resistance. If you wish to remain in one piece, I suggest you surrender.”

  “But why have you done this?” said Brimstone.

  “Because I was cheated.”

  “We were not responsible. There was never any deceit on our behalf. We did not close Heaven. We did not persuade humans to lack the courage and foresight to notice. Only those that triggered the Limpet Syndrome knew what was happening.”

  “Well, I did trigger it,” said Sandy.

  “And who told you your fate could be changed? It wasn’t me, was it?”

  “No,” replied Sandy, under the spell of Brimstone’s reasoning. “It was John.”

  “And yet you have worked with him to aid his cause. He’s very good at manipulation. You’re not the first. There have been many. There’s even one of his victims in your own army. Isn’t that right, Byron.”

  A manic-eyed vessol staggered forward. A well-placed lump of molten lava had singed part of his plastic beard, but other than that it was recognisably the rotund ex-Prime Minister. Sandy hadn’t noticed that Byron’s apartment was nestled next to Bin Laden’s as the shadows purged level twelve. Of course he had to be there. Most of his neighbours had attempted and failed at world domination, it was only right that he would join them. Now Byron’s soul had acquired a particularly unpleasant shadow as a guide on one last rampage.

  John moved out of the tunnel to witness this new revelation. There he was, as large as death.

  “No more reclamations,” said Byron insanely.

  “What are you talking about?” said Sandy.

  “Our souls will never be sent back. Kill!” he screamed.

  The response seemed to act as a rallying cry. Any vessols infected by the shadows advanced on the Soul Catcher. They swarmed over it like a plague of locusts.


  “What are they doing?” shouted Brimstone.

  “I don’t know,” said Sandy honestly.

  The shadows, aided by their newly acquired plastic hosts, attacked panels, unscrewed bolts, smashed screens and removed any part that they could lay their hands on. Pieces of complex engineering were cast to the ground like a demolition team carrying out one last deadline before the pubs shut.

  “Stop, you must stop!” said Brimstone.

  The workings of the vast machine, housed under the bulb and behind the panel of knobs and levers, was opened to the world like petals flowering for the first time. In the centre was a small ball of shiny metal, levitated by a matrix of blue energy pulses. It rotated on its own axis with no obvious source of propulsion. The vessols tore towards it as if addicted to some highly prized treasure.

  “Please don’t touch that. If they touch that they’ll destroy the machine,” begged Brimstone to Sandy.

  “I think that’s their motive,” replied Sandy who’d calculated that the result didn’t affect him too much. He wasn’t interested in going back, even if he could. This was his realm now and if no one could go back then no one could come to take it off him.

  “John,” said Brimstone, “You must help me.”

  “Hmmm…smokey twat…you were trying to accuse me…cracks…it might be important…knickers…”

  “John, I beg you. It’s vital for everyone that they don’t break it,” said Brimstone, metaphorically if not literally on his knees.

  John didn’t know who to trust anymore other than himself. Hell was on his list and Sandy wasn’t. Over many lifetimes they’d lied to him. But there was something deep inside him screaming out in defiance. Where would the souls go if they broke this Soul Catcher? Maybe nowhere. Even here was better than nowhere? Would the world suddenly be flooded with a horde of ghost souls? John’s righteousness battled with his need for revenge.

  “John, I forbid you to help,” said Sandy. “You’re only here because of me. You’d never have sent Faith back without my help.”

  It was all too much. Who could he trust? Crazily he ran towards the machine. Whether to stop them or help them, he still wasn’t entirely sure.

  “Ian, get him. And the rest of you,” said Sandy, indicating the remaining animals still hiding in the entrance of the tunnel.

  The animals intervened before John reached the deconstruction efforts. They ushered him back to where Sandy was still standing a few feet away from Brimstone.

  “I can’t have you disobeying me,” said Sandy, puffing out his chest in an attempt to inflate his own self-importance. The glare of power evident in his plastic pupils. “Brimstone is right. You are the reason I’m here, John. You double-crossed me. It’s you and you alone who is responsible. I have wreaked my vengeance on Hell and now I will wreak it on you. Bring a vase.”

  “But John’s our friend,” said Ian.

  “No. He never was, and neither are you.”

  “Don’t be like that, Sandy,” said Ian. “I know I’ve got faults. Everyone has. John made a mistake, that’s all.”

  “You’re both idiots. If you don’t want to join his fate I’d shut your mouth,” he snapped.

  “I predicted this,” said Roger in a loud voice that demanded recognition. No one gave him any.

  “Pour it down his throat,” instructed Sandy to the six-inch half-demon who’d been using the vase to threaten Brimstone.

  “No! This is wrong,” said Ian, jumping to John’s defence.

  “Traitor!” shouted Sandy. “After all I have done for you.”

  “What have you done for me? All you do is insult and poke fun at me,” replied Ian.

  “Get him out of my sight. Put him where he belongs,” said Sandy, aiming his demands at the remaining animals. They obeyed, not wanting to be the next to get on Sandy’s angry side. The creatures dragged the white pigeon away down the nearest tunnel. Sandy signalled for the shadow to be released from its vase.

  “You’re messing with processes you don’t understand,” said Brimstone. “You don’t know what will happen. There’s only two-thirds of John inside there.”

  “I like experiments.”

  Off came the stopper. Unrestricted by the glass, the shadow crept hungrily out of its cave. It had been kept prisoner for ages, watching as his shadowy friends were released to an orgy of fun. It was starving for a piece of the action. Without waiting for the starting pistol, it surged into John’s vessol.

  Its eagerness to join the ‘fun’ was somewhat misplaced. Its comrades had had one major advantage. They’d all been drawn towards the neutral elements of the souls within their victims. They’d easily devoured these elements and displaced them into the atmosphere. Sadly John’s neutral section was involved in its own issues, some considerable distance and time away. Its absence had quite an effect.

  Those watching could only imagine from the external evidence the great battle being fought inside the fake rodent. The plastic skin rippled with receding waves, each greater than the last. It wobbled, shrank and then expanded slightly. Then for a while nothing happened at all. A concoction of expletive combinations exploded into the air in a flurry of insults, aimed mainly at Sandy. It ended with an almighty fusion of light, energy and noise which ripped the vessol apart and left small pieces of plastic shrew in every corner of the vast cavern.

  Several other phenomena happened at once, although not all were visible in the same dimension.

  A large book started to burn. Although the burning had begun, even the fire responsible couldn’t predict when it would stop. You could keep a supply of marshmallows going forever, if you could whittle a stick long and inflammable enough,.

  The shadow-infected vessols managed to remove the small ball of metal from the Soul Catcher, and with a howl and a screech all activity stopped. When the machine was placed on standby, as it sometimes was, pulses would still explore into space. Not anymore. The lights faded, the energy dissipated and the conveyor belts shuddered to a halt. The ball of metal floated up into the glass bulb, along the barrel and fired itself into space. Brimstone sank to his knees which was only about eight inches below him.

  A sloth took one final step on a journey, from tunnel to cavern, that had started so promisingly.

  “What.”

  “Did.”

  “I.”

  “Miss?”

  *****

  David ran down the stairs of the farmhouse, brain working as fast as his legs to come up with a plan. When he reached the bottom step something passed through him like a bout of nostalgia, a feeling you can neither explain nor re-create. Long-forgotten memories ordered themselves in his brain.

  Closing his eyes, he watched as time sped the memories towards an inevitable conclusion, as if his life had been made into a flick book. The final picture painted itself on his mind and he acknowledged it with a small, internal nod. If the vision was accurate, as he believed, then there was little time to complete his tasks.

  The end was coming.

  *****

  The Clerk looked up from his chair. A noise like a decelerating jumbo jet was fading into the distance. The absence of a noise is almost more disconcerting than the shock of an unexpected one. When you were used to a perpetual soundtrack in the background, you noticed when it wasn’t there anymore. There was nothing more synonymous about Limbo than the crackles that thumped through the sphere with the precision of a beating heart.

  In eerie silence the Clerk held his breath. He crossed his fingers in the hope that someone was firing up the world’s largest defibrillator. The silence continued with the same non-stop regularity that the noise once had. The heart of Limbo had stopped beating.

  As the line of souls continued to dive through the liquid metal with the predictability of lemmings, his chair appeared to be moving closer to it. He stood up. The chair stayed put. He sat down again. He swore the wall was still getting closer. He grabbed a piece of chalk from the desk and marked a thick line on the floor next to the boundary of th
e metal. Then he watched and waited.

  - CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE -

  TIME AND MOTION

  Under the cover of darkness the hull of the Unicorn glided into the waters of a calm sea. The sails caught hold of the breeze and pulled gently against the mast. A hand drew the sail further towards it and the small craft eased away from the shoreline. The moon escaped under the ripples of the water as the keel dragged on, and easily overcame, submerged obstacles. Slowly the boat’s progress increased, but not fast enough for the captain. Science was very clear about it: speed was a matter of distance and time. The distance to the next island was fixed. On this occasion time wasn’t.

  *****

  “They’ve got Scrumpy,” called John as he swept into the lounge. “What’s happened in here?”

  A group of people were involved in a rather surreal game of ‘musical statues’ and the music had definitely stopped. A man in black, almost camouflaged by his surroundings, stood perfectly still, hands behind his head. The reasons for this were clear. A military-grade weapon was being held at close range by another shoddily dressed figure. The only person definitely not winning the game was a young blonde who was cradling a middle-aged body on her knees. There was only one winner. In the face of some unknown horror, Nash’s eyes were closed. His face had set like concrete and all four limbs had lost contact with their nervous system.

  “Faith’s come back to us,” said the gun wielder. “And this one has been sent by Byron.”

  Instantly David’s brain sent him a reminder letter with red font all over the top. Of course they’d be together. Now everyone on his list was here. The only question was what to do about it. Nash’s groans indicated a return to consciousness.

  “Did I hear someone say they have Scrumpy?” said Fiona, bursting into the room looking panic-stricken.

  “Yes. But we’re going to get him back,” replied David.

  “What about Grace?” said Faith. “She’s the only other one not here.”