Strangers in the Night

by E M. Jeanmougin

  Crimson looked out across the sea of stalled traffic. It was not so far as a demon ran. “Got it,” said Crimson. “Stay on the line. Tell me when I’m getting close.”

  #

  Alcander kept him up to date on the car’s slow progress. If it were not for the stalled traffic, Crimson knew he would have lost it by now. Leaping across buildings and over streets, he raced towards them, closing the distance between them with ease. They would not get away. Crimson wouldn’t let them.

  He saw the car, a large black tank of a vehicle, working its laborious way through the traffic as it began to diverge around the scene of the fender bender currently in the middle of the intersection. The police had not yet arrived at this location, not that it would have mattered to Crimson if they had.

  The only reason he didn’t blow out the windows of the car right away was because they were of the blackout variety, and his vantage point did not allow him to see which part of the car Jasper was in. He could have been in the front seat or the back, or unconscious in the trunk for all he knew, and he didn’t want to risk hitting him.

  So he watched.

  And waited.

  The car made it through the intersection and took a left-hand turn onto a less congested road. He cut across the corner of the building and stopped. Now he saw that there were two cars, identical to one another in every way, excusing the license plates. The second was catching up to the first, which slowed down to let it.

  He jumped down to a lower building, following along at the side of the vehicles, then sprang out onto a fire escape that hung almost directly over their path. It would be safer for him to follow them out of the city, where an altercation could be had without any prying eyes, but he didn’t know what sort of magic this Folami guy was packing, and he did not want to run to a location where the spellcaster would feel bold enough to start uprooting trees and hurling them at his head.

  He waited until the first car passed near his perch, then jackknifed over the railing, and dropped feet first towards the roof.

  The impact rattled up through the soles of his boots, but his bones held strong. The body of the vehicle was less fortunate, compacting below him with a crackling CRUNCH. The driver threw on the brakes. Crimson braced himself to keep from rolling down onto the hood.

  The door on the passenger’s side flung open, and a lanky man with surprised, catlike eyes poked his head out. Crimson, already standing, slammed the toe of his boot into his nose, sending him sprawling back into the gutter. He hopped down and turned to point the gun through the open door. The driver (a human from the look and scent of him) half-raised his hands. Crimson’s gaze darted over him to the back seat, where he found the other three passengers already clamoring to get out of the car. None of them were Jasper.

  He heard a squeal of tires, and from the corner of his eye saw the second car go tearing past them, shearing off the side mirrors of both vehicles, and taking the paint off more than one of the cars in the other lane.

  Bad guess.

  He lowered the gun and started to run after the second car, but the whizz of a bullet drew his attention back to the first. He hit the ground to the screams of several pedestrians and rose to them scattering away as he sprang back up and returned fire.

  The one who had fired at him never stood a chance. The bullet struck him between the eyes. He staggered with his hand clapped stupidly to his bleeding forehead, but this was only reflex. The better portion of his brains had splattered out the back of his skull, all over the pavement behind him. His two comrades sensibly dove behind the rear of the vehicle, and the fatally wounded demon crumpled to the ground. As this happened, the driver lunged out of his seat and went running into the throng of fleeing pedestrians, and the two remaining demons opened fire.

  Familiars, thought the Spider gratingly as he danced around the flying bullets, avoiding them by small margins. At least he wouldn’t have to waste a shot on him.

  He dipped low, aimed underneath the car, and squeezed the trigger. One of the demons, now shy a shin, dropped with a yowl. His face appeared underneath the car, twisted in agony. Crimson’s next shot silenced him completely. The other tried to creep around to the side and catch him from behind, but Crimson went straight after him, weaving to draw his fire, then feinting to race up right beside him.

  He slammed into him hard enough to throw him from his feet, pinned his chest under his foot, and in a fit of bloodthirsty rage, unloaded what was left in the gun into his face.

  The humans were in sheer panic now, the cars ahead of him vacant of their passengers, the street quickly clear. Crimson picked up the fallen guns, holstered the two that still had ammunition, and scavenged two extra clips and a long curved blade from the bodies. He could smell Jasper’s scent on them, lingering in their oily odor like a ray of sunshine in the dark.

  Behind him, he heard the rumble of an engine.

  For a moment, he simply stood, watching curiously as the motorcyclist, obviously unaware of the danger, wove his way through the stopped lines of traffic. With his visor down and with Crimson standing in the way, it was probably safe to say that he did not see the three bodies sprawled out on the pavement. Or, if he did, he likely thought it some manner of accident, the likes of which needed observing. Humans, Crimson knew, loved to come and gawk at accidents. He quickly holstered both guns, adjusting the jacket to cover them, and forced himself to be still.

  When the man drew close, he swerved to a stop and popped open his visor. He did, indeed, have the face of a man who was here to gawk. “Holy shit, what happened?”

  Crimson seized the front of his shirt and jerked him off the bike. He hit the asphalt with a grunt. “Sorry, man,” said the werespider, swinging a leg over the seat. “I gotta run.” Lining the tire up with the yellow line, he twisted the throttle. The front end rose slightly at the sudden influx of speed, but he threw his weight forward, and the bike settled back onto the yellow line, the rumble of the engine underneath him.

  Tracking a vehicle by scent was largely unreliable, but his sense of smell was better than a canine’s, and at close range, the drip from the car’s air-conditioning unit (carrying with it all the air molecules, skin cells, and other assorted particles collected from the cabin) was enough to give him a pretty good idea. The scratched paint and damaged sidewalks where the vehicle had forced its way around stopped traffic sufficed as a trail where the scent did not.

  He saw the taillights of the black car but didn’t slow or turn aside. Rather, he got the motorcycle going as fast as it possibly could, and drove it straight into the back. As the handlebars crunched into the taillights, he let go of the grips and sprang from the footrests. This vaulted him over the vehicle. He drew both guns, turned into his fall, and fired at the only place where he was sure Jasper would not be—through the windshield, into the driver’s seat.

  He hit the hood, bouncing once, and rolled quickly aside, out of the way of the tires as the vehicle fishtailed. The front end slammed into a lamppost, sending it careening over to smash through the window of a closed coffee shop. Crimson pushed himself up off the asphalt and, still gripping a pistol in either hand, marched towards the car.

  He was over halfway there when a sudden force blew outwards from the vehicle, like the heat of an explosion without the boom. He was thrown back to the ground, more in surprise than anything, and was back on his feet before he knew it. A large figure was climbing out of the back seat of the car. Crimson, who was taller than most, wasn’t used to having to look up at anyone, but this creature was a giant of a man. He was most of the way to eight feet and very wide at the shoulders, all muscle. As he strode towards him, his eyes shone with reflected yellow light, the pupils thin slits. Elongated fangs showed in his snarling mouth, and black claws grew from the tips of his hands, which turned, twisting all the way around until they were backwards.

  Crimson, who had seen nearly everything there was to see in his long life, had known creatures like this before, though only in the East. The name sw
am around in a sea of half-remembered information.

  Rakshasa.

  “Spider,” Folami roared. The word was a curse and a spell all in one. Crimson felt the hairs on his arms and on the back of his neck stand on end, and moved out of the way of the concentrated blast just in time, firing half a dozen shots from his pistols. The bullets bounced off the rakshasa’s chest like flicked pebbles.

  Crimson swore.

  For the most part, the rakshasa were a fairly harmless species, different from mortals of the human variety in ways that were mainly cosmetic. But every once in a great while, just like humans, they were born with inherent magical capabilities.

  A second burst came in his direction. A manhole cover an inch to his right burst from the ground, flung away by the blast. It crashed into a taxi; the rounded edge sank through the metal like a blade. Crimson took cover behind a car whose engine was still running, though its owner was long gone.

  “Look, man, I’ll cut you a deal.” The magically afflicted were rare. Amongst their own people, they were often viewed as religious figures—demigods of sorts. And for good reason, they were very difficult to kill. He couldn’t even remember how one went about doing so. Was it iron? Did you have to have a pure heart or something (that would put him out of the running)? Or was that just folklore?

  It would be better if he could avoid the situation entirely.

  “You give me back my hybrid, I’ll forget this ever happened!”

  The car trembled and began to slide. It struck another car with the sound of crumpling metal, then threw itself in reverse, the tail end targeted in his direction. Crimson jumped onto the trunk, then the roof, but that posed its own problems, as now he was an open target, and Folami took another shot of magical energy. This one struck him in the chest, cracking two ribs, lifting him from his feet, and throwing him back through the storefront behind him.

  Burglar alarms wailed as glass shattered. He slammed into a showcase filled with silver and gold chains and rings. The leather jacket protected him from the worst of it, though he felt the sizzle on the back of his hand and surged quickly free with a hiss of pain. “Alright, asshole! You wanna do this the hard way? I’m game.”

  He tore out of the shop, running and jumping and weaving between and over blasts as they came. Folami might have been a powerful magician, but the werespider’s reflexes were slightly sharper, and the flourishes of the rakshasa’s casting gave him away.

  He slammed into the other demon the same way he had slammed into his minion up the road, trying to throw him from his feet, but Folami only staggered a step back, then seized his throat with a hand that felt more like a shackle. Sharp, hard claws bit through the skin on the nape of the werespider’s neck. Blood trickled down his back.

  Folami hoisted him up to eye level, fangs bared. “I will turn you inside out, spider.” He lifted his other hand, fingers curled, his wrist spinning slowly.

  Crimson spit venom in his face, hitting him in the eyes, the nose, the corner of his mouth. The feline spit out a hiss, maybe of pain, definitely of disgust, and pawed at the viscous fluid. Gripping his wrist in both hands, the werespider swung his legs up, planted his heels firmly on his chest, and pushed as hard as he could. The claws tore through the back of his neck and the sides of his throat, but the fingers lost their hold, and he fell backward, catching himself on the palm of one hand and flipping himself back onto his feet.

  The venom did not have the desired effect. Even a small dose could usually cause temporary paralysis. A large dose was often fatal. But Folami did not fall inert, as Crimson had hoped he might. It seemed to have only affected the area of contact, for no matter how Folami wiped his eyes, the lids would not open entirely. He brought his other hand over his head in an overarching swing, and Crimson, who had just regained his feet, did not have the opportunity to evade. The energy came down in a slash that cut through his jacket, his shirt, and the flesh underneath, tearing a gash from the inside of his shoulder, all the way down his torso, to his hip. Bone showed through muscle. Another rib cracked. This one splintered up into his lung, and he choked on the flavor of his own blood.

  The pain was excruciating, but ephemeral.

  The blood loss was another matter.

  He could hold the spider no longer. Throwing his jacket off, the spider’s legs tore out of his spine, ripping through the ruined remains of his shirt. His skin hardened and blacked to the spider’s exoskeleton. The fangs pushed themselves through the roof of his mouth and pressed forward, bisecting his lips as his second set of eyes blinked into existence.

  Screeching, he sprang at Folami.

  #

  Jasper’s eyes snapped open, already aglow with white light. He was lying down in the spacious back seat of a very expensive town car. Small lights ran along the ceiling and across the doors, the one opposite him hanging wide open, showing the bizarre dreamscape of the inside of a coffee shop. His ears were ringing—wait, no, that wasn’t right, it was a chorus of far-off sirens and alarms rising together into a mess of noise. Jasper sat up and ran a hand over his face. A metal cuff jingled at his wrist, the broken chain rattling. He stared at it, confused, but then the sound of an explosion commanded his attention. He scrambled out of the car and into the coffee shop.

  Broken glass and rubble crunched under his feet. The entire front wall was collapsed, which was not unusual when you drove a car through it. Live wires sparked and crackled, hanging from the ceiling like deadly vines.

  Through a gap between the crumbled wall and the car, he saw two shapes doing battle out in the street. A titan of a man, very nearly a giant, and a red and black spider, not much smaller than a lion. At first, his mind was too sick and groggy to understand what was happening, then the spider screeched, broken, almost human words mingled in the cry, and everything came rushing back.

  “Crimson?” Jasper knew he should not have assumed his demonic form in the middle of the street, right where any and everyone could see him. Ducking under the sparking wires, the broken links around his wrists still rattling, he stepped out onto the sidewalk.

  Rows of crookedly stopped cars surrounded the pair of demons. Neither seemed to hear the wail of the sirens, both of them fully consumed in the task of killing one another. Presently, Folami wrenched his arm free of the werespider’s grasping appendages and fired a blast of magic that sent the spider cartwheeling back. He slammed into the side of a taxi, breaking the windows and crumpling the metal, then slid down, legs wilting around him. He was back in his human form by the time he hit the street.

  Shit.

  Jasper reached for his gun, but found the holster hanging empty.

  Folami started in the werespider’s direction, his steps slow and heavy. His eyes were nearly swollen shut, steps a little unsteady, but he seemed otherwise unharmed. Across from him, Crimson stirred and slowly lifted his chin from his breastbone.

  Shit, Jasper thought again. He didn’t have a gun or any of his knives. He picked up a sharp, heavy chunk of the broken wall, the closest thing he could find to a weapon, and lobbed it at the back of Folami’s head. “Hey!”

  It struck him on the crown, the plaster breaking and dusting over his shoulders. It left no mark, but the demon wheeled around with a hiss. “You will return to the vehicle and wait!”

  “Jasper, run!” shouted Crimson.

  Jasper ignored both of them, selecting another chunk of concrete and pitching it straight at Folami’s face. “Why don’t you come and make me?” Whatever this thing was, Crimson was obviously having a hell of a time killing it. “Unless you’re scared of a half-blood, you—you—” This taunting thing really wasn’t his racket.

  Crimson cupped his hands to his mouth. “Call him a pussy. Get it? Cuz he’s a—”

  Folami gestured curtly, and the werespider’s voice cut out as he was propelled straight upward. He twisted in the air, grasping for something to catch onto, then dropped like a brick, thudding down on the other side of the cab, out of view. Folami pointed back at Jasper
. “I am losing patience with you. Do as you are told.”

  “No,” Jasper said stubbornly. He did not see Crimson rise from behind the yellow taxi. If he was hurt, or worse…

  Folami strode towards him, giant strides making short work of the distance. Jasper tried not to be frightened, but he was. He just prayed it didn’t show. Bending to retrieve another chunk of rubble, he saw the curved metal leg of a table, half-buried, and grabbed that instead, wielding it like a sword. “Leave us the fuck alone,” he warned. Folami waved his hand as if shooing away a fly, and the piece of metal started to pull from his hand. Gritting his teeth, eyes burning white, he held tight. “Pussy,” he added for good measure.

  “You insolent little cur,” cursed Folami.

  Jasper swung the table leg at him, aiming for his face. Folami caught it, the muscles in his arm straining underneath the silk. He seized the front of Jasper’s shirt, claws tearing through the fabric, grazing his skin. His breath was hot, sharpened fangs an inch from his nose.

  Jasper slammed his balled fist into Folami’s face. The impact rattled through his knuckles; pain exploded in his hand. Folami shoved him, and he went skidding across the tile floor, stopping only when he impacted the counter at the back of the shop.

  “Return to the vehicle before you damage yourself further.” Jasper was still gripping the table leg. The ears on the sides of Folami’s head had grown long and pointed, and they swiveled like radio disks, homing in on the sound of Jasper’s breathing. “You are too valuable to be wasted like this.”

  Jasper pulled himself up using the counter, grabbed hold of the cash register, ripped it free, and winged it at Folami. The demon swatted it right out of the air and advanced on him as Jasper vaulted over the counter and grabbed whatever he could lay a hand on. Various objects—mugs and bottles, shakers and parts of coffee machines—bounced off Folami, clattering to the floor, but he just kept coming. He snatched for his throat, but Jasper took advantage of his impaired eyesight and stepped aside, his fingers only closing on empty air.