[Demonworld #1] Demonworld

by Kyle B. Stiff

  “You ran into a demon?” said Marlon. “Bullshit...”

  Wodi told Marlon and Hermann of his encounter with the demon, and how he escaped when the demon fought another creature, and also how he came by the white spear of the torturer. While Marlon did not seem to believe the story, he did agree that moving quietly was best.

  “But that spear of yours,” said Marlon, “I don’t think it belonged to a demon. As far as I know, they don’t use tools, not like we do. That spear probably belonged to a ghoul.”

  “Ghoul?” said Hermann.

  “It’s a little humanoid creature,” said Marlon. “They’re stupid, they’re mean, and they usually carry disease. They use simple tools. They travel in packs, but they’re not exactly cooperative with one another. They’re not related to demonkind.”

  “I didn’t realize you were an expert in this sort of thing,” said Hermann.

  Marlon winked, said, “Guardians have to take classes in hostile zoology. But I only passed ’cause I cheated off someone else, so don’t press me for details.”

  With that, he finished carving the spear, blew on it, jammed the point into his palm to test it, then handed it to Hermann. “There. If you see something that isn’t human, stick this thing in it.”

  “Right...” said the doctor. Wodi laughed at his limp-wristed stance.

  Marlon stood and suddenly turned towards Wodi. “So you saw a demon. Alright. But... did it speak?”

  Wodi swallowed his great discomfort, then said, “No. I’m not sure it was capable of speech. It did... sound kind of human, though.”

  Marlon nodded thoughtfully. “Cause I’ve heard some of them can do that. And they communicate over distance somehow. You’re lucky you didn’t run into more than one.”

  “This one was bad enough, just as it was. Let’s move on.”

  * * *

  Night set in without warning. For a moment Wodi realized he could see only black silhouettes and fragments of a red sky through the black leafy canopy. The effect was like staring up into forbidding stained glass windows in a cathedral dedicated to telling the history of the world through the record of its nightmares. But the effect soon faded, and then there was darkness and they could no longer even guess at which direction they were headed.

  “I can hear a stream ahead,” said Marlon. “Let’s head there and see about stopping for the night.”

  They crept and stumbled along. Wodi took his eyes off the path and stared into the darkness. The black night sucked up everything until only the phantom lights in his eyes seemed real. It would be a terrible thing to be alone in that, he thought. He did not have much hope for the exiles they had not found.

  Suddenly they came upon a thin stream glittering with faint starlight from a break in the canopy above. They clattered over a bed of stones and lined up beside one another. Wodi watched a strip of mist following the stream. It was like a dim mirror image of the water, a shadow cast by the world of the living onto a world beyond.

  “What is it?” said Marlon.

  “Nothing,” said Wodi, torn from his thoughts.

  “Looked like you were thinking of something,” said Marlon. The air was getting cold and the stream was frigid, but Marlon stuck his entire head in and rose up spluttering and spewing.

  “This is as good a place to stop as any,” said Hermann, but he gave no reason and only let the statement hang in the air. Wodi saw Saul turn to Marlon, and Wodi knew then that Marlon was indeed the closest thing they had to a leader.

  “Should we build a fire...?” said Saul.

  “No way,” said Marlon. “But let’s fan out for a minute and see if there’s anything in the area we should be mindful of.” He thought for a moment, then added, “God damn I’m starving.”

  The four split up and fanned out. Wodi could hear Saul stabbing noisily at bushes. “I can’t see shit out here,” Saul mumbled, then, much louder, “Marlon, I can’t see shit out here man.”

  Wodi reasoned that there might be more going on along the stream, so he followed it. He spied an overhanging lip of stone near the bank. He poked the spear of the torturer inside the dark crevice, hoping there might be something alive that they could eat, but also half hoping there would be nothing inside.

  The spear clattered against stone. There was nothing to be found. Wodi sighed, leaned his head against the stone to rest for a moment, then rose. It was then that something like a leathery vice clamped down on his spear arm, spun him around, then wrapped around his neck and jaw.

  Horrified, unable to breathe, he saw only darkness but felt hot, rotting breath singe his face. Then purple light, the terrible purple light that he could never forget, blazed to life before him. It was the demon from before, hunched over him. Long spidery fingers were wrapped around his throat while the other hand held his spear arm to the side. He was trapped in its grip; his blood pounded so hard that his heart had a better chance of escaping his chest than he would have of fighting free from the demon’s grip.

  Because the light was coming from its chest, Wodi could only make out the dark outline of its face. It was like a huge, distended human skull with flesh stretched around it. Long jagged wounds, still fresh and open, covered the demon’s face and shoulders. Wodi could not see the eyes, but from the shadows he could feel the thing’s rage.

  That was what truly terrified Wodi: The thing knew him, it remembered him. Wodi could not open his mouth to call for help, but his lips peeled back in an involuntary grinding hiss. The thing’s hand clamped down, soft as a coffin lid, then Wodi could no longer breathe, but could only choke on the building pressure.

  Something clattered against the stones, the demon’s head jerked - suddenly Marlon crashed into the demon’s legs and all three tumbled into the ground. Wodi skidded along the ground, face and hands raking against hard stone before he splashed into the thin stream. The beast was on its back and he saw long black limbs flapping in the air. Then he saw Marlon running back the way he had come, shouting, “Run! Run!” Wodi had not dropped his spear the entire time, but he also did not think to use it, either - he rose and ran, desperate to be away from the vengeful monster.

  Wodi and Marlon tore through the woods, tripping, panting, mad with fear. Soon Saul joined them.

  “What was it!?” shouted Saul, falling behind.

  “Demon!” said Marlon. “A demon!”

  “Where’s Hermann?” said Saul. The others ignored him. “Where is Hermann?”

  There was a long, terrible scream behind them. Silence, then the scream redoubled. Wodi slowed, then stopped. Saul stopped, then Marlon as well.

  Wodi listened, then said, “God’s death, man, he’s screaming for help.”

  “It’s Hermann,” said Saul. “That demon, it’s...”

  “Keep running!” shouted Marlon. “That’ll be us screaming, too, if we stay.”

  None moved. As they caught their breath, the cries for help were unmistakable. Hermann was in terrible agony, his nerves played like an instrument.

  “Why doesn’t it just kill him?” Saul hissed. “I can’t stand this!”

  Though the idea of confronting the thing was unthinkable, Wodi was more scared of the idea of leaving the man to whatever torture the flesh demon could dream up. He thought for a moment, then said, “Marlon, Hermann’s a doctor. We’re going to need him.”

  Wodi watched Marlon’s silhouette in the darkness, immobile, silent.

  “First wound we get,” said Wodi, “first broken bone, first deep cut that’s dirty, we’ll wish we had him.”

  Marlon’s black silhouette said nothing. Wodi felt him slipping away. “Marlon, that’s the same demon that attacked me. It remembered me. And now it knows you, too. If we leave, this won’t end here.”

  “Alright,” Marlon said finally. “You two on either side of me. Keep it hemmed in with those spears. I’ll try to get in close and... finish it off.”

  No more words were said after that. Slowly the three trudged through the woods towards the flickering light. T
he screams mixed with panting, ragged breathing, as Hermann was either dying, or losing his mind, or both. They returned to the stream, then passed by the area where the demon had ambushed them. The stream snaked around a rise of stones. Over the rise, they could see the light flickering, shadows shifting behind a line of trees like the gates of Hell opening. The screams died into ragged sobs. Wodi gripped his spear, the only thing that felt real in this waking nightmare. Their bodies could not move any faster than a walk. They only trudged forward, weapons held before them, a ritual hunt enacted in a world frozen stiff.

  They rounded the hill of stones and came to the meeting place. The demon stood in the middle of a black pond fed by the cold stream. The thing stood still as a statue, water up to its waist, with Hermann held in its arms. Now Wodi could see the mystery of the purple light: The flesh of the monster’s overhanging gut was thin, and the strange organs within cast the hellish glow. There were twisted coils of shadowy, black intestines pushing up against the glowing stomach, eating up some of the light.

  Hermann seemed asleep in the arms of the demon. His legs hung limp and one foot touched the surface of the water, an infant soon to be baptized into the one true religion. Wodi looked at the twisted, knobby cords of the demon’s long arms and saw that one hand was latched onto Hermann’s head, a hooked thumb in his ear and a bony, segmented ring finger in his mouth. Suddenly the thumb and finger rotated, grinding slightly, Hermann jerked with a piercing shriek, then Wodi also seemed to come awake - he realized that Saul had been mumbling while Marlon cursed violently, each dealing with his encounter with a god in his own way.

  “That’s enough!” cried Marlon. He raised his club and knife at the thing, shouting, “Get out of here, or we’ll kill you!”

  The monster seemed in no hurry. Its face was impossible to read, for the light down below only served to stretch shadows across its bony contours. The monster acknowledged them by turning about in the water and slowly making for the far bank.

  The three youths stepped up to the water’s edge. They took turns hurling insults at the monster. Wodi shouted at it so hard that his head shook with impotent fury. Finally the monster reached the bank, set Hermann down on the far edge, then turned back to the three. It slowly waded back into the pond, then opened wide its awful mouth and shrieked one long scream that danced in and out of the human range of hearing. The shriek drowned out their cries and hammered at their skulls; Wodi felt terrible waves of nausea crippling his resolve. As if trapped in a nightmare, he saw his hands go limp, saw the spear of the torturer clatter along the ground and then disappear into the black water. Saul’s entire body went limp and smacked into the ground, a boneless sack of meat.

  It was difficult to tell when the demon stopped screaming, for a dull buzzing sound was all that remained of their hearing. Wodi watched the demon tilt its head and gaze upwards, suddenly still. It seemed to be listening to some distant voice. There was nothing left in Wodi, neither resolve nor fear; he merely watched the demon’s unnatural, stretched-out frame, like a morbid sculpture shaped by an alien, degenerate culture. The demon turned its shadowy face back to the three. Wodi stared back at the black orbs lodged in its head. The eyes were not mirrors to the creature’s soul, but were instead holes that led to an empty, black abyss, a void without morality or identity.

  The monster gave a long, tired sigh. Slowly it turned away from the three, casting them into darkness, and then trudged through the water, long arms dangling uselessly at its side. The creature rose onto the far shore and ignored Hermann as it disappeared into the dark forest. The three boys stood still for a long time, listening to the labored breathing of the beast as it shuffled through the undergrowth. Finally there was silence, and they were alone.

  Hermann stirred, rose onto his elbows, and stared at the others on the far shore. Everyone knew that they should be dead, and seemed more confused than relieved at the mercy of the demon.

  * * *

  The four rested for a while, then Marlon sprang up suddenly. “Others will be coming,” he said. “If that demon wanted reinforcements, it’ll send a signal to others that -”

  He was cut off by the sound of rustling nearby. They froze. Just then two people emerged from the woods, a thin, pale woman with brown hair, and a short, beefy, balding man with fierce eyes. They smiled, and the four companions instantly knew the newcomers were fellow citizens of Haven.

  “So there are others!” said the man. “We thought sure we heard some kind of slaughter.”

  “There was a slaughter,” said Marlon, still crouching, ill at ease.

  “Peter,” said the woman, “give them some of my milk.”

  The man furrowed his brow, bristling at being ordered around, but he dutifully dropped a heavy backpack and opened it. Inside there was a treasure trove of shining nutrimilk packets. The four companions instantly dropped their guard and gathered around the bag, happy to sip from packets that tasted like home.

  As they drank, they passed around introductions. Iduna was the woman’s name. Because she and Peter were the oldest, Wodi had the distinct impression that “mom and dad” had just come home to feed the kids.

  “You woke with this nutrimilk?” said Wodi. “It was yours?”

  Iduna nodded, said, “But it’s ours now. We share it.”

  “And you?” Wodi said to Peter.

  “I was given nothing,” he said. “I came by Iduna because she was calling for help. She had all the food, but couldn’t manage to carry it all!”

  Peter laughed, and for one second, and one second only, a wave of pure hatred flashed through Iduna’s face. None saw it but Wodi.

  “We have to move,” said Marlon, tossing a stack of empty packets on the ground.

  “Further up the stream,” said Iduna, “there’s a place where we might stay the night.”

  “Fine, fine, let’s go.”

  As they turned to leave, Wodi felt naked. Unwilling to enter the black forest empty-handed, he looked about the area for a weapon. By some strange and meaningful accident, the white spear of the torturer had washed up on the bank and was pointed directly at Wodi, and none other, as if it was ready to be taken up by its master once again. Wodi retrieved the weapon and held it aloft. He watched water streaming from the thing and he imagined that it was blood.

  Chapter Four

  A Human Sacrifice

  Sevrik entered the apartment and saw Professor Korliss Matri smoking near the balcony. Only a single light shone from the kitchen so that Korliss’s eyes were covered in darkness. He was tall and thin, his long black hair was tied in a bun, and he wore dark clothes. He seemed worn and hollow. His mouth was wide, his lips almost effeminate, but there was something sharp and militant on the other side of his soft features. Sevrik knew that in many ways, he and Korliss were opposites.

  “Were you followed?” said Korliss.

  Sevrik found a chair and sat down heavily. “I’ve got three aides waiting in the car and a guard detail of half a dozen men, one of which is waiting just outside the door. You don’t often see Guardians in their armor this close to the University, so every kid on the block is sitting at his window right now wondering what exactly is going on. Yes, I was followed.” Korliss moved but Sevrik stopped him with a dismissive wave. “It’s too late for caution. Too late, old friend.”

  Korliss burned his eyes into Sevrik, then jerked his head upward – and expression that no doubt meant “Out with it!”

  “Listen, Korliss,” said Sevrik. “It’s not just our Project that’s missing. I think there may be at least seven Havenders missing.”

  Korliss’s face froze as if dead, then he sighed and stumbled to a chair near Sevrik. “Who?” he whispered.

  “A young Guardian. A judge. A University professor, a doctor, two students… a laborer. In total, three youths, four adults. And those are just the ones that we know about. Who knows how many more will prove to be missing tomorrow?”

  Korliss ignored the question, so Sevrik plowed ahead, saying, “
Korliss, how did you know that our Project was missing in the first place? After you contacted me, I went to Didi. He already knew as well. I had to wait until reports came in for missing persons before I could officially make any moves - and even then it made things very difficult for me, Korliss. Imagine my morning! Imagine the Head of Guard of Haven trying to explain to his soldiers that three or four people missing from work for a handful of hours constitutes reason to sound the alarm and scour the entire island!”

  Korliss turned slowly to Sevrik and said, “So Didi hasn’t shown you his NeuSen Array?” Sevrik said nothing, only glared. Korliss smiled cynically, then said, “The Neuron Sensor Array. Take a look, friend – it’s really something!”