Cynthia? Devon cast Chen a questioning look before it dawned on her. Emerson had been in touch with Owen’s girlfriend, but he hadn’t mentioned her name.
“Yes. Cynthia. You remember her, don’t you? She’s waiting. We can leave together, and you can go to her. But you need to take control, Owen.”
Yes. She could see the struggle on the demon’s face, his expression contorting between rage and grief and confusion.
The blow came so quickly and unexpectedly that Devon had no chance of dodging. His claw pierced her breastbone and splintered ribs, opening her chest cavity to the air.
Desperate, she cast Blood Mist as her health fell to just twenty-five points. As she staggered back, her vision tunneling down, she searched for Chen. She’d failed, pushing too hard, too soon. Owen had been trapped inside the beast for weeks. He’d needed time, first to remember himself, and then to gather strength to wrest control from Zaa’s creation.
Tripping on her wings, Devon went down. Raazel stomped forward, raising a hoof to crush the last life from her body.
And then, he abruptly vanished.
Chapter Forty-Four
CYNTHIA’S VOICE WAS hoarse from yelling while the governor had made his speech to the cameras. It wouldn’t be a problem for them to edit out her words, of course, not with the resources—technological resources, ironically—at the governor’s command. But she hadn’t been able to stand silently while the man spouted lies about his reasons for taking Owen to their estate.
Now she’d fallen silent, though, because the medics were loading Owen’s gurney through the helicopter’s hatch and into the wireless-free zone where his connection to the servers would be severed.
“We’re out of time. About to lose him,” she said into her phone before hitting send to message Emerson. Her throat closed down over the final words, and she fought the urge to collapse on the tarmac.
A triumphant glance from Peter put steel in her spine. The weaselly man was standing beside the governor’s security guard. As she glared back, the glint of metal on the guard’s belt caught her eye.
Knowing it was likely the stupidest thing she’d ever done, Cynthia sprinted forward, snatched the pair of handcuffs, and dashed in a crouch to the helicopter. She caught a glimpse of Owen’s mother’s gaping mouth as she slapped one half of the handcuff around a strut connecting to one of the helicopter’s skids. The other pinched as she squeezed it around her wrist. The key was still inserted in the lock, and, taking a page from those Hollywood productions that persisted in creating ridiculous car chases, she pulled the little piece of metal from its housing, then swallowed it.
Or rather, she tried, but the stupid thing got caught in the back of her throat. She gagged, eyes watering, then managed to build up enough saliva to send the awkward lump down to her stomach.
Her phone vibrated, a response from Emerson.
Almost there. 5 minutes. Two and a half with the time compression.
Huh? Time compression?
She shrugged as the security guard stomped forward, deep red splotches high on his cheeks. The man seemed at a loss for words as he grabbed her wrist, raised it, and examined the cuff.
“She swallowed the goddamn key,” he growled.
“And you were idiotic enough to leave it in the cuffs?” the governor shouted. “What if she were an assassin you’d just captured? It could be you she’d cuffed, leaving me defenseless.”
Peter stood frozen and haloed by the floods. His eyes were locked on the handcuffs as the breeze stirred by the lazy rotation of the rotor whipped his hair. Cynthia flashed him an unkind smile. They might have won all of today’s rounds before now, but she’d just delivered a crippling punch.
The aide glanced up at the rotor, then tracked his gaze to the cockpit window. A whine reverberated through the copter’s frame as the rotor slowed, then stopped. A moment later, the cockpit door opened and the pilot climbed out.
Shaking his head, he stepped close to Cynthia, peered at the handcuff, then shrugged.
“We’ll lift off after you deal with this,” he said before pulling off his headset, leaving it hanging around his neck, and heading for the office building.
The medics had frozen in place, hands still on the gurney. A strange silence gripped the scene, allowing the beeping from Owen’s monitors to penetrate.
Assuming the governor was speaking the truth about the helicopter’s wireless shielding, Owen had been cut off for about a minute. When she’d experimented with the tinfoil hat contraption Emerson had sent, placing it over Owen’s skull to cut his implants’ network connection, he’d been isolated for around five minutes before starting to stir. As instructed, she’d immediately removed the cap once that had happened—Emerson had been adamant that severing the network connection without taking the proper steps could kill Owen or drive him insane.
A couple minutes. That might be all the time Owen had left.
She brought her phone to her lips. “Please hurry,” she said.
She hit send as the security guard ripped the device from her hand.
Chapter Forty-Five
/KILL HER. KILL the traitor./
Zaa’s command rattled the chamber as the remaining demons shouted in fury over Raazel’s disappearance. They might hate their fellow demon, but they clearly had a deeper hatred for what had appeared to be Devon’s ability to remove an archdemon from existence.
Struggling to her feet as the first healing pulse from Blood Mist bumped her health up to 60 points, Devon threw down a desperate Wall of Ice.
The frozen barrier cut the chamber in half, slicing across the table and dousing a stripe of Raazel’s map. Steam rose from the edges as the remaining flames licked her wall.
“Devon! One blinked through the wall,” Chen squeaked. “Incoming!”
She whirled to face an enraged beast, the demon’s face twisted with rage. Devon threw a frantic Freeze at the beast’s feet as she backed away. As the icy cage took hold, she cringed, hoping that the teleport spell it had used to pass the barrier was limited by some sort of cooldown.
Breathing hard, she backed out of range just as the demon swiped a wicked claw through the air.
She could feel the rest of the council battering at her Wall of Ice. Maintaining concentration on the spell took almost all her focus.
“So did you teleport Owen out of here, or what?” Chen asked in his annoying imp’s voice as they closed ranks along the chamber wall.
“No! That wasn’t me!”
“Then…” Chen trailed off as the realization of what must have happened seemed to strike him.
“He got disconnected. I think it means the governor won.”
“Crap sandwich.”
“Yeah.”
“So we lost? Does that mean we can leave the hell plane?”
“Theoretically. But our communications with the outside world are cut off, and logging out leaves our toons in the world, totally vulnerable. The way it was supposed to work, we were going to get Owen to break through the possession. Even without us able to use messenger, that would have been the signal for E-Squared to pull us out.”
Devon cast another Blood Mist to replace the one timing out. She followed it with Demonic Frenzy—for all the good a bit of haste would do against a chamber of archdemons.
Out of morbid curiosity for the shape her doom would take, she used Combat Assessment on the demon trapped by her Freeze spell.
Fahzik, Demon Warlord - Level 26
Wait. Just level 26? Sure, taking on seven mobs that were four levels her senior was close to impossible. She wouldn’t even be able to hit them without the Accuracy bonus she gained from being dual-classed and thus advancing slower through the levels. But for some reason, she’d imagined them as level 50+ mega bosses.
Then again, her demon self was the same level as her main character…just level 22. The levels of Zaa’s and Veia’s leaders were probably limited by the rules of the game. Otherwise, ei
ther of the AIs could just create an army of max-level NPCs to smash the other, totally forgoing the need for tactics.
Regardless, whether level 26 or 300, Devon was outnumbered seven to one. Seven to two if she counted the little imp at her side.
“Wait, didn’t you get a teleport at level 20?” Chen asked.
Devon shook her head, grimacing as Freeze broke. The demon warlord covered the distance to Devon and Chen in two long strides and aimed a massive swipe at her face, which by some miracle, Devon managed to dodge. The blow from the demon’s claws sent chips of stone flying when it hit the wall.
With a yelp, Devon ran sideways and cast another Freeze over her shoulder. She looked for a source of light to cast a Shadow Puppet—at this point, any kind would do—but the light in the chamber seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, a sickly glow that cast no shadows. She summoned a Glowing Orb and tossed it toward the wall, but the chamber seemed to swallow any illumination it might have cast.
“Apparently, my teleport doesn’t work if I’m not in my native plane.”
Chen scowled. “Useless.”
“I know, right?”
Devon felt her Wall of Ice strain and groan a split-second before it shattered. She tried to replace it, but a buffeting gust of wind from one of the demon’s massive wing flaps sent her sprawling and canceled the cast. She started crabbing back on claws and hooves, but her arms and legs got tangled up with her wings.
“Heal please,” Chen said with a strange calm. “Just do what you can to keep me up as long as possible.”
“Huh?”
“We can’t win this,” he said, “but I’m not going down without a fight. So are you going to heal your tank with whatever creepy blood spell you have, or am I going to have to do this on my own?”
With that, he managed to get his broken wing out of the way and reach into the small pouch it had hidden. With a pitifully small claw/hand, he pulled out the massive long sword his knight character typically used. The blade was at least as long as his torso.
“What the…?”
“Emerson cheated and made me this cool container. Manpurse of Holding.”
Devon shook her head as her heal landed on his little body, and with the first healing pulse, his wing straightened. Chen flew into the air in what looked like an impossible feat considering the size of his sword.
Seeing him rush at the lead archdemon, Devon found her feet and stood upright. She aimed a Freeze at the center of the group of demons and was rewarded when the spell’s secondary effect fired, rooting two additional beasts.
“How the hell are you flying with that sword?”
“I might look small, but I still have 32 Strength.”
Of course. For someone playing a character skilled in illusion magic, she shouldn’t have let appearances fool her.
She let a tendril of hope thread its way into her thoughts. The odds were shitty, but not impossible.
At least, they looked that way until the demon she’d frozen abruptly clacked its claws together and bellowed. The roar shook her down to the bones, and the chill penetrated her skull.
You successfully resist the Fear spell. +80% chance to your passive ability, Inner Calm.
“Thanks for that, Veia,” she whispered.
Unfortunately, Chen wasn’t blessed with the same resistance. Devon’s hope sank as he turned tail and fled, shrieking, for the stairs and the locked doorway that barred passage just three steps down.
“But I’m afraid it might not be enough.”
Chapter Forty-Six
CYNTHIA DIDN’T HAVE a clock. Her phone had been stolen, but she could feel another minute draining away. Another minute of Owen’s precious time. Inside the helicopter’s cab, the medics spoke in low tones. She locked eyes with Owen’s mother.
“I know you think you have to do this,” Cynthia said. “But you heard what your husband said. This is a stunt. It’s all for politics, and Owen will pay the price.”
Owen’s mother opened her mouth as if to speak, but shut it again and jerked her eyes away.
Cynthia shrugged. It had been worth a try. The governor, Peter, and someone from the camera crew stood in the huddle at the edge of the helipad. The security guard had disappeared into the building under orders to find a bolt cutter or hacksaw.
If not for the circumstances, Cynthia might have found humor in his incompetence. More likely than not, anyone with half a brain and a bobby pin could have picked the lock. Either way, she wouldn’t get out of this without criminal charges, and since it appeared Emerson wasn’t going to come through—not to mention, the governor was now in possession of her phone and potentially damning evidence—it seemed her snap decision had been for nothing.
She successfully fought the urge to sag against the helicopter’s strut.
Later she could be weak, but not in front of Owen’s parents.
Even though she remained upright, she still felt her eyelids sag. When a strange whine reached her ears, she dismissed it as the sound of traffic from the freeway. But the sound quickly grew higher in pitch, and a yelp from one of the camera crew brought Cynthia’s head snapping back up. She stared in shock as the camera drones left the ground, over the shuttered protests of their operators, flew to take position over the helicopter.
Lights flared beneath their undercarriages as their built-in holo-projectors powered up.
A hologram of the governor appeared between the physical man and the helicopter. At first, it was hard to make out, but then the floods shut off with loud clicks, and the projection gained solidity. The audio came out of a drone’s speakers, but it was easy enough to connect to the hologram.
The image of Owen’s father started speaking to a second holo, the rendering of Peter flickering to life beside him.
She knew the dialog well enough, having basically memorized it from listening to the terrible recording again and again.
Cynthia couldn’t help grinning. Of course, she hadn’t had the resources to manufacture an audio and video reconstruction of the conversation. But Emerson worked for a technology company. Hell, his program he’d written—Veia, he called her—had created a whole world. Of course it had been trivial for him to take her miserable audio recording and turn it into a believable production.
Once the initial conversation finished, the scene flashed to Cynthia’s recording from the hospital, zooming in to highlight the family’s reactions to Cynthia’s accusations. Here, Emerson had mostly left the recording alone, probably to enhance a sense of authenticity.
At the end of the segment, the hologram shut off while the audio continued. The floodlights returned to life with another loud click.
“Governor Calhoun. You have thirty seconds to remove your son from the helicopter, or this video will be disseminated far and wide. Starting with the candidate currently leading in the opposition’s primary.
“If you comply, E-Squared will not press charges. We believe it’s in all our interests to wash our hands of the situation. However, we do care deeply about our employee’s health. Each of us at headquarters has been pulling for Owen since he fell ill.”
Cynthia watched, rapt, as emotions played across the governor’s face. Served the bastard right.
A gasp from within the helicopter’s cab ripped her attention away. She whirled her head to see Owen’s mother with hands covering her mouth. Owen lay on the gurney, seizing.
“Shit!” one of the medics yelled. “Get him out. We have better equipment in the ambulance.”
As the first medic jumped down from the cab and took hold of the gurney, Peter stomped forward and yelled, “Wait! You were hired to transport the younger Calhoun to their estate. The plan has not changed.”
“No, you wait, Peter,” the governor spat. “This was always your plan, and its failure is on your head.”
The aide spluttered but said nothing.
Owen’s father nodded at the medics. “Get my son out and do what you can to c
alm his fit.”
After glancing at Cynthia’s phone, he tossed it aside, sending it skittering over the tarmac, then pulled out his own.
“Call my personal driver,” he said into the phone. “I’m heading back to the governor’s mansion.”
“Wait, sir,” Peter said, chasing after the governor as he walked toward the lot’s chain-link gate. “We’ve come this far. We can’t waste the opportunity.”
“Peter,” the man said over his shoulder, “you’re fired.”
The gurney’s legs clicked into place as the medics hurriedly configured them into the rolling position. But their movements slowed from panicked to brisk as Owen’s body calmed and the machines resumed their regular beeping.
Cynthia transferred her attention to Owen’s mother. “He needs to be at the hospital. It’s his best chance.”
Seeming to wake from some kind of trance, the woman blinked. “Yes, you’re right.” She glanced at the medics. “Take him back.”
Chapter Forty-Seven
WITH A THUNDERCLAP, Raazel exploded back into existence. The demon rose from a crouch, shuddered, and then rattled the room with his roar.
“Oh…kay? Thought he was gone…” Chen said as he crawled back into the room. His sword clanked on the staircase as he wearily dragged it forward, then raised it in the guard position.
“Owen!” Devon said through clenched teeth, “Whatever just happened, shake it off. It’s now or never. Fight!”
She’d managed to drop another Wall of Ice to split the group of demons, leaving just three to deal with. By casting a Simulacrum of herself, she’d bought herself another few seconds while the mobs tried to figure out which version of her was real. But one had quickly caught on, and now gripped her arm with iron claws.
Breaking off from staring at Raazel, Chen shouted and run-fluttered forward, sword high. He brought the blade slamming down on her captor’s arm, hacking a chunk from the leathery flesh.
Citadel of Smoke: A LitRPG and GameLit Adventure (Stonehaven League Book 4) Page 32
