Holy Socks and Dirtier Demons (v1.1) (clean fmt)

by J. A. Kazimer

  Lilith smiled, and pointed the tracking device into the air. The beam changed from a stream of white lights into one beacon of blue. “He’s close.”

  A trace of sulfur swirled around us. “He’s not the only one. Move it.”

  I pushed Lilith toward the underground elevator, but it was too late.

  Five demons appeared. Pishachas, or Hindu demons by the look of them. Bulging veins, red eyes, and the stench of curry swirled around them like a chorus line in a Bollywood musical.

  “Liyliyth.” They danced in unison, tails wagging. “We missed you.”

  “Friends of yours?” I gestured to Lilith and pulled my nine-millimeter. Not that a gun would do a damn bit of good, but it would give me a small measure of comfort as my limbs were ripped from my body.

  Boom.

  Sparks flew from the barrel of Lilith’s gun. The weapon recoiled, sending Lilith flying across the pavement. She hit the ground with a squeak.

  I glanced from Lilith, sprawled unladylike on the ground, to the Pishachas. One of the cuter demons wore a watermelon-sized hole in her torso, directly below her heart. Blackness seeped from the wound, rising into the air like mid-afternoon pollution.

  A wail screeched from the remaining demons, a loud piercing cry of grief and hate. I blocked my ears, but the sound bounced around my brainpan.

  “Shut up.” From her position on the ground, Lilith fired three more rounds. The bullets struck true, but the demons didn’t fall. Instead, they moved closer.

  I flipped through my mental good versus evil training manual. A manual reluctantly provided by the angel after he arrived at my door, baby Jesus in his heavenly arms. Thankfully, Hades had supplemented my reading with demon lessons, and booze.

  Let’s see, there was: Paimon, Pazuzu, Penemue, Phenex... Damn, too many fucking demons. Too many hangovers.

  Pishachas.

  Bingo.

  Now how did I stop them?

  “Aum Aem Khreem Kleem Chamundaya Vich.” Lilith stumbled to her feet as she chanted the words. Her voice grew stronger with each incantation, and the demons slowly backed away.

  I translated in my head. The mantra equated to killing ones enemies, and bringing great happiness to ones friends.

  Oh, that wasn’t good. A burning started in my lower body, like flames licking along my clothing, until an intense pressure inside me exploded.

  “Shut the fuck up,” I ordered Lilith seconds before it was too late.

  She stuck out her tongue and repeated the curse, “Aum Aem Khreem Kleem Chamundaya Vich.”

  Poof.

  In a puff of curry-based smoke, the demons vanished as quickly as they had appeared. But it was too late for me. I fell to the concrete in an exhausted heap, my breath coming in short gasps.

  Lilith ran to me, her hands still grasping her big-ass gun. “Are you all right?”

  I shook my head, trying to catch my breath as I hovered in the place between life and death, better known as the afterglow. My heavy eyes closed, and a soft snore escaped my lips.

  Her hands grabbed my shoulders and shook me, hard. “Damn it, Jace. Answer me. Are you okay?”

  “Damn it Lilith, don’t ever do that again.” Embarrassment, a new feeling for me, heated my face. I hadn’t cum in my pants since fifth grade when my eighth grade girlfriend had cupped my nuts at recess.

  “Come on, at least you had a happy ending.” She pulled me to my feet, my blood slowly leaking back into my brain. She added, glancing around the parking garage, “Besides, the demons are gone, and you’re no worse for wear.” Her lips formed a wicked grin. “Maybe you should thank me.”

  “Yeah, right. Find the kid and I’ll give you plenty of thanks.” I picked up the blue beamed tracking device and followed the intense glow down the street.

  Eleven

  Zap. A pulse of electricity shot through my hand, the handheld Jesus finder cupped inside of it. The light winked out, and darkness swallowed Lilith and me. “What happened?” I asked, my hand slipping to my nine-millimeter.

  “He’s here.” Lilith dropped to her knees and caressed the ground.

  “Where? I don’t see shit.” Trash, not Jesus, littered the ground.

  Condoms, needles, and cigarette butts, yes, but no tiny Messiah.

  She cocked her head and sniffed the air. “Do you smell that?”

  I inhaled sharply and smirked. New Baby Jesus smell. A mixture of baby puke, carrot sticks, and purity. The kid was close. “Hey kid, where you at?”

  No response.

  “J.C., it’s all right, sweetheart. We are here to help you.” Lilith circled the sidewalk, kicking at the bushes as if she was searching for a wayward cat. Here Messiah, here Messiah.

  “He is gone.” The angel appeared suddenly, looking like he had been run over by a truck. “No, a bulldozer if you must know,” he said with a huff.

  “Where did he go?” Lilith shook a fist at the angel.

  He visibly swallowed. “I cannot say.” Smack. “Owww! Fine. His captors took him some place safer. Newark is no place for a child.”

  “Where?” I glanced at the angel before focusing on the three gang members circling us like prey. And why not? A hot girl, a guy with cum-stained jeans, and a freak in hair rollers and a white robe made for tempting victims.

  The angel rolled his eyes. “The kidnappers went home.”

  Home? Was that Heaven or New York?

  A flash of lightening in the distance highlighted the New York skyline and answered that question.

  “Thanks for the help,” I told the angel as I took Lilith’s hand.

  “Thanks would not be necessary,” the angel sneered, “if you would do a better job.”

  I smiled and waved to one of the gangbangers. “That dude in white just called you a pussy.”

  The angel’s mouth dropped open, and Lilith and I disappeared down the street.

  ~ * ~

  Smoke flared around my head. I waved it away and examined the woman next to me. God, she was a beauty. Mystery. Danger. Evil. Snakes.

  Medusa winked at me, and I turned back to Lilith, who was seated a bar stool away. The Underworld seemed like the perfect place to drink our disappointments away.

  “What’s plan B?” I took a long drink of my Heineken, rolling the mellow flavor along my tongue and down my throat.

  “Do you have a plan B, because I sure as hell don’t.” She lit another cigarette, ignoring the one already burning in the ashtray in front of her.

  “We will find him.” Why I wanted to console her was beyond me, but I did. Pulling her into my arms, I stroked the scar on the back of her neck. “Trust me. I will not let you or him down.”

  She grinned, but shoved me away. “I know. It’s in your blood. You can’t help it. God’s chosen one.” Her smile grew grim. “But I’m not all that innocent, Jace, and you’re not invincible.”

  Passion flared between us as my fingers caressed her face. “I’m no angel, and Heaven to me is a cold beer, a naked woman, and a hockey game. So you tell me, why am I the chosen one?”

  “You’re God’s—”

  “Come sail away, come sail away…” The boom of music through the bar room speakers cut off Lilith’s words, and broke the spell of intimacy, leaving me flushed. I pounded my fist on the bar with frustration, both sexual and spiritual.

  Lilith jumped from her barstool and motioned to the bathroom. For a second she seemed to glow like the fires of hell, then she disappeared into the crowd, leaving me staring after her.

  Lilith’s wine glass was empty, so I flagged Hades down and gestured for another round. As our drinks arrived the jukebox fell silent, and the bar door opened. Intense white pissed-off angel light flew into the room followed by one pissed off angel.

  He stomped toward me, halting an inch from my nose. “Do you know what those men did to me?”

  I wiped at a glob of stinking angel spit clinging to my shirt, and raised an eyebrow. He didn’t look hurt. If anything, he wore a new layer of protoplasmic glow
.

  “They… I…” The angel swallowed hard. “They made me blaspheme. How could you—”

  I reached behind the bar, and handed him a foamy clear drink with a red umbrella and two cherries. “Here. I got you a Zima.”

  His eyes misted, and the angry glow flicked off like a light bulb. “For me? I thought they didn’t serve it here.”

  “I stopped at the liquor store next door.” I hadn’t really. Instead, I had filled a glass with seven-up and vodka. He would never know the difference. Angels, unlike their demon counterparts, could not indulge in pleasures of the flesh, including eating and drinking, or so the angel had mentioned a million times in our short acquaintance.

  “Thank you.” He sniffed once, and like the crying Christ statue in Bolivia, a blood-red tear slipped down his face, staining his robe pink.

  “You’re welcome.” Yeah, I’m an asshole. “I need a favor.” Anyone else would have looked suspicious at my sudden gesture of friendship, but not the angel. His serene smile pricked my conscience, but I shook it off. “I want you to lie to God for me.”

  “What?” The ”Zima” in his hand crashed to the floor. He looked around as if he was being Punk’d. “Lie to God? Are you insane?”

  Probably. “A small lie.”

  “But He’s omniscient.”

  I’d heard that. “Sure, but He’s also a busy guy. What’s one little lie?”

  “No.”

  “Just don’t mention the kid’s missing when you give your weekly report. That’s all.” I smiled, trying to instill confidence. “Come on, friend,” I said, nearly gagging on the word. “I just need a little more time to find the kid.”

  The angel gave a barely perceptibly nod, his ectoplasmic glow dimming. Slapping the angel on the shoulder, I waved to Hades. “Get my buddy here another Zima.”

  God taken care of, now I had to find the kid, defeat the kidnappers, and figure out what Lilith was before it was too late. Because, she wasn’t what or who she appeared to be, and that made her even more dangerous.

  Returning from the bathroom, Lilith threw back the full glass of wine on the bar, and smiled at me. “What do you say we get out of here? Make tonight a night never to forget?”

  Hell of an idea. Weeding Lilith through the bar packed with Gods and Goddesses, I called over my shoulder to the angel, “Don’t wait up.”

  Outside of the Underworld, the night closed around us. An ambulance siren screamed in the distance, and steam rose from the metal grates, but here, in our dark corner, it felt as if we were the only people left on Earth.

  I brushed a strand of hair from Lilith’s cheek. “So where to?”

  “Queens.” Moonlight illuminated the starkness of her skin, and for a moment, her yellow eyes burned red.

  I should have said no, pleaded exhaustion or dysentery, but stupidly I nodded, hailed a taxi, and slipped to the dark side.

  Twelve

  Three a.m., a few beers, a mysterious girl with a big-ass gun, and a cemetery in Queens. What could possibility go wrong?

  I lit a match. The brief flare of light bounced off the gravestones of some of the biggest names in mobster history. Joey Diamonds. Lupo the Wolf. Lefty Guns Ruggiero. Cold blooded killers sleeping with the worms.

  Romantic.

  “What are we doing here?” I shook out the match before it burned my fingers. Lilith didn’t answer. Instead, she slipped between the headstones like a child at a playground. In and out she weaved, the blackness of her hair and dress absorbed by the darkness.

  Losing her behind a stack of headstones, I jogged to catch up, but it wasn’t fear that quickened my steps. I didn’t fear the dead, worm riddled bodies or decomposing flesh. Nope, it was the damned who scared me. Those that had shuffled off their mortal coil, chained to this world by the lives they lived, or in some cases, lives unlived.

  Dammed if you did, and dammed if you didn’t.

  Queens smelled bad enough, but the stench of the cemetery curdled my stomach. The aroma of death seeped from rotting graves, swirling around the blackness like a disease, ready to strike. Lilith looked right at home.

  “Come here.” She crocked her finger at me, and then to a marble mausoleum a few feet away. Like an idiot, I followed, pausing outside the heavy stone archway.

  “This isn’t going to turn into one of those late night horror movies, the one where the hero follows the succubae to his death?” I stepped inside, taking shallow breaths until my nose acclimated to the smell. “If so, don’t tell anyone I fell for it.”

  She laughed, reached into her pocket, and pulled out a flask. She took a long drink, and passed it to me. “Singular for female demon is succubus, plural is succubae. And what makes you think you’re the hero?”

  “I’m the guy with the white hat.” I pointed to my dingy gray skullcap. It might have been white at one point.

  “I’ll try to control my desire to kill you then.” She pushed me further inside the small room. Behind me, she struggled to pull the heavy door closed. The scraping sound of marble and metal exploded in the dark silence, but somehow instead of being frightened, I felt reassured. Safe.

  In the blackness, Lilith took my hand, or I hoped like hell that it was her hand. A match flared, illuminating Lilith and a fat black candle. She lit the candle, and the mausoleum burst into light. A rush of something curled along my spine; lust, desire, terror?

  She smiled, reading my dark, dirty thoughts, or maybe she recognized the gleam in my eyes. “Don’t get any ideas.” After all, she didn’t strike me as all that innocent.

  “You wanna tell me what we’re doing here?” I sat on the icy floor, sucking in dust-mite dead guy air. The things I do to get laid.

  “Your apartment is condemned.” She lit a few more candles, all black. The flames danced, wavering back and forth in the slight crypt breeze.

  “I know it’s not the Ritz.” I shrugged. “But it ain’t that bad.”

  “No, it’s damned. You and I both felt it this morning. There are powers at work. I don’t know if they’re good or evil, but they’re there.” Her fingers traced the gold inlayed placeholder for Steve Brodie, the first guy to supposedly jump off the Brooklyn Bridge and live. “And I’d rather not deal with that tonight.”

  “There’s more to it, isn’t there?” I gave her my best Clark Gable smile, complete with shiny white teeth.

  She sighed. “I got a phone call before we left the Underworld. A tip if you will. A couple of angry demons planned to pay you a visit tonight.”

  That wasn’t quite what I expected to hear. Damn. “And?”

  “And I don’t want you to die, so I brought you to the one place I know you’ll be safe.”

  “Who are you?” Suspicion crept into my voice. She knew too much about me, about the kid, about the darkness to be human. My brain searched for a name, for a description of the sexy form in front of me. What did I know about her? Her ex-husband, Adam, preached submission to brainwashed idiots. Her boyfriend smelled like brimstone and owned a pit of hell. Hades called her friend, but could I count on him?

  I wanted to trust her, to believe she would lead me to the kid, but I wasn’t born-again yesterday.

  “Who do you want me to be, Jace?”

  “I warned you about that.”

  “About what?” She smirked, knowing damn well. Striding past me, her long, lean legs swung to a hypnotic rhythm uniquely Lilith. I reached for her, knocking her into my lap. She fell willingly enough. Her hands slipped around my neck, and she nipped at my lower lip.

  “Tomorrow. I’ll tell you everything you want to know.” She traced my mouth with the tip of her tongue. She tasted of wine, cigarettes, and salt.

  Salt. Shit.

  The flask.

  GHB.

  “You date-rape drugged us.” I blinked, more stunned than angry.

  “What the fuck for?”

  “Not us, sweetheart.” She shifted positions on my lap and kissed my forehead. “You.”

  Heaviness descended on me. “
I trusted you.” My lungs felt sluggish as my heart rate slowed. Was this it? Death by date rape drugs? A part of me almost hoped so. It would save me from God’s wrath, not to mention the embarrassment of being drugged by a girl. The angel couldn’t save me this time.

  “Hush baby.” Lilith brushed a piece of hair from my eyes. “It won’t hurt a bit. Just relax and go to sleep.”

  Thirteen

  “Ahhhha,” I moaned and clutched at my fractured skull, feeling around for fragmented bones and blood, but finding none. My head remained intact; it just felt shattered into a million pieces. Next, I checked my jaw, chest, arms, legs, and penis. All still there and ready to go, some parts more than others.

  What the hell? I crawled to a sitting position, considered puking, but decided against it. In the dim, seemingly never ending candlelight, my eyes inspected the mausoleum. With the exception of a missing Lilith, nothing looked out of place. I stumbled to my feet and toward the door.

  Check that. A missing Lilith and a broken door handle.

  Fuck. I was trapped, pissed off and claustrophobic too. I had to get out. The walls warped, shrinking in my mind’s eye. Running full tilt at the door, I slipped on a puddle of candle wax, hit my head against the marble archway, and knocked myself unconscious.

  Lord knows how much time had passed when I awoke to the rumble of the granite door opening. A cooling breeze drifted into the room, extinguishing the flickering candles. I inhaled deeply, sucking in the fresh scent of cemetery air.

  My savior spoke, “Jace? Thank God. I was so worried.” Mary ran into my crypt, threw her arms around me, and hugged me tight. She smelled of woman, turpentine, and oil based paint.

  Heaven scent.

  “How’d you find me?” My voice bounced off the stone, sounding louder than it had inside my head. I winced at the sound, but slowly rose to my feet, keeping her body close to me.

  “Someone slipped a map under my door. It said you were in trouble, so I got here as fast as I could.”

  Ah, the angel. He said he couldn’t affect the timeline of someone’s life, but he sure as hell interfered in mine at will. Just this once, I was thankful for the intervention. Spending an eternity with a bridge jumper and two dead New York City mayors held little appeal.