by Aaron Crash
Once they saved Annie, he’d have to get a more complete picture of the temporal physics at work.
Jack focused the hand cannon on the demons. Those Ratling Fugs were nasty, but they simply weren’t that big.
And Gabby had her horn in her left hand, ready to blow. That was what had everyone rethinking simply attacking Jack and the women.
Bailey stood with her war pick on her shoulder. “No Exoria from you two. One word, and Jack is going to blow your head off.”
Gudzu stepped back, a big green dick flapping between his thighs. “Jack. This Jack. Wields the mighty gun—the gun that was lost to the Cast Away, Gone Astray, long, long ago and forever in the future. The Eternity Cannon that would start the war and end it. We’ve heard talk. Yes, we’ve heard rumor. The war is in the minute.”
Carpitia’s spiked spear appeared in her hand. “The war is in the minute! Already here but never coming and always has been.”
The Ratling Fugs crawled across the table, scattering the money. They were coming, eyes on Jack.
“Call off your rats,” Jack said. “We can talk about it.”
“Give us the angel to eat!” Gudzu grunted. “Then, yes, we talk. For we can’t trust you if that filthy pigeon woman is with you!”
“I am not a pigeon!” Gabby’s good nature was gone. She lifted the horn and blew. The sound flung the ratlings back against the wall. One exploded in a splatter of blood.
The death demons had dropped their weapons, put their hands over their ears, and ducked. The mass of the blast went through the people there. And the table wasn’t affected. It seemed that Gabby could control who her horn affected and who it spared.
Jack figured it would come to this.
He aimed and fired his own load into one of the ratlings. He was surprised to see half the thing’s head melt off. A fresh batch of Kairos filled him, and he was pleased to see a good portion of energy both fill him and manage to get into his tank.
Current Kairos: 200/200
Potential Auxiliary Storage: 33/100
Jack was happy that his gun could work without any sort of magical bullet. And at least he could kill Fugs.
Bailey stormed forward and flung the chains connected to her war pick around Gudzu. She had the links around his throat. The froggish demon slammed her into the wall, crashing through the drywall.
Gabby went forward to slash at Carpitia with her sword. The willowy demon, as naked as the froggy, had a patch of green pubic hair between her withered thighs.
Jack didn’t have a shot there, but he did with Gudzu. The demon was fat, and Bailey was thin enough that Jack felt comfortable taking a shot at him. Jack thumbed back the hammer, the cylinder clicked over one, and he fired. The gun thundered, blowing more smoke, which already hung like a mist near the ceiling.
The bullet hit the frog, but it didn’t pierce that gray-green skin.
“Jack!” Bailey called out. “Use one of the magic bullets!”
It would take a minute to find the right chamber. Instead, Jack changed targets. A ratling was inches from ripping his legs to shreds. Jack lowered the pistol and removed the Fug’s head. The last ratling leapt. Jack fired and missed. The claws ripped through his jacket and into his skin.
Current Corpus: 188/200
Jack grabbed the rat by the throat and shoved the pistol into the creature’s chest. Jack thumbed back the hammer and pulled the trigger. Thunder filled his ears and smoke blurred his vision.
Potential Auxiliary Storage: 58/100
Jack blinked and saw the hole he’d blown in the Fug’s chest.
He was good with Kairos, but his chest was bleeding badly. He could feel it soaking his shirt and running down to his jeans.
Jack had fired four shots, but he hadn’t felt the Eternity Cannon’s true power, nor had he been given the opportunity to convert the energy. That meant his next bullet should be one of the enchanted rounds.
He charged forward. “Bailey, grab his sword, now!”
Bailey let go of the chain and rolled away from the frog demon, though it meant tearing up her blouse. All their clothes were getting shredded.
Bailey seized the demon’s hand, but she was right in front of Jack.
He rammed himself into her, slammed the revolver’s barrel into the green demon’s froggy mouth. Another trigger pull, and the demon lost his skull. Brains splattered the wall behind them. At the same time, Bailey wrenched the scimitar away.
Jack staggered back as strange dark energy struck him.
Then he saw a message that was familiar:
A SURPLUS OF NEFESH AND DECAYSIA IS AVAILABLE!
ACTIVATE STORAGE?
CONVERSION OPTIONS?
Jack went on instinct and addressed the pistol by name. “Aeterna, use the Nefesh to top off my Corpus. Use the Decaysia to max my auxiliary storage with Kairos.”
He didn’t hear an answer, but he saw the results immediately.
Current Kairos: 200/200
Current Corpus: 200/200
Potential Auxiliary Storage: 100/100
The pain was gone in his chest, and he knew his wounds were closed. With full Corpus, his flesh had been fixed in an instant. And he had plenty of Kairos now. There was no danger of running out any time soon, and that meant no headaches.
He’d also confirmed something: There was a huge difference between using the enchanted rounds versus normal lead.
With the stats still in his vision, Jack scrambled across the table, spilling more money off the table.
Gabby and Carpitia were circling, the willowy demon with the green pubic hair and saggy tits jabbing at the angel with the long spear. Carpitia’s mouth was open to show two rows of teeth, like a shark, jagged and sticking out in all directions. Her gums and tongue were a dark green. “Gudzu gone back to the void. Carpitia will join him. I’ve had my fun, and that fun is over, unless we deal and deal well.”
She stepped back, spear trembling in her hand.
Jack was on the floor, standing in hundred-dollar bills, pointing the pistol at the demon. “What do you have that we don’t?”
Gabby had her horn ready, and Bailey had the scimitar. The three of them surrounded the willowy demon.
Carpitia licked her rotten green lips. “A spell to reload the Eternity Cannon, a mother’s love, time itself. You shot Gudzu but not with the magical bullet. I can tell you the secret.”
“First,” Bailey said, “give us your tooth.”
Carpitia winced. She tossed the spear to Bailey, who grabbed it out of the air.
“I know the magic,” Bailey said. “Shoot her, Jack. We have what we need.”
Gabby didn’t say a word. There was a definite chill in her eyes. She had no mercy for these demons.
Carpitia’s eyes widened. “But...but...but we had a deal!”
“We never made a deal,” Jack said. “And like Bailey said, we have what we came for.”
He used his last round to blow the top of the demon’s head off. She fell into a pool of blood and brains, and again, Jack sucked in the Nefesh and Decaysia and found he could hold it inside the gun connected to his right hand. Both he and the ancient weapon were completely full of energy.
He directed the energy where it should go. “Aeterna, max out my Kairos.” He touched Gabby’s sweaty back. “Give half of what’s left to Gabby in the form of Nefesh.”
He felt the energy leave the gun, flow though his body, and stream into Gabby.
She sighed. “I feel love and a definite connection with you. The energy is life itself. Thank you, Jack.”
“You’re welcome.” Jack felt her Nefesh core, the Corpus that made up her body, but he could also feel the other Septua energies swirling around in her body. She wasn’t just Nefesh. It was like she had a full human soul.
“It’s your turn, Bailey.” Jack motioned to the demon. She came over, and Jack touched her arm. There was some Corpus damage from her fight with Gudzu, so he fixed that and then used the last of the energy to fill her Ijjinaya cor
e. Aeterna followed his every command, and he thought the gun would talk to him, but it stayed quiet. He kind of missed that quiet, feminine voice.
Gabby stooped and started grabbing blood-speckled hundred-dollar bills. “We need to clean this up, or at least clean it up as best we can. These men shouldn’t know we were here. The bodies and the viscera will melt away back into their component energies. But the damage to the wall and the scattered money would be noticeable.”
“Who in the fuck cares!” Bailey sighed. “Fuck these humans.”
The gore on the wall from Gudzu had faded and was disappearing. The body itself was shrinking, turning to liquid, and that liquid was fading away.
The money the angel had gathered was now as clean as it had been when it was minted. All signs of the supernatural creatures would fade away. With the money back on the table, it would be like nothing had ever happened.
While Gabby cleaned up, Bailey went to the bar and grabbed a bottle of Jim Beam. Her war pick, the scimitar, and the spear were nowhere to be seen. She must’ve tucked them away in her little alternate dimension. The demon guzzled down a good portion of the fifth. “Well, that was fun. I’m surprised Gabby isn’t more pissed. You fucking totally shot Carpitia in the face after we promised we’d make a deal with her.”
“I know I should be upset.” The angel started stacking up the money like it had been before. “However, those demons would’ve fought on the side of hell in the war we can’t talk about. The fewer soldiers hell, has the better. And I guess I just hate demons.”
“Gee, thanks,” Bailey said, obviously hurt. She sulked and drank whiskey.
Jack saw all that money on the table. He pulled out five hundred dollars.
Bailey saw. “That’s all you’re taking? I’d take half of it. Hell, I say we take all of it. Those jokers can afford it. Remember, it’s a hundred grand just to get in the door. Orgies cost more. Lots of orgies here. It’s such a party.”
The angel shook her head. “No, we can’t take a single dollar. It would cause such chaos. They would think one of them cheated. And even this Wycombe House management might be blamed. It wouldn’t be right.”
The demon sucked down another swallow. “Check their Nefesh, Feathers. You’ll see these fuckers are rich pigs. They won’t miss that money. And it’s just those six at the table. The bartender is back here, and Guido Kneecaps is over there in the corner. We either take all of it or none.”
Jack counted out another five hundred dollars. “Or we take enough that they don’t notice. They won’t notice by the end because it’s not like chips. A thousand shy? They won’t miss it. And I know exactly who needs it.”
Gabby’s face darkened. “It’s not right, Jack. We’ll sell the Enochian gold and the goblets. We’ll have enough.”
“This is just like me throwing the rock through the window,” Jack said. “I’m robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. And I’m not a nice man, Gabby. I might’ve been once, but the world is too gray to be nice. Read the men. You’ll know they can afford it.”
“Stealing is wrong.” The angel strode away, leaving Jack alone with Bailey.
The demon shrugged. “Still surprised that she’s more upset about you grabbing pocket change from rich people than shooting the unarmed demon.”
“I have to say, killing the demon was easy since, you know, demons are inherently fucking evil and ugly as shit.” Jack went over, grabbed the bottle, and took a shot. He then put the hooch away.
“Am I ugly? Am I the bad guy?” Bailey asked uncertainly.
“Not ugly. Not the bad guy. You and Gabby nearly have souls, I think. In the end, you’re good to me. You tease Gabby, but I think you like her. And if you were truly evil, you wouldn’t have helped Evelyn Mundi get back home.”
Bailey had tears in her eyes. “Thanks, Jack. I want you...I want both you and Gabby to like me. I’m changing, I can feel it. It’s scary, but it also feels good. But, Jack, if I’m not evil anymore, who will I be?”
“Morally gray like the rest of us.” Jack took her hand.
She squeezed it. “You’re not morally gray. You have that dumb moral compass guiding you. I think it tells you what rules you can break and what rules you can’t.”
“That sounds about right,” he said.
Bailey looked down, then raised her eyes. “I don’t mind not being as evil as I was created to be. But if hell realizes one of their rogue demons isn’t a worthless piece of shit, they’ll come at me. Hell never forgives. Kinda the reason why it’s hell.”
“I’ll protect you,” Jack said. “I won’t let anything, or anyone, hurt you. I promise.”
The sex demon gazed at him with hope in her eyes. Then she laughed, like she didn’t believe him, though it was obvious that she did. “Come on, hero. Let’s go after our angel. I think she’ll forgive us, which is kinda the whole point of heaven.”
Jack kissed her cheek, feeling her soft skin, smelling her perfume. They literally had all the time in world, since he not only had full Kairos, but he also had a full storage tank. He wasn’t going to start up the timestream again until they were out of the house. He stopped and thought. Once the Wycombe House’s management and guests saw the broken front gate and front door, they’d probably assume someone broke in and stole all the money off the poker table.
And why weren’t they using poker chips? Because they didn’t need to. They could play in cash like other people played with pennies, nickels, and dimes.
“So are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Bailey asked.
Jack took the bottle of Jack Daniels, grabbed some napkins, and then went back to the table. This time, he took all the money, and then put napkins on the table. He upended the bottle, splashing the booze across the table. He had the box of matches in his pocket. He lit a match and then let it drop. The minute it left his hand, the match froze in midair. That was another thing he had to learn—the mechanics of his time-stopping powers. His bullets worked once they were out of his orbit, but not the match. He figured it probably had something to do with his intentions.
Then Jack had to wonder about how the other timestreams worked. There seemed to be different flows for the realities outside of the Tempus Influunt, which incorporated Earth and this universe. Heaven had the Influunt Divinatio and hell had the Influunt Diaboli. Would Jack be able to manipulate time in those places? He didn’t know.
When Bailey saw Jack’s arson plans, she clapped with glee. “That’s not what I was thinking, but you’re brilliant. Once time starts, this table is going to catch fire, and there will be worlds of shit for them to deal with. The busted gate and front door will give us supernatural entities an alibi.”
“And I fix all my money problems for the time being.” Jack checked his moral compass. This had been his plan all along. Rob from the rich and give to the poor.
They walked out of the gambling den to the stairs. “What were you thinking back there?” Jack asked.
Bailey grinned. “I wanted to look in the fuck rooms. Don’t you?”
“I’m tempted,” Jack said. “And if there were no men and only women down the hall there, I’d do it, but I do not want to see some rich guy naked. Let’s get out of here. We can always come back. This does seem like a good place to hunt.”
“It is,” the demon agreed.
Walking down the steps, Bailey couldn’t hold back and felt up the woman in lingerie again.
Outside the Wycombe House, they found the angel gazing at the door. With no halo, sword, or horn, she looked like a pretty woman with sadness in her eyes. “I broke down the door using my glorious horn. I have done wrong. I am guilty of wrongdoing.” She sighed. “I had hoped to be a shining example for you two. But look, I’m helping you stray from the righteous path.”
“The righteous path is saving Annie,” Jack said. “And helping people. Let’s focus on that. And you know it yourself. Bailey isn’t completely evil, and you’re not completely good.”
That gave the angel something to th
ink about. She smiled. “I would sacrifice every ounce of my goodness if it meant helping you two.”
Bailey laughed brazenly at that. “Come on, Feathers. Let’s not think about all of this too much.”
They got back into the car, and Jack drove off. They’d gotten lucky to park away from where the cameras could see them. He drove until he hit a snarl of time-stopped traffic. He saw it in time, so he didn’t have to decrease his speed. He touched the toy soldier and joined the flow of traffic seamlessly.
A few minutes later, a fire engine roared past them, sirens blazing.
Jack sighed. “Well, that was fun and educational.”
Bailey pointed. “Looks like that fire might be more dangerous than we first thought.”
“What fire? Or would I be happier not knowing?” Gabby asked from the back seat.
Jack exchanged glances with the sex demon. “You’d be happier not knowing,” Jack said. “Now, we need to make magic bullets and hell keys for our fight Friday night. Where to next?”
Gabby touched Jack’s hair. “I think I need to see some mother’s love in action. Let’s do the bullets.”
Jack wasn’t sure how a mother’s love would help with crafting magical bullets, and he also wasn’t sure how Moms and Aunt Sue would take the women. Was it wrong that a part of him was curious to see what would happen?
Chapter Twenty-Nine
WHILE JACK DROVE, BAILEY slipped on a pair of new sunglasses with the tags still on them. She had the passenger side’s sun visor down so she could admire herself in the mirror. The shades must’ve been from the shopping she’d done that morning. If the demon didn’t stop going on spending sprees, Jack would have to rob the Hellfire Club every other weekend.
The sex demon adjusted her hair. “Feathers isn’t wrong. For the bullet, I’m going to use a little bit of enchantment witchcraft I picked up in Salem a few centuries ago. We need something eternal, like mother’s love. The power of friendship would also work, but maybe not as well.”
