by Adam Dark
“What if I don’t want anything to do with any of this?” Ben added, not really surprised anymore that he was totally willing to take this line of thinking all the way. Right now, he was starting to think he’d grown a little numb to all the horrific possibilities of what might happen. Maybe he should have been a little afraid, but he wasn’t.
“That’s also up to you,” Rufus said. “But we really hope you consider our offer.”
“You haven’t offered me anything real,” Ben said. “You’ve offered to maybe answer my questions with real answers but only after I decide to join you.” He couldn’t help rolling his eyes. “You’ve offered to use me and Ian for whatever it is you actually do. I’m starting to think it’s better that I say no.”
“Are you making that decision right now, Ben?” Anita asked. Now her perpetual scowl of disgust returned, though it was brief and not nearly as intense.
Ben shook his head. “No. I told you I’m not deciding anything today.”
“I’m glad.” Anita lifted her chin, and her smile returned. “Because we never got the chance to tell you that if you do refuse our offer, which is absolutely your choice to make, the three of us and the Sectarian Circle as a whole won’t be able to help you anymore. Even as little as we have already.”
Awesome. Half answers and half threats. This just kept getting better. So no more weird packages showing up at their apartments. No more Richard Monday randomly showing up at the last minute to save them from death by a stupid mistake. No more help at all.
“Fine,” Ben said.
“Fine,” Richard added, and it sounded really odd coming from him—like the man was now playing at being a toddler copying his parents’ attitudes.
“I know this meeting probably wasn’t what you wanted it to be,” Rufus said. Great observation. “If we were able to tell you more, Ben, I’m sure this decision would be easier for you to make. But we can’t. Instead, though, I think we might be able to find a middle ground, here—”
“Rufus,” Richard snapped.
The shorter man craned his neck up to look right into their host’s eyes. “It’s worth it. You know that.”
“I agree with him, Richard,” Anita said, nodding up at him too. “If it helps, it’s absolutely worth it. Not everything. Just a few suggestions. A little guidance.”
For a few seconds, Richard Monday just stared at his colleagues. Then he growled and stormed away from the table to resume his pacing again at the back of the lab.
“So,” Rufus said, turning back to Ben, “this is what we can do. I’d be happy to give you what information we have on another presence from the Fell needing do be dealt with fairly quickly.”
“Project,” Chase interjected, and Ben wanted to pinch himself to be sure the guy had actually used their preferred word for demon-hunting in real life. “And we’ve got the information part covered, thanks.”
“And you’ve figured out how to not repeat your mistakes from the cemetery?” Rufus asked with a definitely ungenuine smile.
“We’re… working on it,” Chase replied. That wasn’t entirely true, but Ben could applaud the guy’s attempt at a poker face. It was probably a lot better than his. But Rufus had a point. They’d stepped in it when they’d gone after a demon they hadn’t known they literally couldn’t touch, as far as some kind of ancient, making-deals-with-demons law went.
‘This again?’
I wasn’t blaming you.
“Well,” Rufus said, “I think until you have all the kinks officially worked out, this might be a safer way to move forward.” He raised an eyebrow, then turned back to Ben. “I can tell you what we know, and I’ll come with you. Maybe give you a little more insight into how the Sectarian Circle likes to handle these cases. As well as the knowledge and technology we’ve amassed over centuries to make the whole process a lot easier for everyone. After that, if you still don’t want to accept our offer, Ben, you’re not obligated to do anything else. But I do think you’ll appreciate what you can learn from us.”
“You want us to shadow you?” Ben asked. Would it have been so hard to start with that from the very beginning?
“Just a trial run. You’re not signing any contracts or committing to a thing.”
Ben hoped that was just a figure of speech; he didn’t like the idea of having to sign anything with these people.
‘They probably make you sign your name in blood,’ Ian said.
Well, with these guys, that didn’t seem so impossible. Despite Rufus’ newest offer, Ben didn’t actually have an answer for that one, either. Did he really want this guy leading him around by the hand to show him how this group of people did whatever they did with demons and spirits? Yeah, they had helpful gadgets, at least, but that didn’t tell him anything about who they were or if running around with the Sectarian Circle would be better or worse for Ben’s conscience.
“Again, you don’t have to decide anything right now,” the man continued. He reached into the inside pocket of his tweed jacket and pulled out a business card. “Think about it. Give me a call. This is my cell. And we’ll set something up.” He slid the card facedown across the table, and Ben stared at it until April squeezed his hand.
So he picked it up and turned it over. “You’re a car salesman?” he asked, staring at the bright, bold letters of Mergile Ferrari sprawled across the card.
“It’s just my day job.” Rufus winked. Chase snorted.
“Anything else, then?” April asked, her voice laced with impatience and skepticism.
Rufus glanced at Anita, who just lifted a shoulder in obvious indifference. Just like that, they’d gone from desperate to convince Ben he needed to be on their team to apparently not giving a crap one way or the other what they did next. He wasn’t buying it.
“I think that’s it,” the man replied.
“Great.” April stood, releasing Ben’s hand in the process, and he had a feeling she deliberately kicked back the metal chair as far as she could without bothering to scoot it toward the table again. “Who’s gonna let us out?”
Rufus smiled. “The door will be open when you reach it.”
Before Ben had stood all the way, Chase said, “Wait. Hold on a minute. I want to know how you guys have been watching us this whole time and I never saw it.”
“We’re really good at what we do,” Rufus said.
“That’s not even an answer.” Chase hadn’t gotten up from his chair, but Ben noticed the guy was gripping the sides of it like he expected to fall out of it.
“When Ben makes his decision, we’ll add that to the list of things to go over,” Anita said, her voice stupidly sweet-sounding and totally fake. Probably.
With a grunt of disgust, Chase leapt from his chair and turned to follow April toward the staircase. Ben did the same, just in time to see Peter stand slowly from his own chair, moving like he had all the time in the world to do absolutely nothing. Ben definitely didn’t expect him to whirl around and kick the metal chair as hard as he could, sending it hurtling over the floor to clatter against the wall. April jumped, spun around, then glared at Peter.
“Two days, Benjamin!” Richard Monday shouted from the back of the lab. “You have two days to contact Rufus. We will not wait for you indefinitely.”
Ben just kept walking. There wasn’t really anything else he could do, and he knew it was going to take a whole lot more out of him to deal with whatever happened once they left this ridiculous house. Because he still had April’s irritation and Peter’s rage waiting for him once they were alone.
‘Whatever happens,’ Ian said, ‘I’ll still be here.’
Yeah. There was that.
9
‘Hey, look at that,’ Ian said. ‘The door’s open.’
Yeah, those assholes in the lab got one point for not screwing them. Awesome. That hardly made a difference. Because it wasn’t like anybody got any kind of relief by stepping out of that narrow staircase and into Richard Monday’s oddly pristine study. No one said a word when P
eter barreled through that office and jerked open the double doors. Nobody stopped to study any part of the weirdest collection any one man had ever had in his own home. Peter all but ran beneath the massive staircase to the second story, past the kitchen, and into the foyer toward the front door.
And there was Anton, standing beside the door as if he’d never left that post. Only they all knew that wasn’t true, and Ben wondered how the heck the guy had known they’d be coming up here to leave Richard Monday’s house at this exact moment. Nothing here was getting any less creepy.
“Thank you for joining us this evening,” Anton told them, placing a hand over his heart through his tight white t-shirt and bowing his head a little. “We hope to see you again in the near future.” He didn’t address Ben, but the man didn’t look at anyone else. Ben just widened his eyes at the man and couldn’t even try to smile.
“Yeah, right,” Peter muttered, never having slowed on his way toward the door. Maybe he would have run right into it, but Anton turned the knob and opened the door at the last possible second, and Peter just stormed right through. Chase followed him, then April, and finally Ben.
Yeah, he was entirely aware of how rude it was to leave the house without saying thanks or goodbye or have a nice night. But none of those things were applicable right now. He’d just had his entire life and his one massive secret flayed open and dissected by three lunatics claiming to be a part of the Sectarian Circle, right in front of the two people Ben had dreaded telling about Ian. And now he had to deal with the backlash of that all by himself, because those two people were also the only friends he would have gone to just to help him feel better about this. It wasn’t like Chase would be any help.
‘What about me?’
I’m not sure you count right now, man.
‘Ouch.’
Peter tromped off the stoop and down the stairs to his car pulled up in front of Richard Monday’s house. Just the idea of riding in that car with Peter, April, and Chase made Ben’s stomach turn on itself. This was going to be the tensest, most awkward half-hour car ride of his life, hands down. He’d rather just get an Uber and let Peter decompress a little without him. Maybe April, even, if she felt like she needed it. But how much worse would that make Ben look? He couldn’t just say, ‘Hey, I don’t really want to have to endure you guys being pissed at me, so I’ll just not go with you.’ That made him look like a coward. It made him look guilty. Well, he was pretty sure he was both of those things, and now Peter and April had just been made aware of it.
But he didn’t even have to make the decision. Peter unlocked his car, opened the driver door, and glared at Ben with so much anger, Ben just stopped there on the sidewalk. “I’m not driving you home. So…” He shrugged. “Figure it out.” Then he got into the driver’s seat and started the car.
Ben just blinked. He hadn’t expected the guy to actually make a stand like that; Peter was a lot angrier than he’d thought. Chase raised his eyebrows and mouthed, ‘Ouch.’ He was clearly saying it as an attempt to support Ben—he thought—but even if Chase was trying to be a jerk about it on purpose, it barely even registered for Ben. April just stared at Peter through the window for a few seconds, her mouth open, then turned to face Ben. She closed and opened her mouth again a few times, like she couldn’t figure out how to say what she might not have even been able to think.
“It’s okay,” Ben said, shaking his head. “I’ll just get an Uber.” He slipped his phone out of his pocket and started the process.
“Wait, Ben.” April stepped away from the car and approached him. “Peter shouldn’t be—”
“No, really.” Ben didn’t think he could handle her sympathy right now, or whatever this was. He wasn’t even sure she wasn’t trying to say this to him now just because she felt like it was the right thing to do. She could have been just as furious with him as Peter—only she didn’t look like it. And April wasn’t the kind of person who tried to choke back her anger.
“I’ll come with you,” she said.
He frowned at her and realized that no, she wasn’t actually hiding anything. It looked like she was just fine, and somehow, that made him feel even worse. “Honestly,” he said, having to clear his voice when it croaked out of him. “I think I actually just want to… go. On my own. Call it a night, you know?” Well now he sounded like he was the one all butthurt about everything, and that sucked. But it was true.
“Yeah. Okay.” April studied him, her blue eyes wide beneath a tiny frown of concern. She stepped closer and reached up to wrap her arms around his neck. Ben’s response was just a little delayed, but he eventually hugged her back, feeling awkward with his phone in his hand. “I’m not mad at you,” she whispered in his ear, then kissed his cheek and released him. “So… just give me a call soon, okay?”
“Yeah.” Ben nodded, swallowed really hard, and watched her walk to the passenger-side door. She turned back to look at him again, then finally got in the car. With Chase already in the back seat, as soon as April closed the door behind her, Peter must have floored the gas. His tires squealed on the asphalt, the car jerked forward, and then they were gone.
‘You think he’ll let Chase vape on the way back?’ Ian asked.
“That’s seriously your only question?” Ben muttered.
‘Just trying to lighten the mood. Maybe.’
Definitely not.
The Uber driver who’d come to pick him up from Richard Monday’s house was a ridiculously chipper woman in her mid-thirties who apparently thought being an Uber driver meant she’d be making all her own new best friends on the job. When he’d gotten in the car, she’d asked him what kind of party he’d been to “in that house”, and Ben literally could not think of a single thing to say in reply. So he’d shrugged and buckled his seatbelt in the back seat, even though she’d offered the front seat, if he wanted. Yeah, like he wanted to sit next to this slap-happy chick at almost nine o’clock at night after the kind of day he’d had. No, thanks.
That hadn’t mattered at all. She’d talked nonstop the entire way back, and if Ben had been paying attention to what she’d said instead of how much he’d wanted her to shut up, he’d probably have learned her entire life’s story in thirty-five minutes. Staring out the window gave him enough of an opportunity to zone out during most of it, and when she pulled up in front of his apartment complex, he’d stepped quickly out of the car with a muttered, “Thanks.” Thank god.
Now, he lay sprawled out on his couch with one leg still on the floor and thought about literally nothing. He couldn’t let himself think about the worst night—minus anything having to do with actually fighting or escaping demons—he’d had in a long time. At least a dozen times, he thought about calling April, then remembered that was the worst idea ever.
‘She said to call you,’ Ian offered.
“Yeah, not tonight.”
‘You don’t know that.’
“I’m not calling her tonight.” He wanted to say he wasn’t that desperate, but he knew he probably was, which made it an even worse idea. He’d gotten himself into this mess by deciding every single day not to say a single word to either Peter or April about Ian and what was going on with them, and he’d never gotten the chance to tell them in his own way, in his own time. The fact that he’d been forced into revealing everything tonight made him think he would have told them eventually, but he didn’t even know anymore.
‘So I think it’s a little weird that I’ve never heard of this Sectarian Circle,’ Ian added.
“I don’t want to talk about that.”
‘Or the Fell. What kind of name is that, anyway? These people have to—’
“Jesus, Ian, will you give it a rest?” Ben shouted, launching up to sit on the couch. He was literally glaring at the flimsy coffee table between the couch and the cheap TV stand, because it wasn’t like he was talking to anyone he could actually see.
‘Lighten up, man.’
“No.” Ben stood and crossed the small living room to his bedr
oom. He glanced at the oven clock in the kitchen to see that it was already after two in the morning. So, cool, he’d been doing absolutely nothing for the last three hours at least. And now he just wanted to sleep. “Please, just shut up for the rest of the night, okay?”
Ian’s response of absolutely nothing whatsoever was perfect. Best part of Ben’s day. And he didn’t even care if that thought stung the guy who could sift through all his thoughts whenever he wanted, anyway. None of that was Ben’s fault.
10
The cold woke him first. Ben bunched the comforter up around and his shoulders and rolled over in bed, but that seemed to make it worse. Irritated now and half asleep, he moved to toss the comforter off his body, meaning to go check the stupid heat setting in his apartment. But his blankets were gone. He sat up quickly, thinking maybe he’d already kicked them off in his sleep—which was weird, because he’d literally just pulled them up almost over his head. But now his bed was gone too, and his comforter, and his entire bedroom.
Ben wasn’t even in his apartment, and by the looks of it, he wasn’t anywhere in Boston, either.
Instead, it looked like he was in a desert—a green desert, with rolling dunes stretching in every direction and not a bit of it recognizable. But that eerie glow of the spirit realm infected everything, so at least he could assume he was there instead.
The fact that he’d woken up in the spirit realm but not the gross-green version of his own apartment definitely worried him. That had never happened before. Every time Ian jerked him back through the realms, stopping time in the world of the living and entering the place where demons and spirits and whatever else existed, they’d always gone to a mirrored image of wherever Ben’s physical body currently was. Unless somebody had abducted him in the middle of the night and carted him way out into the middle of nowhere in a freakin’ desert, this didn’t make any sense. Or maybe he was dreaming.
