by Michael Todd
“Still sweating that big demon last year? You shouldn’t. It invades your mind and becomes a phobia or obsession. Like I’ve said many times before, John, just give it to God.”
“Easier for a demon-possessed priest to say than for me to do. Wait, I can’t believe I’m able to say those words.”
Damian patted his shoulder. “Me too. Meee too.”
Ugh, I can’t wait to get back and take a dang shower. I feel like I’ve been driving forever.
That would be nice, you stinky bitch.
Katie laughed. Now hold on, you...
Katie reached up and turned her rearview mirror to show the headlights behind her. There were two identical pairs side by side, just far enough behind her to not be able to make out the vehicles. She squinted at them for a moment and changed lanes, seeing the sign for the exit in half a mile.
You have to pee already? Seriously, I need to stop on the boobs and work on your bladder.
No, just curious about something.
Katie’s tone put Pandora on alert, and she sniffed the air. When the turn lane to the next exit opened up she put on her blinker and eased over, slowing down. She watched the cars carefully, driving as close to the exit ramp as possible.
When she was almost at the point where she would be forced to turn they both got over behind her. She grabbed the wheel and jerked it violently, heading back out onto the highway. She watched the cars behind her do the same exact thing.
I fucking knew it.
We have a tail, don’t we? When they got close enough I could smell ‘em.
Yep, but no fear. They won’t get far.
I don’t like the sound of that.
Hold on, Pandora. We’re going for a little joy ride.
By that point the tails could see that she knew they were there. They sped up to try to bracket her and she looked at the sign, but the next exit wasn’t for ten miles. She couldn’t wait that long or she just might find herself kidnapped all over again. She bit her lip and looked at the open stretch of desert ahead on the left.
“Here goes nothin’,” she muttered.
Katie gripped the steering wheel and turned quickly, driving through the median and grunting as the truck bounced wildly. She crossed the other side of the highway and the trucks made it across behind her, but then she gunned it and veered onto the desert. She threw the car into four-wheel drive and put her pedal to the floor, leaving a rooster-tail behind the truck.
Katie, breathing heavily, glanced at the trucks in the rear-view mirror. Like idiots they followed her into the sand, almost immediately bogging down.
She chuckled and slowed a bit, rolling down the window and sticking her hand out. She flipped them the bird as the two guys got out and kicked their SUVs, putting their hands on their hips and watching her drive into the dunes. Katie threw her head back and laughed.
I knew that would work.
Glad you were confident. I really didn’t want to have another needle in the neck to clean up.
Now who worries too much? You’d think by now you would be more confident in my off-road driving abilities.
Oh, I’m confident, but knowing our luck, this will be quicksand. It does help that whoever is sending these goons has a lineup of complete and total morons working for them.
Moloch?
I don’t know. Incognito doesn’t really seem to be his style, but whoever it is, those guys are in for a hurtin’ when they report back home with bad grades. Can’t find good help anywhere these days.
In this case, I am pretty happy about that. I’m too tired to fight off Moloch right now. A few poltergeists or even a dozen demons, maybe, but Moloch gives no shits. And quite frankly, at this moment I don’t either.
Pandora laughed when the guys faded into the background.
Arrivederci, motherfuckers! Better luck next time!
Damian had his cross at the ready and began creeping through the hotel very carefully. The three ghost hunters followed him, John holding the bible and the other two taking readings and photos as they went.
Of all the settings in the world, this hotel couldn’t have been much creepier. The old wallpaper was peeling, the lights were off permanently, there were Victorian-style decorations badly worn by time and weather, and every floorboard they stepped on made a creaking or wailing sound.
Even Damian felt a chill run down his spine.
“Up ahead on the right, Room Thirteen. That’s the place.”
“Of course it is.” Damian rolled his eyes. “People and their superstitions.”
He approached the door and pushed it open, peeking in from the hallway. Slowly he stepped inside and shined his flashlight around. He illuminated the ceiling and found seven ropes, all perfectly tied, still hanging in a circle. They had taken the bodies but not the weapons, which didn’t help with the fact that the ghosts were still there.
Suddenly, something moaned in the corner and Damian shined his light over there, squinting at a crouching translucent figure. Carefully he stepped forward, trying to get a better view of her. She was crying with her head down and her dirty blonde hair covered her face.
“Why are you crying?” Damian asked, hoping to gain her trust.
The apparition didn’t answer. Damian moved another step closer and her crying stopped. Slowly she raised her head, her eyes wide and bloodshot, her lips blue, and the imprint around her strangled neck giving the impression of a fresh wound.
She curled her lip slightly, snarling. Damian extended his cross and gave John the flashlight, taking the Bible.
“In virtute Dei per ejiciam vos de hoc mundo. Nec tua plus cladis in medio patet, movere on. Portas afterworld manent. Compes Christo Iesu vos moveri in hoc mundo!”
The apparition stood, then her eyes rolled back and she screamed as if in agony. The ghost hunters backed up, fearful of what would come next. Her apparition flickered in and out, disappearing for a moment and then reappearing on the rope she’d hung herself with. Damian held his cross out, continuing to chant as another apparition appeared. The spirit swiped at his arm, leaving three red burn marks, but Damian persisted.
“Fiat tibi Dominus. Movere ab hoc loco. Quoniam tu ambulavero in valle umbrae mortis. Da tuum est dolor tuus doloris et maeroris adfirmant.”
The other ghost flickered and flashed, appearing on his rope. Damian stood back, breathing deeply and holding the cross tightly in his hand. He set the bible down on a broken side table and raised one arm into the air.
“If you took your life in this place, appear! Do not be afraid, for all your sins can be washed away. Move on from this place!”
A third ghost came screaming into the room, rolling right through Landon. He dropped the camera and grabbed his chest, breathing heavily with fright. He was fine physically, but fear had hit him hard. Damian focused on the ghost who had run through Landon, watching the spirit arise from the floor, alternately hissing and screaming, his head swiveling atop his broken neck. He appeared next to the others; three translucent spirits swinging in front of him.
“Be Gone!” Damian screamed, and a wind blew wildly through the room.
The three hanging ghosts disappeared, their wailing echoing through the halls of the hotel. The wind stopped, and Damian dropped his hand, looking at the marks on his arm. He glanced at John and shook his head.
“I’m gonna need backup for the last four. They won’t go so easily.”
He took one last glance at the swaying ropes and nodded, heading back out into the parking lot. As John helped his two assistants back outside, Damian grabbed his phone and dialed Katie.
“You are still alive and you didn’t forget about me,” Katie answered cheerfully.
“Yeah.” He chuckled as he caught his breath.
She caught his heavy breathing. “Uh oh, what’s wrong?”
“I have four ghosts right outside the city in the old Vegas Dive Hotel, and they are stubborn bastards. I could use a little KatieDora power over here if you’re free.”
“Act
ually this is perfect timing. I was just taking a little detour through the desert, enjoying the cool night air. I can be there in thirty.”
“Perfect, and bring your courage because this one is a little freaky.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Well, well, well, the fearless leader is checking in. I thought for a moment that you had run off and left us to sort it out on our own.” Calvin chuckled. He wasn’t serious; he was enjoying having Katie to mess with again.
She had only been gone for a few days, but in their world, that was a lifetime. Mercenaries never knew if they would be alive from one day to the next.
The base had been quiet, and Calvin was more than ready for things to get back to normal, or at least as normal as they ever were. Katie smiled as she jumped over a sand dune, the windows rattling in their tracks.
“Yeah, I thought you might need me from time to time,” she joked.
“How was your vacation?” he asked.
Katie snorted. “Not a vacation.”
“I figured as much. What did they have you doing out there in the glitz and glamour of Los Angeles? Clearing Beverly Hills of the not as rich and famous?”
“Ha! I wish. There was a pretty big incursion, and then I had problems of my own.”
“That sounds mysterious.”
“Actually it kind of is, but I don’t have time to tell you about it now. Just know it’s personal and we need to get to the bottom of it before anything else happens.
“Roger that. We’ll have a sit-down when you get home. Why doesn’t it surprise me that it’s personal? You seem to piss off just about everyone you come across?”
“That’s Pandora. I’m the sweet one.”
“Yeah, right.” Calvin laughed. “Anything else, my picture of grace and manners?
“Actually, yeah. Damian called.”
“Oh yeah? Trying to convert you again?”
“Ha! I don’t really think it’s a matter of belief anymore.”
“Yeah, the facts are weighing in with the gates of hell opening up. I know he’s at a ghost call, but I figured it would be simple enough for him to rock on his own. What’s up?”
“I don’t know the exact details yet, but it seems he needs a little backup. I figured, why not? I’ll start out my return to Vegas by taking down a few idiot souls that decided to hang around for the after party.”
Calvin started singing. “Oh, to be you, with soooo much power, and soooo few fears.”
“Oh, yeah.” She snorted. “It’s a blast. My demon, you know—she’s a riot all the time.”
Hey, bitch, watch it.
“You better be careful.” Calvin laughed. “One day she’s gonna take over and you’re gonna wake up with a dick tattooed on your forearm and one eyebrow shaved off.”
I like how he thinks.
“Knock it off! You’re giving her ideas, and I don’t like it when she has ideas.”
“You sound like a 1940s husband slapping his wife back into the kitchen.”
“Hey, I’m nicer than that, but the last thing I want is a penis tattoo.”
Calvin grunted. “Don’t blame you.”
“All right, I’m gonna jet. I have some ravines to jump before I can get to Damian. Talk to you when we get back.”
“Yep, and be careful.”
“Always.” She scoffed. “Pandora and I are the picture of safety and caution. In fact, we should do a seminar for the other teams to show them the rules of hall monitoring.”
“Yeah, right. How about I just say, ‘keep your head on your shoulders?’”
“You got it. Firmly attached.”
Timothy sat at his desk, holding his forehead up with one hand, skimming through the information he’d found in the secret military database.
He had been excited at first, if for no other reason than because he had been able to hack a system everyone deemed unhackable.
But as he sat there skimming through email after email filled with political nonsense, bribery, outright crime, and a whole lot of extortion, it was all becoming less shiny and exciting.
Maybe he was fucking with you. You know how those military boys can be around gay people.
Oh, so it’s me, not his mean spirit.
That’s not what I said.
I don’t know, these guys run a pretty tight ship. If it were one of the plebes I’d say there was a chance, but the actual boss? I don’t see that happening. I’m sure there’s something in here that he knew about that needed to be found off the record. I just have to figure out what that is.
All I’m sayin’ is this place would run a lot smoother with a bunch of hot military babes running it.
You just want too... Hold up, what’s this?
Timothy sat up in his chair, having located an email about Katie. He skimmed through it and hacked the encryption on the attachment. He had found it! He’d found the information the sergeant had tipped him off about and it wasn’t good at all. Immediately his inner and outer hacker kicked in and he started to dig deeper. He wiped the sweat from his forehead, his body tensing with stress.
He couldn’t believe what he was reading.
He printed out copies of everything he could find on the topic and grabbed them from the printer, then logged out of the servers and sat back in his chair, taking a sip of his Mountain Dew and flipping through the pages. This was bigger than just one person.
There was an entire network, and they had painted a bullseye right between Katie’s eyes.
“I knew these bastards would never actually be allies. They can’t even control the people in their own group.”
He put the stack down and breathed deeply, trying to figure out the best course of action. He got up from the desk and walked over to the intercom. This wasn’t something he could keep to himself, not if he didn’t want to condemn Katie to a nasty death.
“Calvin, this is a code...uh... A code... Fuck it, just come down to IT, please. I got something you’re gonna want to see.”
He turned the intercom off and plopped back down in his chair, then put his hand to his chin and swiveled back and forth. Things had gone way past out of hand. Now not only did they have to worry about demons hunting them down, but their own people as well.
That was exactly why he wasn’t interested in being a mercenary; you couldn’t trust one damn person. Eventually, someone on the inside would betray you and you would never quite know who it might be.
Calvin walked into the room, shoving the tail end of a piece of pizza into his mouth and wiping his chin. “Whaf gon on?”
Timothy grimaced at the food displayed in his mouth when he spoke. “Charming.”
“What? You called it a ‘Code Fuck It’, so I figured I should rush down.”
“Yeah, yeah, and you were right to do so. I found some encrypted information in the military email servers.”
Calvin stopped his bite. “Is that legal?”
Timothy snorted. “Does that matter?”
Calvin shrugged. “Depends on what you found.”
Timothy handed him the stack of papers and crossed his arms over his chest. “Trust me, this was worth the break-in.”
Calvin looked at him worriedly and took the papers, his eyes growing wide as he read. “Holy shit.”
Katie got to the hotel and raised her eyebrows. Just what she needed; a scary-ass hotel to end her vacation.
She pulled up next to the van and took off her coat, spotting Damian and the three ghost hunters she recognized from one of her very first haunting calls with Damian.
She remembered it like it was yesterday. The bleeding walls, the laughing, the demon who grew so big he barely fit in the old house. That had been the first time Damian had realized she wasn’t like the others. That her demon was strong, and she was capable of so much more than most.
She got out of the truck and walked over to them, nodding at Damian. “Hey there. Everyone all right?”
Damian nodded. “You remember the ghost hunters?”
“I do.
How are ya?”
Everyone gave her a tight-lipped smile, trying to recover from the fear that had taken them over inside the hotel. Katie looked over at the old place: the shutters falling off, stains everywhere, and graffiti peppering the walls.
Katie pursed her lips. “Looks lovely. I hope they have room service.”
“Room service, yes, but not quite the kind you’re thinking.” Damian chuckled. “There were seven ghosts, all capable of physical harm. I took care of three of them, but the others may be a bit harder to convince. It took everything in me to get those three to leave, so I figured a little backup might be in order. You game?”
“Always.” Katie smiled.
Damian turned to the hunters. “Why don’t you guys sit this one out?”
John nodded and Katie and Damian headed back toward the front entrance.
In the shadows to the right of the door, unknown to Katie—or anyone else, for that matter—a man stood, watching them carefully. His long black trench coat camouflaged him, and his tanned skin and chiseled face gave him a wise and handsome appeal.
His hair was cropped short, the white so bright it almost glowed, and he wore dark sunglasses, even within the darkness of the corners and crevasses.
The two mercenaries walked into the hotel and stood in the entry, looking around. The walls were moldy, and the paint was chipped and peeling.
Katie took a deep breath and closed her eyes, trying to sense the ghosts. She figured it worked with demons, so why not spirits? At first she felt nothing, but after a moment a warm feeling bubbled inside her and began to grow stronger. She opened her eyes, the red light of her pupils illuminating the floor.
“They’re in the meeting room.” She whispered.
Katie took off toward the room before Damian could say anything. He ran behind her, catching up as she burst through the old doors, and they almost ran into the four angry and writhing ghosts. She tilted her head to the side and tapped her finger against her knife, knowing weapons wouldn’t work there. She didn’t know how to explain it, but it was like she understood what to do though no one had ever taught her, much like the ghost in the hotel in Los Angeles.
