tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-69496373489140627272024-02-18T23:06:13.401-08:00The Reaper's Case NotesThe Reaper's been sifting through his memories, hunting for what he really wants. Harvesting Earth's souls leaves him with little time to wield a pen in place of his iconic scythe. His demon bodyguard Ava Vasaga has got the magic and martial arts skills to defend him from thieves who want his scythe, but can she help The Reaper piece together the mysteries in his past? Hell would starve for souls and Earth would be flooded with them if they fail.Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.comBlogger46125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-3930742079849702292017-12-09T18:30:00.002-08:002018-02-11T19:22:23.359-08:00Final Episode - Cycle Seen, Cycle Reaped.<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIP5gkGteITLDf8cCOfZCinc7MkyfdR-KKOggYs-qUWrHsaM8eYwRIBWLDpbdJRu8LmgsE6kmmq3gywzUm3cVUTwsj90kVaID6i2IRJXwV_xK1bM2MwGIke3f9p07ArixBPJXYiLlF_rs/s1600/Finale.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIP5gkGteITLDf8cCOfZCinc7MkyfdR-KKOggYs-qUWrHsaM8eYwRIBWLDpbdJRu8LmgsE6kmmq3gywzUm3cVUTwsj90kVaID6i2IRJXwV_xK1bM2MwGIke3f9p07ArixBPJXYiLlF_rs/s320/Finale.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Finale In Chibi by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
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<span class="s1">Nia leaned on the bar and eyed me through a drape of dark hair. “Well you obviously stopped the Cuban Missile Crisis. Earth hasn’t had a nuclear war yet, and it’s twenty-fifteen. I’d say we’re blessed that you and The Reaper are still kicking.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I put the pencil down, not bothering with finishing this last Case Note. Dim light smudged the smoky interior of The Down South Lounge, but I could still see The Reaper sitting on the stool to my left. He’d taken his hood down and was rubbing his skull between the horns, dark bones scraping against each other and sending gooseflesh up my arms. Sharp mixes of liquor lingered on my tongue. Those shots of Styx Comfort should have burned warm in my stomach instead of congealing. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“You’re anxious, Ava,” Nia said. “Come on. I’m an angel. You can tell me what’s on your mind.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“The Coalition just destroyed Reap’s office and all the writings,” I said, exasperated. “We only have Avarice’s disembodied horns as proof of her attack on The Soul Fountains. Apathy and the rest of The Coalition could spit b.s. and continue engineering another global disaster here in the present.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Ruffling her wing feathers, Nia said, “You’ll be there to stop that one too.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Pride survived,” I blurted. “We stopped all the bombs. We did our duty. The VGA dismantled them all and humankind still thinks that no warhead even got launched.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper pounded an open palm on the bar and rasped, “No matter what we do, the cycle repeats itself. I harvest souls every hour of the day. We produce millions of motes despite distraction and organized hostility. We succeed in defending The Soul Fountains and the mote system, yet The Coalition’s resources grow. Every effort we make to break the cycle is snuffed or shoved to the back burner when another Earthly disaster springs up.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia laid a hand on Reap’s radius and ulna. “You and Ava are doing the right thing. The best thing. Heaven and Hell survive because of you.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Are we?” I blurted. “The Coalition keeps gaining flocks of demon supporters. Every step ahead is actually a step backward. If we’re so right, where’s the support from the Seraphs? If we help so much, where are the demons jumping up to make The Three Domains better? We need to build a better system, but dammit, there isn’t time.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia shook her head. “I’m confused. You got most of what you wanted. Those Case Notes, the rumors you spread. You ended a ginormous threat when you killed Avarice.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Yeah, and tomorrow we’ve got a double shift of harvesting on <i>top </i>of answering the Seraphs’ questions about the attack at Reap’s office.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Did you expect The Three Domains to change overnight?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“No, but you’d think each success would bring us a <i>little </i>help at least.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Shoving his stool back, The Reaper stood and hovered three feet in the air. He paced back and forth between the pool tables and the bar. “How do demons respond to threats?”</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“What?” I said, kicking off of my barstool and flapping along beside him.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“How do they respond to the possibility of losing all they have?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“All the demons I know kill the threat. They’re violent by nature and they don’t question that violence. Lashing out is their reflex and their defense.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That means every death gets back to the friends of those who died.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Then the murder cycle begins anew. I kill you, your friends kill me, my friends kill your friends, and so on.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>We flew round and round the Lounge, barely noticing the arcade, the flatscreens, and the standing room tables passing alongside and beneath us. The Reaper’s robes fluttered, and I could only half-see his ram-horned skull in the dimness. He rumbled, “That is a lot of knowledge for one demon to gather simply to exact revenge. What if someone wanted their plans to remain hidden?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“What, you mean like Apathy? He’s still pulling The Pneuma Coalition’s strings. He’ll probably come for us next.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Would a mastermind like Apathy generate countless distractions that benefit him no matter the result?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Bahaha. Apathy’s the laziest among them.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I disagree. He has exerted the least effort <i>publicly</i>, but I suspect that he is cooking dozens of plots <i>privately</i>.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Thoughts of Apathy’s interests sprang to mind. While we wrote those Case Notes, I remembered that he was the only Septuplet who had a wide range of interests. He liked things as simple as the radio, and he set his sights on things as huge as nuclear war. He’d even tried to make off with The Reaper’s scythe, Seversoul.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper went on. “Have you ever heard the expression, ‘three can keep a secret if two are dead?’“</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Heh, that’s demon nature right there.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Remove the ‘dead’ part and what do you have?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Um, three can keep a secret if two forgot it?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap cackled. “Yes, but no. I ask for personal reasons only. At least right now. You and I will make sure The Soul Fountains keep flowing whether we unearth the truth or not. We will initiate plans to ah, streamline the harvesting process.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I didn’t think learning to kick more ass could be called, ‘streamlining.’”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He tilted his skull down at me like he was eyeing me over glasses. “The Soul Fountains will need more assistance as well. Perhaps your angelic man-toy can help with that. I must return to Fountainia and work with the Seraphs. They may require several days of convincing before they believe we are not the problem.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“How are you going to do that <i>and </i>harvest?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Another being is in charge, remember? I am number two in this organization.” The Reaper put his hood back up and hovered for the door. “I am glad I forgave you, Avaline. Forgiveness is either a strength or a weakness. Forgive the right person, and you will share undying loyalty. Forgive the wrong one, and they will use it as an excuse to walk all over you. Don’t be the latter.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>With his scythe gripped tight, Reap shoved the front doors open and flew out into the reddening New Purgatory night. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>When the doors clanged shut, I inhaled the sulfur and spilled beer scents that had wafted in from outside. Puffs of Nia’s perfume and the suede that covered The Lounge’s stools joined in. Looking over one shoulder, I watched as my best friend the bartender angel sauntered toward me. Her wings and halo were brighter than the flickering flatscreens and neon lights lining the bar’s walls. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Home. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia sipped juice from a wineglass and dried her hand on her pink Lounge top. “Did you two find what you were looking for? I helped as much as I could.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Shrugging, I straightened my blazer and wriggled away from the wire poking me under the button-down. “Everyone forgets history. Either history didn’t impact them on a personal level, or they don’t have time to read up on it so they can learn from it.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“History’s the best education there is.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“It feels like a bunch of things have screwed the population out of that education.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She threw back the rest of the juice. “Everyone in The Three Domains, or just angels and demons?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I grimaced. “Everyone. Work makes us too busy to think about it. TV shows and hours of chores act like blinders, and yet we choose them over making a big change. I bet that’s one reason that so many demons choose The Coalition over us.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Passions for things that only result in benefit for one person eat up everyone’s time.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“And most of the time, they let their hunger consume them.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“No one teams up anymore.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I quirked an eyebrow. “That’s because backstabby angels fall quick, and the demons get smoked even faster.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia glanced behind her at something in the shadowed upper corners of the Lounge. “Yet I keep getting regulars that aren’t dead.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“If they just ignored all the bullshit, they could team up and fight back to build a better system.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“They make some pretty tasty b.s. these days. Hard to stop eating it.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I did,” I blurted. “Because the mote system is the best thing we’ve got for Hell and Heaven. The Soul Fountains <i>are </i>the mote system. They could go down through brute force, in-fighting, or making the important ones forget.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My feet carried me from the doors all the way to the bar and back without me noticing. “Did The Reaper mean there’s someone out there who knows important beings and has the magic to delete memories? All it would take is one spy with a brain to wreck The Soul Fountains and all three Domains. Mass distraction would do most of the work for them. If anyone existed who remembered a better way, they’d be a threat to that spy.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia followed, her footsteps lighter than mine. “You’re saying The Coalition designed demonkind’s obedience to their cause?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I nodded. “<i>Anything </i>could become ‘how society works’ with enough brainwashing.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Or memory surgery.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Could be that Apathy and The Coalition are good at more than wrecking Earth’s shit.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Nia's smile stretched and lingered. “Has The Reaper made you a tin foil hat to go with this paranoia?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Shaking my head to clear it, I said, “No. Reap’s onto something else now. Brainwashing is effective, but not half-of-Hell effective.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia nudged me with a wing. “Engineered ignorance is huge. It’ll take forgiveness and honesty to pull a veil this big off everyone’s eyes.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I smirked and whipped out my Blood Magic folio. “And unwavering teamwork. We should hurry and start this before the next harvest.”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-44457179265497166112017-12-02T08:28:00.002-08:002018-02-11T19:22:09.661-08:00Case 15 - Ep. 3: Souls By Fire<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaol6AhdLbAAmeX4Yl2Y1mL3Wfz8Nf2asGSQ7oUVr5qccruqogeh410kHQ9zI4_oBElcT9Qd46nmdT75GDsNJsErIg3Xy9Px0j64OWhP1CLTNDB6wU5KGpMwZ2Bd_WOdQyZEr-yUQEjN8/s1600/Hail+Mary+GIF+4.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="837" data-original-width="966" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaol6AhdLbAAmeX4Yl2Y1mL3Wfz8Nf2asGSQ7oUVr5qccruqogeh410kHQ9zI4_oBElcT9Qd46nmdT75GDsNJsErIg3Xy9Px0j64OWhP1CLTNDB6wU5KGpMwZ2Bd_WOdQyZEr-yUQEjN8/s320/Hail+Mary+GIF+4.gif" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Reaper's Mercy by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span class="s1">Haloxite, starvation, and oxygen deprivation. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Each will kill a demon just as dead as the others.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Over the decades of fighting against my ex-boss Avarice, she had stabbed me, and I’d recovered.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She and her fallen angel Jack had trapped me until I nearly starved for life force, and I’d escaped.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>With Avarice’s bola around my neck, I’d choke until nothing was left of me but smoke.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I pounded air with both wings and soared over the Florida Straits while I still had the strength. Half the Volunteer Guardian Angels with me and The Reaper were miles back, dismantling the nuclear warhead they’d just caught with their heavenly spells. The other half was plummeting to the water’s surface below, courtesy of Avarice’s conjured bolas. The four Septuplets flying in formation behind us each escorted another atom bomb toward unknown destinations. This Cuban Missile Crisis on Earth would get so hot it could wipe out humanity-and Hell’s and Heaven’s crop of souls-if even one bomb struck a city.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Good thing I was bleeding.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I slapped my left hand to the bola choking me and got blood on the rope. With a yank, the unguided Blood Magic tore it apart and the whole thing dropped away. Thin air rushed into my nose and I breathed it deep, then I swooped in a sideways U and reached The Reaper’s side. I knew Avarice was riding my ass the whole way, so I shouted at Reap, “Nukes first.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He was already a step ahead of me. Ripping his hood off, The Reaper spun his scythe between bony hands and pelted toward the bomb rocketing along on our right. My current boss knew that if these bombs went off, he’d be out of a job harvesting souls once they ran out. He arced around Voracity and the bomb the Septuplet was escorting. Three demons unfurled their wings from their hiding spots on the back end of the warhead, but I didn’t have time to help Reap wax them. His nightmare of a visage and his Hellblessed scythe would have to be enough.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I dove for his discarded hood and snatched it in my left hand. Once I had the cloth gripped tight, Avarice smashed into me right between the shoulder blades. She blanketed me with both her wings and both arms. We fell like meteors toward the waters beneath the battle. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Anything Avarice managed to scream at me got lost in the wind rushing through my ears, hair, and jacket. My panicked reaction stirred her blood and she barked with laughter. Bitch probably thought I was terrified of another trap like this because she’d gotten me before. I reached back at a crooked angle, scratched my left hand against her wing scales on the inside, then fired up a surge of Blood Magic. The unguided spell cost me more blood than usual since I smeared her whole wing, but it was worth the dizziness.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She pirouetted away from me like a whirlygig in a tornado, completely unable to flap her left wing with the Blood Magic shoving against it. I seized the energy I had left before I got too lightheaded to fly. Looping downward, I shoved the blood-soaked hood I still carried onto her head and squeaked out a tiny unguided spell. The Blood Magic wrenched her head left and right, piling on the vertigo better than a spinning teacup roller coaster with a three drink minimum. A dozen weapons and implements appeared in her hands while she tumbled. Soliduction was a crazy-good power in a war zone as long as one had the capacity to use it. She didn’t now.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>With Avarice out of the fight, I whirled in the air and flapped drunkenly for half a minute. The four bombs were below me, then above, then below again. Sunspots skidded across my vision until I caught my breath and the sky stopped spinning. The Reaper was cackling madly fifty feet above, where severed demon wings and bursts of smoke littered the cloudscape. Moments ago, the sky had been clear. They’d flown into a cloud bank while I was dizzy.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I pumped my wings and flopped sideways when the world lurched again. The cloud was the only skymark close enough to orient on. I focused on it and clung to the knowledge that forward was forward no matter where the ocean and sky were. After an hour-long minute, we left the cloud behind and the quadri-bombs were a hundred feet ahead of me. They’d gained sky while I reeled.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>By the time the ground went down where it belonged, The Reaper was chasing Voracity away from the bomb on my right. A few dozen VGA angels caught up to us from the first warhead once Voracity had dipped. They circled the back end and worked their heavenly hoodoo. Bomb number two was safe, and no one among The Coalition bothered deserting their own can-o’-death to save that one. That told me Jack, Apathy, and Pride’s goal was to make sure at least one bomb annihilated its target.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Three left.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Apathy watched the clash around the next bomb on the right from behind a wall of Coalition demons that appeared to hear his every word despite flying hard. Our naked demon friends from the Make-A-Sin Foundation didn’t have a scratch among them. They whittled Apathy’s guards down one by one with haloxite blades. Guess they weren’t great fighters. Apathy himself vamoosed sometime during the fighting, go figure.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Blue-head and Jackhole were duking it out in the airspace above bomb number three. Every time Blue-head flung his fistful of motes at Jack, the fallen angel would dodge and open fire with a rifle he’d summoned to his hand from the bomb’s underside. I made sure to stay in the sun as I flew closer. Jack had strapped maybe thirty rifles to the bomb’s belly, and though I couldn’t hear him shouting over the wind, I knew those were French words he bellowed. It looked to me like they were both using some kind of magicks from Heaven, but all I knew of Heaven I’d learned from Nia, and she wasn’t combative. With each rifle shot, Blue-head lost sky until Jack forced him to fly in a loop to avoid a haloxite round. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack summoned two rifles to him and gripped one in each hand. Blue-head cut his loop short to avoid the first shot, but the second went off at the same time and caught Blue-head in his right wing. That hole in his wing joint was enough to send him packing. He wobbled while he retreated and even dropped some of his motes as he fled. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I had maybe one more spell in me before I lost so much blood I passed out. Pride was as good a martial artist as I was, and Jack had some number of rifles left. He summoned another one, took aim, and opened fire at the VGA angels who were trying to catch the two bombs that The Reaper and the naked demons had freed up. The round he fired was brimstone.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>It ripped through three or four angels. So did the next one, and the next. I seized the opening and pelted toward the fallen angel. Jack’s maniacal rage against his former brethren turned on me too late. I knocked away the next rifle he summoned with a forearm block and lowered my head. Both brimstone horns penetrated the protection from his haloxite noggin ring. One gouged a hole in Jack’s left cheek. The other scraped his halo and chipped a sliver out of the front.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He didn’t seem to notice anything at first; Jack countered the flying headbutt with an uppercut. That gave him enough sky to catch another rifle he summoned. Before he got the shot off, Reap blindsided him with a knee to the face. Jack screamed louder than the wind in our ears and flopped out of the fight with one hand clutching each cheekbone. I’d wounded the left side, and Reap had apparently crushed the bones beneath the right side with his ebon knee. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">That wasn’t supposed to be possible; halos protected angels and their fallen opposites from pain and harm the same way a demon’s horns protected us.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I let Jack fall and focused on the bombs. The Reaper swerved and circled his scythe blade around the nearest warhead’s outer shell. Every remaining rifle of Jack’s fell apart in two pieces. With that, the only threats left were Pride and the bombs themselves. A hundred angels finished halting the third of five bombs and flocked toward Jack’s and Pride’s deadly escorts. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Land coming up fast,” an angel belted out.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I squinted through the bright Atlantic sunlight and saw the gray-blue arc of islands dotting the ocean in the distance. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">The Florida Keys. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">If we were going to keep these last two bombs from detonating, we had less than two minutes to catch them.</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-64983121410262808552017-11-25T09:12:00.000-08:002018-02-11T19:22:00.799-08:00Case 15 - Ep. 2: Souls By Fire<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaol6AhdLbAAmeX4Yl2Y1mL3Wfz8Nf2asGSQ7oUVr5qccruqogeh410kHQ9zI4_oBElcT9Qd46nmdT75GDsNJsErIg3Xy9Px0j64OWhP1CLTNDB6wU5KGpMwZ2Bd_WOdQyZEr-yUQEjN8/s1600/Hail+Mary+GIF+4.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="837" data-original-width="966" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaol6AhdLbAAmeX4Yl2Y1mL3Wfz8Nf2asGSQ7oUVr5qccruqogeh410kHQ9zI4_oBElcT9Qd46nmdT75GDsNJsErIg3Xy9Px0j64OWhP1CLTNDB6wU5KGpMwZ2Bd_WOdQyZEr-yUQEjN8/s320/Hail+Mary+GIF+4.gif" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Reaper's Mercy by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Closing time at The Down South Lounge didn’t exist unless Nia said it did. When Apathy’s skyscraper night clubs shut down at 2am for clean up duty, the after-partiers left downtown New Purgatory and flocked here. Every demon living in the First Circle had spent motes and waged war on their livers at the bar where The Reaper and I now sat. None of the demons in any Circle could know how bad The Coalition had wrecked us.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>That’s why Reap and I used the last of his brimvisibility to sneak into The Lounge and ask Nia to clear the place out.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I watched Nia shoo a blue-haired grifter demon out with a pushy, “Get the heck out, please,” then downed half of my Sin and Tonic. I couldn’t even taste the alcohol, and the flatscreens behind the bar blaring their music videos sounded as flat as their sources. A paranoid glance around The Lounge showed me the warmly lit standing room tables, the dart booths behind them, the pool tables to my left, and the arcade way at the back. The glass reappeared when I set it on the bar’s polished wood and let go. Adrenaline still prickled in my veins from the fight at the Motery Center. Tonight, I needed shots.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper audibly slugged the rest of his Hallelujah Tequila, the full highball glass vanishing when he grabbed it and materializing empty. “We will appear to be even weaker after today. Prudence’s fall and our failed trap set us further behind. It sends the wrong message.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>When I heard the double doors snap closed, I shucked my torn blazer and let it fall to the floor and reappear. “Now we’ve both killed a Septuplet. I don’t think The Coalition will screw with us anytime soon.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia flapped behind the bar on vanilla wings and brushed her dark, crescent moon hair back with one hand. Then she squinted at the six barstools nearest her. “I could help a lot more if I could see you. Can’t you switch that brimvisibility off?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I shook my head.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia’s lips quirked up. “You’re shaking your head aren’t you?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Yeah,” I grumbled, kicking myself. “And no I can’t. Brimstone Chemistry isn’t like Blood Magic. Wait. You know that. You studied Haloxite Chemistry in college.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She bobbed her head and grinned wider. “I know. Good thing you’re invisible, or The Reaper might see how embarrassed you are.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I’m strung out, Nia. We both almost died and you’re being all devious and walking me into verbal traps.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia clapped a palm on her chest over her Down South Lounge top. “I am <i>not </i>devious. Looks like you need a refill.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Two shots this time. Phlegethon’s Kiss.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Ooh, the heavy stuff,” she breathed. “You better tell me what happened at work.” Nia whirled around and lifted a pink decanter off the top shelf, then giggled and put it back. “Whoops, that one’s too dangerous.” She snagged a bottle of Styx Comfort and two shot glasses with her hands, and a bottle of amaretto and an acetylene torch from beneath the bar with her wings.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>An exhausted laugh escaped me at the sight. Some weight whisked off of my mind as Nia juggled the bottles and the torch between pours. Either it was a miracle she didn’t spill any, or she had bar tending down to an exact magic. Flames flickered from both shots when she slid them toward me. My hand reappeared along with the rest of me when I reached for one, and The Reaper’s black bones shone once more from the stool next to me. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“You look like krapfen,” Nia said.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That’s a swear word,” I replied, downing a shot flames and all. Dual fires burned down my throat and I groaned, then smacked my lips. “It burns so sweet.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Krapfen is a German dessert, Avaline.” The Reaper rumbled. “No more tequila for me, thank you. With our Case Notes destroyed, we might as well update Niariel now while it’s fresh in our memories. I am sure she will listen to our account of the Cuban Missile Crisis before we have to return to Fountainia. Once we contact the SPD from there, Seraphs will arrive to document our stories, and that will take time.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia put the bottles back and tilted her halo at us. “All your writing’s gone?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“It is,” Reap said while I threw back shot number two. He steepled his finger bones. “Almost everything went to plan, save for the shot to The Soul Fountains’ reputation and the loss of the Case Notes.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia pouted a little, then hurried into the office behind the bar and emerged with a handful of loose leaf paper and a pencil. “Finish what you started, and I’ll help with the lost stuff. Now screw the taboos and tell me everything.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Amaretto lingered on my breath as I let it all out. I shared Reap’s two-week plan to suss out The Coalition’s leader. The way we lured Avarice to his office. How I’d ended her existence with Seversoul. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Just when I’d finished venting, Nia pushed the paper and pencil at me. She found my eyes and held them, her voice solemn. “It means so much that you worked up to telling us about your history with Avarice. I don’t think either of us will forget the day you told us. I know how long you suffered under her. That pain will stay there even though she’s dead. However you justified what you did as her bodyguard, don’t use that pain to justify another downward spiral. If you feel yourself slipping, you can fall back on us.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>It was probably a little more than the alcohol spreading its warmth from my chest outward. I smiled and twirled the pencil. “You’re such a cheeseball angel.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“And you wouldn’t have it any other way.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Damn right. So, the Cuban Missile Crisis.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia’s wings ruffled in excitement. “That’s one I haven’t heard yet. I thought I was your best friend.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">The Reaper cackled while I continued. “Avarice had just dropped Prudy a couple thousand feet out of the sky. . .”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-82085748660832536572017-11-18T10:59:00.002-08:002018-02-11T19:21:38.862-08:00Case 15 - Ep. 1: Souls By Fire<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGowcUoyuV-x3P1r0eLUg-RugN36dKlk6a7hu5HjFH6wCE1-PAa1qwjptgaqxJytWhgpaZNs_2up-jTeDviixtyuts89KU34SEB3aa-pHqFRNFvlnEHA-ymaVkM8vbJmQJlJP3zZ6hmpI/s1600/Hail+Mary+GIF+4.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="837" data-original-width="966" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGowcUoyuV-x3P1r0eLUg-RugN36dKlk6a7hu5HjFH6wCE1-PAa1qwjptgaqxJytWhgpaZNs_2up-jTeDviixtyuts89KU34SEB3aa-pHqFRNFvlnEHA-ymaVkM8vbJmQJlJP3zZ6hmpI/s320/Hail+Mary+GIF+4.gif" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Reaper's Mercy by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Glass imploded behind The Reaper and I pumped both wings and leapt backward by reflex. Grenade after grenade plunked down between Reap’s chair and the wrecked windows. Each one exploded within a second’s time. Over a hundred decibels slammed into my eardrums. All that stopped me from deafness and immolation was the physical protection my brimstone horns lent me.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Case Notes I’d been writing fluttered every which way. They crumbled to ash and joined the maelstrom of debris that had been Reap’s office seconds earlier. The flames and the splintered office furniture devoured everything in the room except the building’s supports. Flaming file cabinets blew outward through the office door to plunge thirteen stories where they’d crash and hopefully alert the Motery Center’s banker demons and usher angels.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Tangs of metal and burnt wood charred the air I managed to breath amid the heat and dust. I staggered backward when Avarice swooped into The Reaper’s office. Her hair was as messy as the runway dress and pumps she wore. The Septuplet conjured a pair of whips with her Soliduction power and searched for me and The Reaper. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">She wouldn’t find us. The Reaper had chugged a vial of brimvisibility and vanished as planned. We’d been expecting a Sunday ambush since we started writing down Reap’s incidents with The Coalition.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>After a century of duking it out with the spoiled satanic skank, I knew how Avarice fought. Conjure expendable weapons first, then remove the biggest threats in the confusion and save her favorite non-magic weapons for last. Thank goodness she couldn’t conjure haloxite or brimstone. Even the sins re-branded had limits.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I slunk back into the smoke and dust filling the room to obscure myself. Avarice swung a whip at random through the middle of the wrecked room. "Come on out here, traitor. Killing you will convince The Coalition that I was right."</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Was Avarice their leader if she had to convince them of anything?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Wrapping both wings tight at my back, I bent and drew the haloxite lancet pen I used for Blood Magic in place of my knife. I jabbed my thumb and crept to The Reaper’s burning office chair. Then I reached into the flames engulfing it to smear orange blood on the back. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Avarice’s eyes snapped my direction and she whirled both whips over her head. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">I surged the unguided Blood Magic before the blood started boiling and the chair shot toward her.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She batted the thing aside with a wing and screeched, "You would live through this day if you were still on my side."</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Fear of the past spurred the adrenaline into my veins faster than the threat of death did. I seized the only other object on the floor-The Reaper’s scythe-and raised the awkward thing in both hands.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Wings beating, I leapt toward her and threw out a flying side kick. The heavy weapon weighed me down enough for Avarice to lash both whips around my leg and hips. She wrenched them downward and I crashed, rolling through seared debris and smacking against the shattered window frames.</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
Seversoul tumbled like a wrecked helicopter blade toward The Soul Fountains below.</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Avarice dropped a whip and drew a haloxite switchblade from inside one of her pumps. "All seven of us raised you to be my partner, Avaline. We raised you. The Coalition."</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I arched my back and kipped up to my feet to take wing, but Avarice swept my legs out with the whip she’d kept hold of. "We cast The Convictionists down and adapted to Earth's metamorphosis. Why did you backstab us during The Industrial Revolution?"</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Flashes of conversations I had with Nia back then hit me and I spat, "I was a better bodyguard than you deserved."</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Her laugh was a banshee’s shriek. "You still fight and twist words rather than face what is true."</span></div>
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I twisted my hips and threw a leg sweep at her pumps. It whiffed by a foot. "What's true is I was never yours."</div>
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<span class="s1">Avarice spread her wings and snarled, "Everything you are belongs to us. Your ideas <i>and </i>your training."</span></div>
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"You chose to teach me. I took that and did what you <i>should </i>have."</div>
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"Heaven Law will never erase the human farms we set in motion. Demons need the life force from our tortured souls."</div>
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"They don't need the eternal backstabbing game you forced on them. Demons. Need. Hell."</div>
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Her giggle was iced sulfur. "Pride will be jealous that I murdered her former student."</div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My ex-boss pounded her wings and lashed the whip that bound me. She flung me up against the ceiling and let me drop to the floor in a heap. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">With that whip of hers, Avarice could keep me at a distance and no amount of martial arts would help. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Blood Magic was useless unless I bled on her whip. I could use that. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I shoved forward and reached for the leather weapon binding my leg. Avarice’s mocking laugh saturated the air while she beat her wings and ripped the whip upward. I smashed into the ceiling again and this time, Avarice readied the haloxite switchblade. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Flapping hard, I soared over her head and her knife slash missed my stomach by half a foot. Her enraged cry sounded like she’d taken a huge gut punch.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">I pounded air and flew out the office's wrecked wall. I cranked some unguided Blood Magic and summoned the scythe I’d bled on moments ago. Its haft snapped into my hands from thirteen stories down. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Avarice didn’t emerge to fight me, so I seized the chance and smeared blood along the back of the two-toned blade and on the bottom of the handle. I would spin the blade at her like a cartwheel of death if she came at me. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Cautiously, I flew closer to Reap’s burnt out office to find Avarice’s arms pinned to the floor by an unseen force.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I cheered at the mad image of The Reaper sitting on Avarice’s chest, unseen thanks to the brimvisibility vials I’d mixed up. In two flaps I was back in the office where the Septuplet writhed against Reap’s invisible weight. Her whips disappeared when she conjured grenades in both hands, but she couldn’t reach over to pull their pins. So he wasn’t sitting on her chest. He was standing on each wrist with his legs spread.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Avarice writhed and twisted her legs and wings. “Avaline! I’m gonna tell The Reaper everything. I'll smoke you for what you did to us. You will be a jobless washout again.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper’s snarl was a landslide. “Your threats are as empty as you.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Wh--what spell is this? Blood Magic? Incantation?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>A scraping sounded from the floor. That haloxite switchblade Avarice dropped vanished. The Reaper rasped, “Ava told me everything herself, you husk of a bitch. I did something no being from Hell would expect. I forgave her.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“The Coalition will own the Three Domains. We will not st--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>A gaping wound sliced open Avarice’s ribcage and she screamed. Orange blood poured from the flesh and pale white ribs parted like curtains. Heavy bones clacking against the floor told me The Reaper had stepped off of Avarice’s body. Hefting the scythe, I brought it down like a sledgehammer on Avarice’s chest.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Smoke gushed outward from the corpse and Avarice’s body disappeared. While the smog remained, the glowing white life force siphoned into the scythe’s blade like she was just another soul we’d harvested. Her brimstone horns thunked to the floor and I picked them up. They were the only evidence that anyone from The Coalition had acted out against The Soul Fountains. Not that one being’s horns were enough proof that The Coalition had decimated Heaven Law. Without the Case Notes intact, they could claim murder, or tragic accident, or some other bs. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Magic made it way too easy to cover up a crime.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Dozens of wingbeats pounded the air behind me and I spun around. Motery Center demons and angels surrounded the thirteenth floor where I stood in plain view with The Reaper’s bloody scythe gripped tight. I didn’t know how much of the fight they’d seen, but I knew better than to let the adrenaline from the fight control me, so I stood tall and faced the flying crowd. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Waving both wings, I stepped aside to let Soul Fountains staff into the office. Some talked of calling the SPD, others spoke of an internal vendetta against The Reaper. The majority fell into asking me questions, piecing together the rumors from the past two weeks with the sudden explosions and raining debris that Avarice’s attack caused.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Amid the chaos of bringing order to the scene, The Reaper’s disembodied voice rumbled one word into my ear. “Lounge.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>An invisible hand took one of mine off the scythe and placed a vial into it. Brimvisibility.</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-78480384610852032742017-11-11T09:17:00.003-08:002018-02-11T19:21:27.347-08:00Case 14 - Ep. 3: Engineered Starvation<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc_UXOSCptOs5nh5mzD0wvK62bPH1fShy6zI6miMpYZQAkbHlxHuy0yF2HT8fbVqePOfcC72Jk_Ia-wlehR-VbfQ8Esi0UBc5PF7ACFAEzT2_aVbvqbMNXw5LKiI3AfhpTWjGtHlJR4ak/s1600/We%2527re+fucked.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc_UXOSCptOs5nh5mzD0wvK62bPH1fShy6zI6miMpYZQAkbHlxHuy0yF2HT8fbVqePOfcC72Jk_Ia-wlehR-VbfQ8Esi0UBc5PF7ACFAEzT2_aVbvqbMNXw5LKiI3AfhpTWjGtHlJR4ak/s320/We%2527re+fucked.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">How F'd Are We by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
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<span class="s1">“Do you want to tell them we’re fucked, or should I?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I brushed sand off my cerulean admiral’s jacket and waited for Prudence’s response. The Reaper’s other bodyguard tied her long brown hair up and pushed past me with her honey-gold wings. She strode across the Cuban beach toward the Volunteer Guardian Angels I’d been training with moments ago. Prudy’s deep blue dress and sandals lent her a stiff movie-starlet image that she hadn’t exuded until recently. She might be one of the Lucky Seven, but her white collar powers and full-moon halo weren’t free passes to trample on others.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Her ugly mood and my blood loss would help us stop a nuclear missile strike. Yep, they sure would. Time to fake it like we weren’t underprepared and exhausted.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Breathing the salty ocean air wasn’t enough to calm my nerves. A last check of the weapons and the Blood Magic folios under my jacket helped more. I waved The Reaper over and crossed to the front of a company of a hundred demons from the Make A Sin Foundation awaiting us on the beachfront. Sand slid and squished beneath my haloxite-toed boots. The sun slathered us with so much heat I was surprised Reap wasn’t melting under that heavy brown robe.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Towering over me by a foot and a quarter, he pointed his brimstone-and-haloxite scythe skyward in one bony fist. His voice was a bone-on-bone bullhorn. “A bomb that would destroy the humans whose souls we harvest could launch into the sky above us. If that occurs, more could follow. It is our responsibility to prevent this. If you stand here with us Fountainians, then you believe in The Soul Fountains and what we do for all three Domains. For Hell to have a future, we must infiltrate Cuban bunkers and watch the skies for nuclear missiles. Are you prepared?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>One blue-haired demon called out to The Reaper. “We have brimstone horns, big guy. An atom bomb wouldn’t even tickle us.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper’s voice was a cat-o-nine-tails. “Do you <i>want </i>humanity to nuke itself to death?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>On any other day, I’d be proud of Reap’s sarcasm. Speeches like that might set some of these demons off today, so I stepped up and announced, “We are all demons here. We’re the superior ones. You want to prove it? Then stop the men in this missile crisis from doing something that your inferiors chose to ignore. The SPD is ignoring this and so are all the demons that didn’t show up today.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Blue-head blurted, “Maybe I like the idea of not having to work for my life force. That’s what The Coalition’s all about. They want abundance, and you want everyone to starve so that a select few can hoard the life force. Why not let the war happen? Free life force for all of us.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Spots flared red in my vision and I almost pounced at the blue haired demon. What, was this guy the ringleader? Maybe he was Coalition, and maybe he didn’t know any better than to toss insults. I’d already assumed The Coalition had something to do with this global tension, especially after Reap and I discovered their underground human towns during The Korean War. It looked like none of these demons knew that. Arguing the opposite point would just turn the demons against each other and against us.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Calm washed through me and I put a hand on my hip. “An all-you-can-eat buffet this year means no life force next year. Think of humans as crops if you have to. We still need to keep growing them.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Naked, armed, and crazy, the demons murmured and actually nodded their agreements. Blue-head tilted his horns sideways. “Guess that makes sense. We can’t exactly eat happy thoughts.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper cackled and all the Foundation demons flinched. Hundreds of angel wings fluttered in sync behind me, peppering us with sand. Fear needled every inch of my skin and I searched the skies overhead. A single dot rocketed upward from Cuba’s mainland, and Prudence led the Volunteer Guardian Angels in a webwork formation straight up into the bomb’s path.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I tasted dust when I shouted, “Live nuke overhead. Demons, hit all the Cuban bases you can find and kill the humans in charge of launching bombs. It's your job to prevent more launches. Reap, stay with the VGA or with me or Prudence. Blue-head and the naked ones, with me.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>At that, I launched skyward and re-opened the scab on my left hand with a haloxite knife off my belt. I checked behind me and found everyone was flying along in a loose cloud. Dozens of demons slugged vials, spun inland, and vanished from sight. A handful of full-frontal demons flapped closer, and the blue-haired demon opened his hand. Scarlet and white motes darted away from his palm and formed a bi-colored halo over his head, the coins spinning in a ring around his horns. He yelled, “Gonna cuddle me a bomb today.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I didn’t have time to snicker. We were three-quarters of the way to the bomb when I noticed four more streaking along in a line behind the first. The VGA was already swooping around the first missile and slowing it to a stop. I recognized the Septuplet that was clashing with Prudence in mid-air alongside the first warhead’s flight path. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>It was Avarice. Her expensive hairstyle and pin-up girl’s uniform wasn’t made for fighting. The former tangled in her face and the latter tore a little every time she flapped her wings to dodge Prudy’s telekinetic blows. I hadn’t seen her cut loose with her white collar super power since The Battle Of Amiens. Dozens of broken, jagged, and half-sheared haloxite bayonets swirled around Prudence’s body in a spherical cloud. Pair after pair lanced out, missed Avarice, and returned to the sphere as she flew.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Only the seven virtues embodied and the seven sins re-branded had abilities, and only Avarice and her Soliduction power could gain airspace on one of The Lucky Seven. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Avarice conjured an oversize bola in one hand and slung it at Prudence. She cut the flailing weapon out of the sky with one of her bayonets. More bolas appeared in Avarice’s hands. With each manic sling, she got closer to entangling Prudence.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She and I knew that traps were more dangerous to demons and angels than brimstone or haloxite. Prudence pumped her wings hard, staying close enough to the streaking bomb so Avarice couldn’t stop the VGA from catching it. An explosion now wouldn’t serve The Coalition, and Avarice knew it. A pair of Prudy's bayonets circled behind Avarice for a psychic backstabbing. Avarice shot toward Prudy and heaved two bolas into the open space in her sphere. <span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Ropes wrapped around my colleague’s wings and legs. They cinched tight. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Avarice conjured bola after bola and unleashed them at Prudence. Every time she sliced a rope free with her bayonets, she shredded her dress more and took two or three more bolas to the body. In moments, she was a mummified pincushion plummeting to the ocean’s surface thousands of feet below.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My pissed-off shouts did less than Prudy’s falling bayonets. She tried harrying Avarice with them, but the farther Prudy fell, the more the haloxite weapons became a danger to me and the Foundation demons following behind me. She wasn’t as experienced at escaping immediate traps like I was. It probably never occurred to her to try anything but slaying her original target.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap switched his grip on his scythe and tried to shoot forward, but I seized his robe and bellowed, “Stop. Avarice will trap you too.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Before I could nab a picture from my folio, Avarice surged straight at the VGA flock. Soliduction wreaked chaos among them; every second it took us to catch up was another bunch of thrown bolas binding more angels’ wings to their sides. They flopped out of the air and plunged after Prudy’s form.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I caught up to Avarice first, snagged the bola she flung at me in my bleeding left hand, and hurled it back at her with an unguided surge of Blood Magic.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper shrieked behind me and I wrenched my eyes away from Avarice before the bola connected. I focused on Reap long enough to catch the words, “--Konos and more Septuplets. One with each bomb.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My eyes found a being escorting each of the four warheads following the first.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">So I didn't see as the bola cinched off my windpipe and wrenched itself too tight to yank off.</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-30305128242499569242017-11-04T09:57:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:21:15.055-08:00Case 14 - Ep. 2: Engineered Starvation<div class="p1">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc_UXOSCptOs5nh5mzD0wvK62bPH1fShy6zI6miMpYZQAkbHlxHuy0yF2HT8fbVqePOfcC72Jk_Ia-wlehR-VbfQ8Esi0UBc5PF7ACFAEzT2_aVbvqbMNXw5LKiI3AfhpTWjGtHlJR4ak/s1600/We%2527re+fucked.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc_UXOSCptOs5nh5mzD0wvK62bPH1fShy6zI6miMpYZQAkbHlxHuy0yF2HT8fbVqePOfcC72Jk_Ia-wlehR-VbfQ8Esi0UBc5PF7ACFAEzT2_aVbvqbMNXw5LKiI3AfhpTWjGtHlJR4ak/s320/We%2527re+fucked.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">How F'd Are We? by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
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<span class="s1">Demon that I am, my trips to Heaven were next to nil until the 1960s. All I knew of angelkind was from the north side of Fountainia. Angels could construct wondrous temples, ziggurat offices, and cumulus cafes if you were into that kind of thing. Whenever mankind needed saving from a disaster-in-progress like the Cuban Missile Crisis, angels and their magic got shit accomplished.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>The sun blared its white light onto the Florida Straits a thousand feet below. Salt tang crusted the air and I tasted the grit with each ragged breath. The Reaper gripped his scythe and flew at a fast clip ahead of me. I beat my wings in an hour-long back-and-forth to keep an eye on him and crank out Blood Magic for the flock of angels following us. Blood crusted both palms. It stuck to my forearms in orange runnels under the Hades Watch and the white-lined cerulean admiral’s jacket I wore. The haloxite knife I’d used to draw that blood was one of a dozen belted to my hip with a thick belt and holsters beneath the jacket.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I slung an empty tractor-trailer plastered with magazine ads at the hundreds of Volunteer Guardian Angels behind us. My magic, guided by the attached pages, made for a prop the size of a nuclear warhead that returned to me every time the Volunteer Guardian Angels caught it. Good practice for if a <i>real </i>warhead took flight, which damn well might happen today. For the past eighty-eight miles, they hadn’t let the rig touch water once. How they caught it was beyond me.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>One angel would fly straight for the back of the truck, circle it top-to-bottom, then flap aside for more angels to do the same. After fifty or so angels ringed around the big rig, it would slow down. After a couple hundred, the truck would freeze mid-air. Then I’d boomerang it back to myself and try the whole thing again over the next mile of ocean. Thanks to the magic, I even got to choose whether the Newtonian kickback affected me or not.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>What’s physics going to do, arrest me?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>The Reaper swooped in close once I flung the truck at the angels for the eighty-ninth time. “What did you use for pictures?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Boomerangs,” I replied. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Before the Fountainia sirens went off, you were rooting through toy store ads.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Where else was I going to find the right pictures?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“I am not sure. Weren’t boomerangs always children’s toys?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Two hundred angels looped the back end of the truck and stopped it dead in the air. Glancing behind me, I saw the Cuban shoreline and a hundred tiny winged figures standing in ranks with a familiar winged woman pacing among them. I flapped and faced The Reaper. “You should know. Reap, you’re so old that if you had wrinkles, <i>they’d </i>have wrinkles.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“It is rude to comment on a Reaper’s age.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Laughing, I summoned the big rig back to me with guided Blood Magic. A few of the boomerang ads had fluttered loose. One weakness of my magic: if the demon’s blood dried up, so did the spells. I wasn’t quite dizzy from blood loss yet, but this whole flight to Cuba combined with constantly re-attaching pictures took more out of me than The Battle Of Khalkin Gol did.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>As we descended on the beachfront, Reap shouted, “As soon as our boss knew the likelihood of an Earthly catastrophe, the Fountainia sirens went off. We responded within two minutes. Over two hundred VGA angels rendezvous’d with us in that time. Your hasty training regimen will serve us well in preventing nuclear war.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“And it’ll keep us in jobs,” I answered. “The VGA can catch one bomb, or slow down three long enough to stop detonation. If I did the math right.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Touching down in the surf, I dropped the truck next to us and cut the magic. The rig pounded down amid plumes of sand and salt water, creaking to a halt. A quick jacket check confirmed that yes, I was still armed to the horns. The inner pocket held two Blood Magic folios. A chest holster snagged at my breast, but it held a snub nosed pistol with one haloxite round within easy reach for drawing. A new pair of haloxite-powdered boots were laced to my feet. One fresh scarlet mote was tied into Nia’s bracelet on my wrist, and the Hades watch on the other wrist showed it was business o’clock.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>The feathered wings of the VGA fluttered behind me as The Reaper took the lead, marching toward the ranks of demons awaiting us. My best friend Nia had put in a call to the Make A Sin Foundation after I called her about the Fountainia sirens. The Foundation sent a hundred demons trained at Hell’s colleges in stealth and sabotage in war zones. Breathing the sea air deep, I strode up to the rows of demons and inspected their clothing, armaments, and magical objects of choice.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Some demons wore vials in pouches. Others had haloxite needles. A few stood naked with nothing on them but the wings on their backs and the horns on their heads. One blue-haired demon squeezed a fistful of red and white motes like a handful of candy he wouldn’t let anyone else have. If I didn’t absolutely trust Nia, I’d say she picked the crazy brigade to back us up. At least it seemed like none of them were Coalition spies. They liked to keep their followers close to starvation, which meant they’d have pounced at the mote I wore by now if they were here.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Prudence, one of Reap’s other bodyguards, emerged from the Foundation’s ranks. She was five-eleven, scowling, and her wings and full-moon halo were honey-gold. Everything else about her had changed in the past several decades. Prudy had grown her hair out in a long brown drape that fell down her back. A mote necklace similar to my bracelet dangled below her collarbone. The coin’s pale white aura set off the midnight blue of her business dress like a bleached skull on a velvet cushion.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Smiling at the demons, I gestured for The Reaper to continue inspecting. He did, and I took Prudy aside. “You look like a pissed-off mother.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>She nodded approvingly, her voice mellow but crisp. “Good. You look like a woman of authority for once.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“For once. Pfft. It’s better when I’m in charge, and I don’t need clothes for that.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Eyeing me up and down, she continued slower than before. “That jacket is far more commanding than your zoot suit. Are you ready for responsibility, or do you still insist on being the party girl in your off time?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I raised an eyebrow and hissed, “Who do you think you are talking to me like that?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“We Lucky Seven hone our powers to be sharper than any demon’s second rate magic. What do you do besides plunge The Reaper into trouble?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“We’ve escaped Coalition traps dozens of times.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“He is <i>never </i>in danger with me around.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“So you wouldn’t know how to get him <i>out</i> of danger. It’s okay. I forgive you, but I do expect you to learn from this mistake.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Before she could respond, I flapped to The Reaper’s side and kicked up sand when I landed. “Prudence has changed, Reap.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“She recently finished an Incantment that prevents recording devices from capturing images of demons and angels. For my safety, of course. She is exhausted and grumpy. She will handle herself if a nuclear weapon gets launched.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I made a mental note to dig up what Incantment was. Heaven magic, probably.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Warm winds whirled around the winged warriors gathered on the beach. The VGA behind us, the Make-A-Sinners ahead of us, and The Reaper and Prudence ready to give orders. I whipped out my folio and asked Reap, “When’s the SPD getting here?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“No sirens in Heaven,” The Reaper rumbled. “The Seraphs believe they watch over the biggest targets in the world, so they’ll already be there in the big cities when a missile approaches.”</span></div>
<br />
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">When Prudy approached us, I leaned into her space and whispered, “Do you want to tell them we’re fucked, or should I?”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-11525942212041472722017-10-28T09:26:00.001-07:002018-02-11T19:20:56.451-08:00Case 14 - Ep. 1: Engineered Starvation<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJuStiYEQ-9R9blBc8jRdJSyk7lFNjg58X83ZBdGLkzrxWPz3J7Ej-LQpZknCO812G93LtEfN0rUeRhA4X_f97edFZPJ863dhrFjAeVmch5bdhUMPDe94sLG6MqhDZjb46iCndf_sB8Kc/s1600/We%2527re+fucked.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJuStiYEQ-9R9blBc8jRdJSyk7lFNjg58X83ZBdGLkzrxWPz3J7Ej-LQpZknCO812G93LtEfN0rUeRhA4X_f97edFZPJ863dhrFjAeVmch5bdhUMPDe94sLG6MqhDZjb46iCndf_sB8Kc/s320/We%2527re+fucked.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">How F'd Are We? by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">The Reaper whispered like a gossipy schoolgirl from his carved office chair in the Motery Center. "The Korean War was when we learned the worst about The Pneuma Coalition. They kept soul farms hidden below the Earth in caverns.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“In that tone of voice," I murmured back, "I thought you'd be telling me who's having a workplace affair."</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Neither of us was even thinking of the Sunday harvest we’d just finished. I managed to forget the sweaty blazer and blouse clinging to me only because I smelled like I'd spent eight hours fighting demon thieves. The Soul Fountains were flowing like usual thirteen stories below us. Reap’s office was silent except for his phalanges drumming on his glass desktop. Firelight LEDs danced and shimmered overhead, lighting the brick room lined with file cabinets. Contressa could come in early for her bodyguard shift and I wouldn’t notice even if she screamed like a banshee. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Cackling, Reap went on. "We do not know if Avarice or Apathy is leading The Coalition. You live in New Purgatory, so you must fly past Apathy's keep on your way to work."</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
I nodded and fanned myself with my shirt. "It’s so like Apathy to set things up so he doesn’t have to do any work. Not that the SPD <i>could</i> act if we brought them these Case Notes for evidence. Ending a soul ring like The Coalition’s would take decades and thousands of angels ditching their duties to root them out.”</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper steepled his phalanges. "How well equipped are Apathy and Avarice?"</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I brushed back my scarlet hair. “Avarice owns Hell's version of Hollywood, and Apathy's slaves would do anything for him. The guy’s got a moat around his castle filled with motes. Full ones. And he’s got thousands of living humans stashed in caves in case of emergency. He's probably got even more souls than that.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“The word The Coalition seems focused on is, ‘emergency,’ “ Reap rasped. “If humanity drives itself into the ground, Apathy will have what everyone needs. If The Coalition engineers an Earthly emergency, Apathy will have what everyone needs.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Overwork and hunger clawed at my mind and stomach. The salt taste of Terrence’s warm skin under my tongue was <i>not </i>the distraction I needed right now. This morning with my angel with benefits had been the most explosive sex yet and--no, focus. Focus.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>No one from The Coalition had bitten on our bait. We’d made ourselves look weak and open for a sneak attack, yet no one had struck. Not Avarice. Not Pride. Not Voracity. Apathy wouldn’t come himself, the lazy-horns. But someone <i>had </i>broken in a few days ago and stolen one of our Case Notes only to put it back again as though nothing was out of place. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My body ached for more release. The mellow chill of a Moloch and Coke. That buzz combined with my angel with benefits’ tongue--</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“No, Ava,” I snapped at myself. “Think. What <i>can </i>we do with what we’ve learned?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper tilted his skull at me. “Are you asking me or yourself?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Look at Skully the Comedian over here,” I hissed. “What if The Coalition <i>knows </i>we're setting up this trap?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
"Because we did not spring it when the initial break-in occurred. We are waiting to hook bigger fish, and that is the deception."</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Avarice and Apathy have <i>got </i>to be the biggest fish. Apathy seemed interested in your scythe too. The future of his plans mattered more to him than a one-object fix. From what we know of him over the decades, he'd be too smart to rely completely that.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That is bizarre. We’ve repelled hundreds of demons intent on obtaining Seversoul. It would benefit The Coalition to try and steal it, but they have never made the attempt.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">"And why is that?"</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">"Because I am too--what is the phrase? Badass?"</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>We had a good chuckle at that. I didn’t want to think of the power The Coalition would have if they stole that scythe either. Reap lived in the Sixth Circle where there was nothing but roiling charcoal clouds, graveyards, and The Vault Cabins. He was so secluded that only myself, Contressa, and Prudence even knew where he lived. Good thing too. A being like The Reaper who could fly without wings, carried a scythe that absorbed souls, and had bones blacker than a tuxedo would attract tons of needy demons wanting favors.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Raising a finger, I poked the air with each thought. “Apathy commented on your memory during the Korean War.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That matters not.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Terrence can’t do crap to get the SPD on our side without dozens of eyewitnesses.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That’s your man-toy’s name?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Prudence developed that GlassEye spell or whatever you called it to stop cameras from seeing us.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That was before her fall, and is not even relevant here. The Coalition will set off our trap today, and I have brimvisibility ready when they do.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I stabbed that finger down on the glass and cracked it with a nail. “Maybe we should take Prudence’s fall more seriously. Why did Prudy fall <i>recently? </i>Why didn’t she fall when she designed a spell that blocks <i>all cameras on Earth</i> from seeing demons or angels? Anything that benefits The Coalition is enough to get most angels to fall, and then they join up.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">I let the subtext hang there like B.O. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Avaline,” The Reaper rasped. “We bought time with a double shift Friday. Jack Te-Konos and The Coalition interfered in Nepal and New York this week. The headway we have made is already gone. We released Hildariel from duties as my bodyguard, and that means another double shift after today. We have baited the trap as sweetly as we could. If The Coalition will meander into it, today will be the day. You can ponder the fallen virtue later.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">He was already calling Prudy, 'the fallen virtue.' </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack’s words from decades ago echoed in my head. We <i>were </i>about to be flying around in a hurricane whether this plan worked or not. I hissed, "The Coalition already engineered one disaster on Earth, and that was the Cuban Missile Crisis. They’re taking advantage of today’s disasters to engineer another one. I know Avarice. I know Pride. If they pull another Missile Crisis off and we can't stop it, Earth won’t be around in 2016 for us to harvest from anymore."</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
Reap ground his teeth. "Then you should speak with your man-toy soon and get us help from the SPD."</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
"Good idea, but not enough. We need to do more. If I was going to build a better system for harvesting souls than The Coalition’s, I’d need more time." I flexed both wings to try and vent off some of the frustration seething in me. "What if they don’t bite? What if they <i>let </i>us waste all this time?”</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
"Focus on tomorrow's disasters tomorrow. The Cuban Missile Crisis is The Coalition's biggest violation of Heaven Law. We were there in anticipation of a soul harvest so massive we called in the Volunteer Guardian Angels <i>and </i>the Make A Sin Foundation. Write this down, quickly and have faith in my plans. We may need to spring the trap and fight for our lives at any time.”</div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-54624079070763427762017-10-21T10:38:00.002-07:002018-02-11T19:20:44.527-08:00Case 13 - Ep. 3: Brimvisibility<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8noTx-tTgug5Xo5ZDwJ-jdSvVTehIAbYCUD2hnkK6pDmYhZ2RqN9NpG-v5KtF56Nng9oa1O7jn6tH2MxOz4zWls0_B2FyDfF7wWREkr-T7JAEBLJh_IcFBi_k7DOlC1xsTtrHG1xBAHA/s1600/Soul+Fountains.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8noTx-tTgug5Xo5ZDwJ-jdSvVTehIAbYCUD2hnkK6pDmYhZ2RqN9NpG-v5KtF56Nng9oa1O7jn6tH2MxOz4zWls0_B2FyDfF7wWREkr-T7JAEBLJh_IcFBi_k7DOlC1xsTtrHG1xBAHA/s320/Soul+Fountains.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Soul Fountains Schemes by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">It might be ridiculous to say I was flying away from a weaponized door, but when your attacker was a fallen angel who’d carved spells into the wood, that door became a demon trap. I pumped both wings and looped behind the door, then slapped one bleeding hand to the carved-out word on the back and flared some unguided Blood Magic. It splintered and tumbled to the ground where The Reaper was slashing away at tin roof slabs pelting him from the rapidly disappearing shed. Souls still swirled around the tools and equipment mounded up in the rice paddy’s lone shed where a well-sized hole in the ground emanated crimson light.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Every reason for Jack and The Coalition to hole up here in Korea on the 38th parallel hit me. They were building underground soul caches against both Heaven Law <i>and </i>The Soul Fountains.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Then Jack Te-Konos spear-tackled me in the chest halo-first.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Hot bruises welled up under the skin and I cried out, reeling at the dense pain radiating through my right breast. The agony sank deep under the ribs and wouldn’t let up. Flapping at random to escape made it worse and a scream tore out from my windpipe as soon as I could catch a breath. We plummeted to the dirt and rolled among American and Korean corpses, dust and rank fluids caking to our clothes and wings.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Gasping, I shoved myself up with both bloody palms only to have a blazer that was half-slashed to ribbons shove itself over both shoulders. The sleeves scissored my weight from under me and I face-planted in the muck, the pain re-doubling. </span>He’d turned his freaking <i>blazer </i>into a trap with the same magic he’d used on the shack. Both slashed sleeves slid over my own blazer and the whole garment shoved downward, pinning me from neck to hips. </div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
I flapped and snarled, then craned around to find Jack standing over me with the haloxite knife I’d been carrying pointed straight at me in his left hand. I surged the Blood Magic and the unguided spell ripped the arm from Jack’s ruffed shirt. He’d cleaned my blood off the knife with his sleeve while I’d been cringing in pain. It was a sign of how much he’d blindsided me. I’d forgotten fallen angels couldn’t be hurt with haloxite. </div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
It took the brimstone of a demon’s horns to do that.</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Wriggling both wrists underneath me, I spat, “You’re making underground soul stashes you fangel bastard.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Ava,” Jack scolded, walking around in front of me. “I thought you had more class than to use that word.” He took out a comb with his right hand and ran it through his ink black hair. “Fallen angels are rebellious leaders. We’re more worthy of the term ‘angel’ than the actual angels are.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“You think you’re the one in control,” I grunted, still squirming. “You’ve just handed your leash to someone else besides The Big Man Upstairs.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I’ve heard He doesn’t like being equated with men. You know, I’m the only one of us who’s actually seen Heaven, so I ought to know. My proud support of The Coalition goes back decades, remember?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Brainless dogs like you will lick any master’s shoes.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He dangled the haloxite knife over my head. “You’re just mad because if humanity keeps going the way it’s going, you’ll starve just like you almost did during The Industrial Revolution.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack <i>had </i>been there when Avarice taunted me about nearly starving from life force deprivation. That was during World War II. I’d underestimated Jack before and paid for it. He’d read the subtext of my back-and-forth with Avarice back then. He was shrewd enough to combine that with my actions these past decades to make a snap judgment about me. </span>Keyword: snap.</div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>It wasn’t hard to writhe like I was in pain. Disguising where I put my hands was harder since Jack’s blazer was fueled by the same spell the door and tin slabs had been. A thought hit me and I strained to laugh. “So Avarice told you to get functional clothing and this is how you took it?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He pointed the comb at me and kept twiddling the knife over my head. “That blazer that’s kicking your ass has more tears in it than last time. Those are my--”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Yeah yeah, they’re from all the times someone tried to kill you and failed.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack’s face curled in a smug grin. “You remembered. I’m honored. And look, your bonehead manager’s on his way.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper floated in front of me at the top of my vision, sandwiched between several tin roofing slabs. Only his robes and the shadows undulating off his bones stuck out of the cracks. His scythe appeared in my vision next, followed by Apathy, the other being who’d been flying behind Jack on the soul-covered rice paddy. Apathy’s bald, rail-thin form walked a lap around me, his battered slacks and smoking jacket soaking up mud and blood from the human bodies that festered around us.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“This reminds me of Hell,” Apathy commented. He dragged Reap’s scythe so the blade carved a circle into the dirt around me. “Fifth Circle. The war Circle. Rage used to decorate his property with cadavers imported from Earthen war zones.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Yessss,” Reap said, cackling. “And I am now thankful I destroyed him at The Battle Of Amiens.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Apathy rested his forehead against the tin holding The Reaper prisoner. “Hmm. Good memory. Yes, most unexpected. I shall speak for Rage when we have you in front of the Seraph Police Department.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>At the time, I hadn’t heard any significance to those words because that cheap shot to the boobs hurt like home. </span>I lifted my head from the dirt and hissed, “So Fickle Jack gets a new master and thinks he can march us right to the Seraphs?”</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack barked a laugh. “New master? I go where I want and build what I choose.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Apathy dragged the scythe past my head, then started circling around behind me a second time. “That he does. How dare you see through my plans, Ava.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Cliches are lazier than original words, dick.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Now that’s just vulgar,” Apathy said, completing his second circle. “Jack, are our enemies always so un--”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I flared unguided Blood Magic and aimed both palms to point behind me underneath my body. Blood had leaked all over them and I used the magic to surge forth and sweep Apathy’s feet from under him. I knew he’d be too careless to expect a trap from the trapped, and he fell on his bohunkus a second before I plowed into Jack Te-Konos’s shins horns-first. I felt them pierce one foot and one calf before the magic within his entangling blazer weakened. Oh, he screamed like a pansy too.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Ripping off Jack’s grubby blazer along with the one I wore, I wrenched my horns left and right, tearing through the fallen angel’s bone and muscle tissue. Silver blood dripped from his legs onto my horns and into my hair. He dropped the haloxite knife and it sank point first into Apathy’s left shoulder, scraping bone and drawing out a screech. Tempted as I was to finish them both off, The Reaper’s freedom and securing his scythe came first.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I flapped toward the tin cage Jack had rigged up with his heavenly magic and searched for the French words carved into the metal. I found them and smeared orange blood onto each one, then let loose a third Blood Magic wave. The unguided spell tore holes in the slabs where the words were and ripped them straight into the mud like gravity had thrown a temper tantrum. The rest of the holey metal flopped to the ground, useless. With Reap free, I seized his scythe off the ground where Apathy had let it fall after he’d been tackled and knifed.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The scythe was a foot taller than me and harder to lug around than the staves and sticks I’d trained with as a martial artist. Reap’s wingless flight carried him a whole mile ahead of me. I didn’t catch up to him until I reached the outskirts of Seoul. Seraphs patrolled the skies above the South Korean city in search of demon thieves or any other Three Domains trouble. Tastes of mud and grit still clung to my mouth and I spat into the open air.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Handing The Reaper his two-toned scythe, I rubbed at my chest and groaned. “You can have this. I won't be swinging that awkward thing around any time soon. We should tell the SPD about those underground soul stashes The Coalition is setting up.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap gripped the weapon and his voice became an ice floe. “It is best we did not end them back there. Better that we continue our work than sacrifice it in vain and only <i>damage</i> The Coalition. Let us return to the Seoul hell divide and unload what souls we have. Then we shall reveal this subterfuge to the Chief Seraph.”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-14723024935743259382017-10-14T08:58:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:20:34.559-08:00Case 13 - Ep. 2: Brimvisibility<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8noTx-tTgug5Xo5ZDwJ-jdSvVTehIAbYCUD2hnkK6pDmYhZ2RqN9NpG-v5KtF56Nng9oa1O7jn6tH2MxOz4zWls0_B2FyDfF7wWREkr-T7JAEBLJh_IcFBi_k7DOlC1xsTtrHG1xBAHA/s1600/Soul+Fountains.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8noTx-tTgug5Xo5ZDwJ-jdSvVTehIAbYCUD2hnkK6pDmYhZ2RqN9NpG-v5KtF56Nng9oa1O7jn6tH2MxOz4zWls0_B2FyDfF7wWREkr-T7JAEBLJh_IcFBi_k7DOlC1xsTtrHG1xBAHA/s320/Soul+Fountains.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Soul Fountains Schemes by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">“When we harvested souls in Mexico City,” The Reaper rasped, “they called this Montezuma’s Revenge.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I bent over one of the hundreds of corpses at the edge of a rice paddy on the 38th Parallel in Korea. This young American soldier had died of intestinal disease, like a good third of the bodies around him. Flies buzzed in noxious clouds that shifted through the abandoned paddy like wind eddies made visible. The sun baked the Korean landscape and everything around us to the point where the trees were brittle husks, and anything in the half-dried-up paddy was a petri dish.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Oh, and half the soldiers had literally crapped themselves to death.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I plugged my nose with one hand and reached up to touch my left horn with the other. “Some days I’m real thankful that brimstone horns are part of the whole demon package. If I had to worry about infections from drinking the wrong thing, I’d be dead already.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper paced around the edge of the paddy, swinging Seversoul and absorbing handfuls of fresh souls into the two-toned scythe blade. “You didn’t drink the water, did you Avaline?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I kept both nostrils pinched closed while I talked. “Yes, I go around doing all the shit that would kill a human just to prove I’m superior. You sure you don’t want a day off from harvesting? This war’s not going to stop for a year at least.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper tilted his skull under his brown hood like he was considering saying one thing, but went with, “I’d prefer to stay away from cities where humans carry cameras.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I swatted both wings at a swarm of flies. Most of them tumbled helter-skelter, some of them died and peppered the mud. “Because cameras can see us when the human eye can’t?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap nodded and jerked a phalange at a second paddy brimming with souls. “Humanity must have gotten enough powdered haloxite from The Coalition to design those cameras. The only way they could penetrate our horns’ protection to see us is if they combined that with some sort of spell equivalent to a summoning or a proper prayer.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I unfurled both wings, then eyed Reap. “What makes you think that?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He launched skyward and I followed, flapping up out of the miasma and over stands of trees and rickety farmhouses to the next paddy over. When we touched down, there were fewer corpses and more souls than last time. I wondered if even the dead could smell that stank blanketing the place. I drew out my Blood Magic folio in case there was trouble, but the Chinese, the North Koreans, the Americans, and the South Koreans had already withdrawn with as much of their dead as they could stand to haul away. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I asked again, “Reap, do you really think Avarice would give humans any magic at all? Human souls produce the life force that feeds all demons and angels. Last thing any of us wants is for our only source of food to kick our asses.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He lifted his scythe in front of a soul cluster and hesitated. “Those smoke clouds that burst from their cameras have to contain haloxite. You must have seen--”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I slapped my knee and burst out laughing. “Those cameras are decades old. They have new ones now, Reap. This is the fifties. Cameras capture light and reality a lot better than human eyes and minds can.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He harvested the cluster and moved to a larger one ambling toward the farmhouse shed. “So you believe that science trumps magic?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I searched the area for more souls and intruders who might be gorging themselves since the former battlefield was deserted and Seraph-free. “Science can do things that magic hasn’t found a way to counteract yet. Humans get pictures of ghosts and demons all the time these days. All those hauntings and random demon attacks are really just the small-time souls in the backwoods we don’t have time to harvest.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper hovered a couple feet off the ground and raised his scythe in both bone hands. “The Coalition must have demon supporters living as hermits among those small human settlements.” He pointed the blade at the line of souls lingering around the shed. “This is why we venture away from civilization on occasion. Coalition demons could sip life force from souls that are too far out from the major cities for us or the SPD to be interested in.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>When he stopped talking, voices permeated through the shed’s thin walls. I threw up a hand in warning and hissed, “Wait, there’s no reason for humans to hide in a shed this long after a battle.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>As though the beings within had heard me, the flimsy wood doors crashed outward and pelted at me and The Reaper. He swiped his scythe through one of the door missiles with a well-timed swing, and I flapped skyward away from the thing. Whenever magic fueled something mundane and wide that came for me, it was because someone wanted to entrap me. Aside from killing, a solid trap was the best way to get a pain-in-the-rump demon out of the way.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Jack Te-Konos,” I shouted as the fallen angel emerged from the shanty. “What, did Avarice get sick of you painting her toenails?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I back-flapped and dodged the door, watching for Jack’s next move. He stood at the door, adjusted his torn blazer and ruffed shirt, then combed his hair while a sheet of tin hurled itself at The Reaper next. By the time I’d drawn my haloxite knife and drawn blood from a palm, Jack had unfurled his oil-black wings, flown skyward, and arced toward me with another being flapping behind him.</span></div>
<br />
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I opened the other palm with the knife tip and groaned, then readied two unguided Blood Magics. One for the trap, and one for the fallen angel who’d almost entangled us again.</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-38409975611307549662017-10-07T21:55:00.000-07:002018-02-13T12:36:29.508-08:00Case 13 - Ep. 1: Brimvisibility<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6he_4N_SUccSiYMo5_fdJJGI0VvFWp-R7o8at1rbTJawgAN4YIKvYz3xXgYdkFBCWKCsKBgFxCYHcMSXXrip9Do2pTnzlql4o9U-A5P6faLKRbqOGdxTOVKdBkW_Vu9fOZidR62SGOfQ/s1600/Soul+Fountains.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6he_4N_SUccSiYMo5_fdJJGI0VvFWp-R7o8at1rbTJawgAN4YIKvYz3xXgYdkFBCWKCsKBgFxCYHcMSXXrip9Do2pTnzlql4o9U-A5P6faLKRbqOGdxTOVKdBkW_Vu9fOZidR62SGOfQ/s320/Soul+Fountains.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Soul Fountains Schemes by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">I soared out of the hell divide that connected my home city of New Purgatory with the city of Fountainia. The eight foot circular portal was carved into the side of the Motery Center building at the fortieth story so the incoming banker demons and usher angels could see the entire city and view how mote production was going at a single glance. Fountainia’s north side brimmed with ziggurats and structures that combined ancient design with heavenly modernity. Its south side looked like a graffiti’d future sci-fi city more likely to spit out flying beater cars than thousands of demons working for The Soul Fountains. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>There was no sign of The Reaper anywhere I could see.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Ten stories of intricate carvings covered the haloxite bowls that made up The Soul Fountains in the square below me. Yesterday’s souls from Nepal and New York still crowded the space set up for separating the soul from its swirling life force. While the usher angels led souls into the waters, banker demons counted the red and white motes that rolled down from the fountain tops into bins at their desks. Once a soul had been filtered through the Fountains, the usher angels at the back read off of clipboards and directed the stripped souls to their fates through hell divides and heaven lanes leading to the Circles and Rivers. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I swooped in a “J” shape, touched down next to a demon sitting behind a desk, and still couldn’t see Reap with my bare eyes. A glance at my Hades watch told me it was almost two o’clock pm on a Saturday. The banker dropped a wingful of motes-crimson and ivory coins the size of a half-dollar-into a bin, then stood and looked me down and up. “Payday was yesterday, Ms. Vasaga. Did you drink all the life force out of your motes already?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I cocked a hip and showed her the mote bracelet Nia had made me earlier, with a three-quarters-full red mote bound to my dark skin. “It’s not motes that I need. Could you do something for me?”</span><br />
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She nodded and perked up for a second, then swapped the intrigued expression for a pro smile. “He’s behind me, isn’t he?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper cackled from a foot behind her. “It works, Avaline. Nobody saw the scythe either. Brimvisibility is spectacular. What gave me away?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She turned and squinted at the space where The Reaper wasn’t. “Rumors and The Reaper’s robes flopping around like fish. Everyone saw Niariel arrive at your office the other day, and we’ve seen you and Ava unload souls before. The set-up was obvious, I just didn’t know what your endgame was until the robes announced your presence.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I quirked an eyebrow at her and kept silent. It looked like The Reaper’s plan of doing the right things to spread rumors was working. If Soul Fountain staff was talking about all the goings-on at Reap’s office, The Coalition would get word soon. My reputation as bodyguard numero uno still held strong too. The only thing wrong was I hadn’t thought ahead enough. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Looks like I’ll have to find a way to silence Reap’s robes before I fly back to Terrence’s place for more angel with benefits time. After six days of work, I needed to lose myself. With him sliding his arms around me, pretending he was helping me stretch with his too familiar hands. His hips pressing against me always told another story, and that was the story I craved more than anything else.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I breathed the hearty scent of fresh souls and fake frowned. “Good job. Now I have to report The Reaper for hexual harassment.”</span></div>
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<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The banker snorted and Reap rasped, “Next time, you owe me motes when you crack terrible jokes like that. This isn’t a spell. You told me it was a--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Let’s get to work, shall we?” I interjected. “Harvest time’s in thirty minutes and we’ve got Hildariel to train.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Right on, Ms. Vasaga. Motes are piling up. Thanks for the scary-not-scary time.”</span></div>
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<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>With that, she sat back down and The Reaper and I took off for his office. We flew straight up and arced to the side when we hit the thirteenth story, then landed on Reap’s office balcony where the new glass windowpane read, “The Reaper. Collector Of Souls.” I heard my boss’s huge seven foot self land next to me, mainly because his robes fluttered and his tarsals clacked against the marble. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The door opened and I strode in, flicking on the lights and crossing to the file cabinets on the right. Firelight LEDs flickered to life overhead and I rooted around for the next labeled folder and papers in line. Reap closed the door behind me and I heard him sitting down in his high-backed chair covered in carvings. I spun with my hands full and found nothing in the chair for a moment. Then Seversoul appeared when The Reaper set it on the desk longways and took his grip off the haft. “Do you remember who was with Avarice during the ’38 boxing match at Yankee Stadium?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I sat across from the boss and nodded. “Avarice led Voracity and Apathy’s lazy ass there for some downtime. They didn’t know we’d cleaned the place of souls before they arrived, so the Seraph Police Department couldn’t do anything to stop us fighting.”</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The empty air ahead of me spoke in an earthquake’s whisper. “I suspect Avarice is not heading The Coalition anymore. Leadership may have changed as early as the Korean War. Write this down.”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-63349458822885081912017-09-30T11:45:00.001-07:002018-02-13T12:35:39.079-08:00Case 12 - Ep. 3: The Reaper's Tuxedo<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaxiq1th0FGfEeirors89A6_Cb2D2S8xwNyATEigwGBBy7SttR4-KLzviOiZ6H3FpZA-f1WIUcKGED49tEj2uoHB3KvADC-UapjSX31LnyRY4wfKY6rlbjBFVOx3lXDOndUK70mc7yKCE/s1600/Surprise+for+the+Reaper.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaxiq1th0FGfEeirors89A6_Cb2D2S8xwNyATEigwGBBy7SttR4-KLzviOiZ6H3FpZA-f1WIUcKGED49tEj2uoHB3KvADC-UapjSX31LnyRY4wfKY6rlbjBFVOx3lXDOndUK70mc7yKCE/s320/Surprise+for+the+Reaper.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Reaping With Class by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">I rigged the Blood Magic before I’d even finished taunting the bitch that stole from me and The Reaper. Pumping both wings, I leapt at Avarice with the haloxite knife in my right hand, ready to dig up whatever she had in place of a heart. Orange blood still dripped from the knife tip where I’d pricked my finger to fuel the Demon-Angel aviators, which fell to the ground when I attacked. I daubed blood from my finger on the knife’s handle and the unguided Blood Magic launched the knife forward even faster than I was flying.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Avarice’s eyes shot open and she flipped her wing sideways to parry the strike. I could see she’d be too late to block the knife that was three feet ahead of me. Martial arts are noble until you need to trick your opponent in order to survive. I’d end her at last and then take out her paunchy partner in the white hat next. He hadn’t moved since handing her that beer--</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Hat-head pitched a hip flask from behind Avarice and it smashed into the haloxite knife. Golden powder burst from the flask and I flew right into the haze. Powdered haloxite got into my eyes, mouth, and nose and I sputtered. Brimstone penetrated the defenses of an angel’s halo, and haloxite wrecked demons despite our horns’ protection. Avarice’s block snapped my arm to the side and I flopped right past the pair into a row of spectators watching the Friday Night boxing match.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>It was a good thing Yankee Stadium was already getting rowdy with the Louis-Schmeling fight ramping up to a finish. The men and women I collided with tumbled to the cement at the edge of the boxing ring. Multiple shouts erupted and more New Yorkers jumped into the fray, some helping people up, some throwing punches. I kipped up to my feet and sneezed, then queued in on The Reaper’s rasping snarl.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He’d stayed back and clashed with Avarice while the humans caused more chaos, and now he had the Septuplet in a vicegrip between him and the haft of his scythe. Flying without wings, The Reaper soared straight skyward and out of the stadium with one of The Pneuma Coalition’s highest-ranked Septuplets ready to be delivered to the SPD. Or destroyed. Since no souls were in the area, we weren’t bound by Heaven Law to give a crap about these parasites of society.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My grudge against The Coalition boiled in my veins and I flapped up after them. Two more flasks arced past me and I scoffed, craning around to blow a raspberry at hat-head. He shed his fedora and blazer, revealing a mullet, a beer gut and a pit-stained button-up. The horns and the beer gut had already given Voracity away. He was here with Avarice to. . .what, watch a boxing match?</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I looped over the rim of the stadium and chased after Reap and his writhing captive. They were already far below, duking it out in the parking lot. Seraphs dotted the skies above us, and a few swooped closer, but stayed away or eased back toward the streets where souls were more likely to be meandering. I descended on Reap as he hurled Avarice down the middle of an aisle of parked cars. She tumbled and skidded, then smacked into an overly polished bumper and lay among the bulky classic vehicles like a crumpled hotdog wrapper.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I touched down next to The Reaper and reached for my Blood Magic folio again. It was out of my blazer pocket when Voracity landed in front of Avarice with a greasy grin on his mug. His overconfident celebrity voice rang out among the cars. “Do you see me futzing around? Get over here and do your job.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Apathy, the bald careless Septuplet, walked out from between two cars that had their AM radios blaring. The people inside were either rowdy because of the match they were listening to, or the horizontal mambo was in full swing. Apathy waved Voracity’s comment off with a thin hand and adjusted his battered smoking jacket. “I provided you and Avarice with thousands of humans. What more do you want?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Voracity flicked a wing behind him. Avarice took it by the claw and sprang to her feet, tucking her cleave back into her dirty cream-colored dress. She conjured two fishing nets, one in each hand, and snapped at Apathy. “Soliduction is how I fight for The Coalition. I don’t see you<i> </i>acting when action is needed. Get out there and pull your weight.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Bahahaha,” I shrieked, pointing at Apathy with my folio. “<i>She’s </i>lecturing <i>you </i>on responsibility.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper leaned in close to me while he tugged at his tux. “Avarice is The Coalition’s leader. She must be.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I nodded and grinned at how well that fit into what I knew of their organization. Avarice could Soliduct any solid object she wanted into existence as long as it wasn’t brimstone, haloxite, magic, or alive. That included gold to use on Earth to buy whatever The Coalition needed. Once they walked away with thousands of weapons, another Soliduction would vanish the gold and create plethoras of something else like ammunition or food. What could Voracity and Apathy do with their white collar powers? Trick people and bore them to death?</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Apathy crossed to the middle of the aisle next to Avarice and sneered. “Don’t mistake the ability to rout an enemy once with true victory. Physical combat with The Reaper is stultifying. The AM radio got the broadcast of this fight out so the world could hear it. It did wonders for Joe DiMaggio and the Yankees, and could be made to help The Coalition. So could the cameras the spectators used to photograph the match.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Yep, Apathy was one of only fourteen beings in the Three Domains with powers, and his <i>had </i>to be the ability to say pointless, obvious crap.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I flipped to the ‘strength’ section of the folio and whipped out a political cartoon of a fifty foot over-muscled ape. “Reap, let’s finish the niff-naff here and unload at the Fountains.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He rolled his humerus. “I am in a tuxedo, Avaline. We had our chance to destroy Avarice and my choice of garment ruined it. You didn’t see my two clashes with her, but she conjured objects to shield herself from Seversoul’s blows.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I was about to crank out Blood Magic and suggest Reap use that scythe again when a pair of souls ambled into the lot from the direction of the stadium. Five or six more souls dotted the surging crowd that poured out of every entrance. Most of the humans hurried to their cars, while the rest brawled and attracted event security and police. Three Seraphs swooped from above to watch the fracas now that souls were in the area.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Apathy’s lips twisted. “Consequences, Ms. Vasaga. Your actions within the stadium brought the SPD at a time when you could have finished The Coalition. Let’s go, Voracity.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>With that, the trio unfurled their wings and flapped skyward around the Seraphs and disappeared in the direction of one of the New York hell divides that connected Domains.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper jabbed the haft of his scythe down and leaned on it as humans filled the lot. “We must wait until these disperse before we can harvest the new souls. Apathy’s talk of radios and cameras fits the current trend we’ve seen with humanity recently.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I heard more in what he didn’t say than what he did. We wouldn’t kill living humans to get at the souls and their life force. Avarice knew that, and antagonized me into making a mistake that let The Coalition get away with their stolen souls and their lives.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Heaven Law created a balance. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Fountainians like me and The Reaper worked to build a system that could support all demons and angels, though not in the way they might want or in the way that most helps them.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Avarice and The Coalition used everything from their members’ choices to their very lives as stepping stones so a select few could thrive, while the rest got less than nothing.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>They’d be sure to use these things humanity invented against us. All Hell’s magic and all Heaven’s spells would be tested in the coming decades. We could adapt, or The Coalition could exploit weaknesses they found to destroy The Soul Fountains. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">This night didn’t mesh with their usual schtick. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Why didn’t it?</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-32907578237500318282017-09-23T13:23:00.003-07:002018-02-13T12:20:50.353-08:00Case 12 - Ep. 2: The Reaper's Tuxedo<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaxiq1th0FGfEeirors89A6_Cb2D2S8xwNyATEigwGBBy7SttR4-KLzviOiZ6H3FpZA-f1WIUcKGED49tEj2uoHB3KvADC-UapjSX31LnyRY4wfKY6rlbjBFVOx3lXDOndUK70mc7yKCE/s1600/Surprise+for+the+Reaper.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaxiq1th0FGfEeirors89A6_Cb2D2S8xwNyATEigwGBBy7SttR4-KLzviOiZ6H3FpZA-f1WIUcKGED49tEj2uoHB3KvADC-UapjSX31LnyRY4wfKY6rlbjBFVOx3lXDOndUK70mc7yKCE/s320/Surprise+for+the+Reaper.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Reaping With Class by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Friday night at Yankee Stadium usually meant there was enough alcohol going around to drown a small town.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>On Friday, June 22nd, 1938, there was at least twice that.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper grinned at me from beneath the fedora on his black skull. “Prohibition is fresh in the minds of the humans within this stadium, Avaline. In their minds, they deserve an evening like this after being oppressed by the law for longer than they care to remember.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I patted the Blood Magic folio and haloxite knife in my blazer pockets, then drew a pair of aviators out. “Reap, they won’t even remember this fight night. We just got done harvesting. Why are we hiding in the back rows?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He pointed to the center of the blazing lights where two men duked it out with gloved fists in a boxing ring. “Even drunk summoners can see us in our usual garb.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap wasn’t wrong. Demon thieves may have followed us from Manhattan. Chances were good that in a city the size of New York, The Coalition would have a few summoners or prayers among the 70,000 strong crowd. Cheers and jeers pierced the eardrums and might have damaged a cochlea if I hadn’t had brimstone horns same as The Reaper did.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I looked him down and up, taking in the solid black tuxedo and fedora he’d swapped out his robes for. “No, I’m saying we don’t have to hide. We already ditched Jack Te-Konos, and I’ll use a little Blood Magic to check for any creeps tailing us. I think we’ve got a little in common with the humans tonight.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Drawing out my folio, I flipped to the ‘sight’ section and withdrew two magazine pictures. One was a painting of an angel from some bigwig church, and the other was a ridiculous sketch of a demon out of a political cartoon. I took the haloxite knife, slid the point into my finger, and daubed the orange blood that welled up onto both pictures. Then I rolled them up and made sure the blood, picture, and the aviators’ frames were all in contact with each other.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Noise erupted from the well-dressed crowd around the boxing ring and I cranked out the Blood Magic while I waited for it to die down. With the shades on, I glanced skyward and saw half a dozen Seraphs on flight patrol. The left lens highlighted them in sharp violet light. When I peered down, I raised my own right arm and saw it outlined in green through the right lens. A smile quirked the corners of my mouth. The new Demon-Angel aviators worked.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I was about to tell Reap we were safe to watch from the front row when a second shimmering green outline appeared in the D. & A. aviators. A woman in a low-cut, cream colored dress raised her wings and screamed along with the crowd. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
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<span class="s1">“Dammit,” I cursed, nudging The Reaper with an elbow. “See that woman with the carmel hair?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He shook his skull.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Avarice,” I spat. “Figures she’d be here. Humans spend a lot of money on fight nights.” I looked up at the Seraphs again, then back down at Avarice as she applauded one of the boxers falling down. “Are there any souls anywhere?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper straightened his tux. “None whatsoever.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I leapt from the back row bleachers and flapped hard for the front row where Avarice was accepting a beer cup from a portly man in a crisp white suit and hat. Two announcers behind a table nearby shouted into mics about Schmeling landing a punch on Louis. Sweat stink and cigar smoke clogged the air and I squinted at Avarice and Beer Cup Man, who was clearly Voracity with that mullet hanging down the back of his suit. Their light clothes and green outlines fit snugly among the men who must have been summoners in the crowd around them.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Humans might not be able to see or hear us unless they’d summoned or prayed recently, but I wasn’t risking this chance. Not with the plan I had fully formed in my mind. If thousands of humans saw a whole lot of invisible nothings thrashing around between them and the boxers, it would have to be because they were too drunk to see the fight right. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Voracity shimmered in green as I descended on the ring and landed on the edge beside the turnbuckle. I pointed the haloxite knife with my blood on it straight at Avarice’s forehead. “You stole two thousand souls during our harvest earlier tonight.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Avarice’s expression flashed with annoyance and she jerked her horns skyward. “You still think you can end The Coalition with violence? In front of the SPD? Heaven Law states there can be no blows delivered between Soul Fountain workers and Coalition members during a harvest.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I bared my teeth and readied enough Blood Magic for Voracity <i>and </i>Avarice. “Do you see any souls in the crowd?”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-1032794296773019842017-09-16T20:42:00.001-07:002018-02-11T19:19:34.440-08:00Case 12 - Ep. 1: The Reaper's Tuxedo<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiq0QjsER8NQ8tzdIYO_XrlniEaFL2W8oVOfPryhxcyhhbHE9yEgJPHMmUxD4vsx_p6DTmpKc9iDalACCZ6Yt9Fju47pKWRiob3uaKgLbsQyO3DYp4fF47K06n7KgK5yeg7MQXSZbn5MJw/s1600/Surprise+for+the+Reaper.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiq0QjsER8NQ8tzdIYO_XrlniEaFL2W8oVOfPryhxcyhhbHE9yEgJPHMmUxD4vsx_p6DTmpKc9iDalACCZ6Yt9Fju47pKWRiob3uaKgLbsQyO3DYp4fF47K06n7KgK5yeg7MQXSZbn5MJw/s320/Surprise+for+the+Reaper.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Reaping With Class by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">“So The Reaper drinks tequila?” Nia asked from behind the bar at The Down South Lounge. She was in her favorite spaghetti strap pink top and yoga pants, a far cry from the blue blazer and slacks she’d worn when I saw her yesterday. Three other bartender demons rushed around the long counter, mixing drinks and pouring drafts for the hundred or so bar-hopping angels and trashed demons Friday nights always brought in. Raucous chatter filled the long room, the air was heavy, and the bouncer Hildariel was letting in rowdier demons than Nia typically allowed.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap had to shout over the slurred singing from the digital jukebox at the end of the bar, where a demon in a cheap blue suit and black fedora was arguing with the pair of angels making blatherskites of themselves. “This night does not merit a simple ale.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I finished my Sin and Tonic and met Nia’s smoky eyes. “He’s still learning modern vernacular. It’s not a beer kind of night.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia tossed a bottle of Lethe Gin to a bartender in a jersey and he swung a bottle of Hallelujah Tequila behind his back at her. She caught it with one hand, pointed a wing at her co-worker, and did a little shimmy. Then she faced The Reaper and poured tequila into the highball glass full of ice in front of him. “I hope you’re not neglecting work. You two helped create every mote I make selling drinks tonight.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I blew a lock of my crimson hair out of my face. “We worked a double tonight and Jack Te-Konos showed up in Nepal <i>and </i>New York.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia garnished Reap’s drink with lime and haloxite powder. “What happened there?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Huge earthquake in Nepal killed thousands of humans, and New York is New York.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She slid The Reaper’s drink to him and he downed half, then crunched on the ice. Nia refreshed my Sin and Tonic. “The Pneuma Coalition needs to stop messing with my girl. Jack didn’t follow you here, did he?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span></b>I shook my head and pulled a pair of aviators out of my inner blazer pocket. Blood still clung to the frames on each side, along with a folded picture of military-quality infrared goggles. “Been using these to watch for tails on the flight over. Infrared aviators. Jack won’t be a problem tonight.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The blue-clad demon sat on a barstool closer to The Reaper than anyone had dared since we came in after our shift. Nia asked the bartender in the jersey to serve him, and came back to examine the shades. “You’re always pushing your Blood Magic.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap checked that his scythe was safe on the barstool next to him, then rasped, “Doesn’t using that much blood in your magic make you a lightweight?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I quirked an eyebrow. “How do <i>you </i>even drink? Alcohol and haloxite powder travel through the bloodstream, and you don’t have veins or arteries.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He tilted his ram’s horns to the side. “I have a mouth, therefore, I can drink.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I laughed and said, “Well, at least this means we’ll have the time to recruit another bodyguard. Double shifts are shit, but it frees up more time than we usually have.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Once I ran out of positives, my mind dwelled on the negatives. Someone broke into The Reaper’s office in Fountainia and stole the last Case Note we’d written. Everything I’d hoped no one would ever learn about me was in that Note. Pride. My ideas. My pain. Had Jack or someone else from The Coalition listened in on us yesterday? I couldn’t exactly investigate either since we’d harvested twice in one day.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Demons and angels didn’t need to sleep thanks to their horns and halos, but that only meant there could always be someone hunting you.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I buried the negatives and the pain with a huge swig of Sin and Tonic. Most of it went down the hatch. When Nia pulled a hanger with a solid black tuxedo from around the door of her back room, I sprayed the rest onto the rainbow of bottles behind the bar. “You’re bringing that out tonight?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia beamed mischievously. “You told me he needed a new wardrobe last Saturday.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>A grin snuck across both lips. “Yes. I did.” Spinning on the barstool, I caught Reap dumping the last of his drink into is ah, mandibles. “You want to attract more bodyguard candidates? Put that on.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper set his glass down. If he had eyes, I could tell he’d be rolling them. “We have discussed this before, Avaline. Plain brown robes are practical, expendable, and give me a fearsome appearance.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia sashayed around from behind the bar, drawing demons’ and angels’ leers. She flourished the suit at The Reaper. “You. Tux. Now.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Voices quieted around us and drinkers stopped talking to listen to The Reaper’s response. “The raiment I wear is sufficient, and I choose it--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Try it on, or the next one will be hot pink.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I stifled a burst of laughter and The Reaper stood to his full seven foot height. “Be careful what you desire, Nia. I’ll play along this time, but remember that you <i>pushed </i>for this.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>With that, The Reaper stripped off his robe to stand naked among a hundred gaping drunks. He seized the tuxedo, whipped the pants off the hanger, and slid into them like he’d done it for centuries. Shirt on, vest buttoned, belt and bow tie secured in a New Purgatory minute. Reap slipped the jacket on and hefted his scythe, then faced Nia with his shadow-black skull tilted down. “It isn’t my color. Too light.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Shock and absurdity blended like a bad drink recipe in my chest. Nia’s mouth hung wide and her eyes darted among the patrons and bartenders. A good dozen demons had fled the bar while The Reaper dressed, no doubt expecting an angry outburst that would end with them dead and their life force as food for other demons. When nobody spoke, Reap cackled and gestured to himself. “Perhaps there is no one in Hell capable of guarding all this.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Laughter burst from me and the angels at the pool tables behind The Reaper. Nia’s mouth opened and closed, failing to find any words. I drank some Sin and Tonic to give myself a second, then said, “All he needs now is one glove and a fedora.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia’s flabbergasted face turned into a guilty smile and she pointed behind The Reaper. “Hey Shawn, can we borrow that?”<span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The demon in the cheap blue suit doffed his chapeau and tossed it like a frisbee to The Reaper. He ringed it on a finger, then placed it between his horns. “What do you think?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Shawn stammered. “The light color pairs so well with your dark erm, complexion. You’d kill at the clubs downtown.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap’s growl was a dragon’s. “Thank you. Now I have work to do. Speak with Nia later to get your hat back.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Y-yessir,” he said, backing away from his barstool and fleeing toward the classic arcade games at the back of the Lounge.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>When The Reaper sat back down and twiddled his glass, the crowd dissolved and went about their drinking. The angels kept shooting pool, the bartenders poured more drinks, and Nia ambled back to her spot behind the bar. She shook her head and nodded her halo at Reap. “Ava, warn me next time I’m about to push The Reaper too far.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Hey,” I said from behind my glass. “You hugged him yesterday. I thought you two were close enough to know that.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“You’re a s--you’re so bad.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That’s why you love me. And did you almost--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Avaline,” The Reaper hissed. “Tuxedos are dangerous. I cannot fight well in one even if it is tailored to my bones. Get out your pen. Do you recall our visit to Yankee Stadium in the late thirties?”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-32310387432724393692017-09-09T08:09:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:19:18.538-08:00Case 11 - Ep. 3: Bandwagon Pride<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqwQDHAo6LAB7ByfQoP7O7BGhf1AXLkve5QBHWuIO8pfZ1o7ex82EhfHwvWmi-9Z-NarYKJalMI5U3WbcURUwjLgTG3wdWoKFZBXezVYRIcQ9KT9Kfb9Bb6QMpRlIsuTWQk7UKI1ej9hk/s1600/Ohel+Yakob+Synagogue.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqwQDHAo6LAB7ByfQoP7O7BGhf1AXLkve5QBHWuIO8pfZ1o7ex82EhfHwvWmi-9Z-NarYKJalMI5U3WbcURUwjLgTG3wdWoKFZBXezVYRIcQ9KT9Kfb9Bb6QMpRlIsuTWQk7UKI1ej9hk/s320/Ohel+Yakob+Synagogue.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A World For A Secret by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">The shattered wall re-formed around me like a stockade, pinning both hands in front of me and leaving my wings and legs hanging back outside of the synagogue. Pride, in her fully decorated black-and-gold Convictionist uniform, kept touching the wall and cranked her white collar power all the way up. Overhead, the burning synagogue’s walls Re-Glorified and its stained glass windows assembled themselves from the shards on the sidewalk. Outside those windows, The Night Of Broken Glass raged on, and The Reaper harvested dozens of souls on the surrounding Munich street.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I could have screeched and brought my boss down my ex-instructor, but maybe too much of her nature had rubbed off on me.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>While ceiling beams and capstones slid into place, Pride drew a haloxite flensing knife from within her uniform. She said, “You left me and latched onto the first organization that would support you.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride drew closer and I pumped my wings hard, but I couldn’t move or reach the stained glass window six feet above where I was trapped. I sucked in a lungful of brick dust and smoldering wood. “I’d say you’re obsessed with the old Convictionists. Hell has moved on since then. Get with the times.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride pressed the tip of the flensing knife on my scalp between the horns, but didn’t break the skin. “Humans used to summon us. Earth was a whole Domain where people devoted ceremonies and resources to attracting <i>our </i>attention. To feeding <i>us </i>the life force of their enemies. They were just like demons that way. Ever seeking the upper hand.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“So you joined The Coalition,” I spat, trying to ignore the death that hovered two inches above my brain. “A build-it-yourself parasite system. Throw everything the Fountainians built straight to the Ninth Circle and sacrifice their cause for yours.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride leaned forward at the waist like a sparring champion taking a bow. “I fight for something that will last longer than you and your Reaper’s Soul Fountains. Your way is a fad. A little for everyone. Who can be proud of a molehill? Demons want more.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“There was nothing to stop us going extinct when the Industrial Revolution came,” I said, flapping my wings as much as I could with them half-encased in brick. “Factory production saved humanity and wrecked us. All the opportunities to get summoned and make a living vanished.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride leapt up, pumped her wings once, and shattered the stained glass window overhead with both wings. She back-flapped out of the way so none of the sharp pieces would slice her immaculate uniform. Glass shards showered down on me, gouging holes into my blazer and blouse. The right sleeve tore loose and hung off me like a beggar’s rag. I kept pumping both wings even though I knew I couldn’t gain any momentum to power through the wall I was stuck in.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“The Coalition will have more,” Pride shrieked. “Your pitiful Soul Fountains will end because they don’t do enough for the beings that support them. Demons will not live on scraps. Angels will always demand more than they’ve earned. Why do you think they fall so often?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Hades watch on my left wrist flickered with the firelight outside. If I didn’t get free soon, my former instructor would kill me. Or The Reaper would find out about my history with his enemies. I tasted rage as I snarled, “Everything you ‘build’ is just going to get wrecked again. It doesn’t matter what you fight for, because you’re too conceited to maintain it.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride bared her teeth and brandished the haloxite knife. “What’s more fragile? Pride, or prudence? I could slice your horns off inch by inch. That would guarantee a long lasting lesson.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I cackled like The Reaper did when he was amused. “You just tack onto others’ accomplishments and call them your own. You’re such a bandwagon bitch you don’t even build anything yourself.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She did exactly what I wanted and sank the blade into the back of my hairline until it touched bone. Pain bit through my head and I wailed, biting my tongue because I knew I couldn’t bite through it. My horns protected me from a lot of things, but haloxite was the only thing that could hurt or harm me. I clung to the idea that it was also the only thing that could save me and kept screaming.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride lapped it up. “Avaline, you were a great student who made a ridiculous choice. This is where it got you. Your adherence to prudence makes you more logical, and more predictable. I never could train that out of you. It is why your previous master fired you, and it is why I found you starving for life force. You should never have shared your life force network idea with us. If you had the proper amount of pride, you would have nurtured it yourself and flourished because of it.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>If The Reaper had come around the synagogue and heard any of that, he’d fire me on the spot too. It was time to cover up this history before he found out how much fuel I’d given The Coalition when I was younger. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>When I wrenched my right arm up to my scalp, Pride laughed, clearly assuming I was flapping my wings harder.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Blood dripped onto the paving stones and I smeared my right palm and forearm with it. <span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Then I screeched and unguided Blood Magic surged out of me.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The paving stone whipped upward and knocked Pride’s knife hand up and behind her. I knew she’d keep her grip-she was a trained martial artist-so I wrenched my body around and smeared blood from my forearm in an almost complete circle on the wall. Another blast of unguided Blood Magic shattered the wall in a ring around me and I pumped both wings at the same moment. Pride brought the haloxite knife around and sank it into the meat of my right shoulder. Agony seared me deep, but my momentum was too much for Pride and the full weight of Ava plus brick wall equalled one wrecked Pride.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Bleeding from the head and upper arm, I reeled and clove to the one thread of focus I had among the pain and chaos. My ex-instructor tried Re-Glorifying the wall again to pull me and it off of her. I panted and lashed out with a third pulse of Blood Magic. The ring of brick barreled forward and pancaked her like an anvil from an old cartoon. I flew straight out of the hole I’d just made in the synagogue wall. Seraphs were nearby in the skies above, and they’d stop any more violence between us and The Coalition. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>It was about time Heaven Law worked in my favor.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride didn’t give chase, but The Reaper found me a couple hundred feet above the city of Munich. He hadn’t learned to speak bullshit-ese back in 1938, so I chucked him some deuces and he believed it. Blood on my head? I’d head-butted a demon thief and used Blood Magic to knock him into the next Domain. Blazer ripped to shreds? That’s what happens when you barrel roll through a stained glass window for fun. I still had a long shift ahead, and those souls wouldn’t harvest themselves.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Now all I had to do was keep pretending I hadn’t fucked things up so bad.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Don’t tell anyone else.</span></div>
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<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Please.</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-82255813422187737232017-09-02T09:47:00.001-07:002018-02-11T20:37:53.482-08:00Case 11 - Ep. 2: Bandwagon Pride<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqwQDHAo6LAB7ByfQoP7O7BGhf1AXLkve5QBHWuIO8pfZ1o7ex82EhfHwvWmi-9Z-NarYKJalMI5U3WbcURUwjLgTG3wdWoKFZBXezVYRIcQ9KT9Kfb9Bb6QMpRlIsuTWQk7UKI1ej9hk/s1600/Ohel+Yakob+Synagogue.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqwQDHAo6LAB7ByfQoP7O7BGhf1AXLkve5QBHWuIO8pfZ1o7ex82EhfHwvWmi-9Z-NarYKJalMI5U3WbcURUwjLgTG3wdWoKFZBXezVYRIcQ9KT9Kfb9Bb6QMpRlIsuTWQk7UKI1ej9hk/s320/Ohel+Yakob+Synagogue.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A World For A Secret by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Taboos were as common in Hell as snowballs. Demons did things according to the sins that fueled them. My home city of New Purgatory was full of skyscraper night clubs and ultra-modern condo towers because the only thing the demons there cared about was partying. I’d lived there since the Industrial Revolution because the landlords maintained the condos while the demon tenants did whatever they wanted, no holds barred. Demon society overlooked me, and that’s how I liked it.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I <i>wanted </i>to be too busy kicking ass and harvesting souls to think about the Industrial Revolution.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><i>They </i>could pretend The Industrial Revolution wasn’t taboo if they were preoccupied with finding, feeling, fucking, and forgetting each other. When their appetites mattered more than the pain they buried, they could continue with life and feel rewarded for achieving goal after goal, all the while pretending that their buried pain wasn’t festering. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Addressing the pain was the taboo. Covering it up was the norm.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Damn. I’m doing the same thing right now. Ranting instead of writing.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap, we’ve worked together for a hundred and thirty five years. This Case Note is one of those things I’ve only told Nia. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Industrial Revolution started with one idea, that sparked one factory, that led to all of humanity relying on mass production. They didn’t need to summon demons or pray to angels if they could shoot someone themselves or heal a loved one with quick doses of medicine. That left 98% of demon kind starving for life force. We used to get life force by devouring it off of humans’ souls like corn from a cob. After their souls left the bodies we’d been summoned to murder, it was dinner time. We were all used to being Convictionists, spending our free time promoting demon summoning on Earth so we could get our daily life force. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>November 9th and 10th, 1938. The Night of Broken Glass. That night started with a single event too. One Polish-Jewish student shot one German diplomat and chaos erupted like a grease fire. Humans had gotten used to blindly following their leaders, just like we’d gotten used to thinking the Convictionists in power knew how to bring our old lifestyle back by repeating the same thing over and over.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper and I descended upon Munich that night armed to the horns. It had been several years since The Coalition struck at us, so I expected a fight and had brought the Blood Magic folio and haloxite knife to defend The Reaper. That and I’d had the chemical-toed boots prepared as a surprise for Jack Te-Konos or whatever Septuplet awaited us. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">A “demonstration” was in full swing when I touched down in front of a wrecked store front with The Reaper close behind me. The souls that shone among the rioting Nazis were mostly stale; their life force was about to vanish since we hadn’t harvested here in a while. </span>Looking skyward, I spotted dozens of Seraphs flapping in a circuitous pattern above the city. No demon thieves swooped down upon the exposed souls. I puffed out a breath and said, “Slow days are the best.”</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper tilted his horns, glancing around us. “There is anarchy in the streets.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I shrugged. “Slow for us.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper picked his way through the hundreds of Nazis and Jewish business owners lashing out at each other. He held his scythe high over their heads so as not to remove the soul from a living person. I watched as men and women destroyed windows, stole merchandise, and made a general mess of the business district. Sweat and burning wood and paint wafted through the area, and I could taste the despair on the breeze the same way I did during my Convictionist days when I’d been summoned by a murderous human.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Harvesting was slow work with all the live bodies thrashing and sprinting around. I kept The Reaper between me and each cluster of souls while we traversed road after road. He drew handfuls of the dead into his scythe with downward jabs, sweeping Seversoul down, around, and up again. Two images flashed in my mind and I blurted, “This reminds me of Chicago in the late 1800s. Remember the Haymarket Square riot?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap cackled. “I thought you’d be comparing me to a rice farmer wading about in his paddy.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I was thinking more a wheat farmer, but that works too. Since when did the Collector Of Souls get such a random imagination?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He turned his skull at me the way a stern teacher or librarian would. “Let us focus on the harvest. We cannot fly and harvest by the hundreds this time. There are too many living humans in the area for that.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Okay, I’ll fly above you and call out the next cluster of souls.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>With that I leapt skyward and flapped fifteen feet above The Reaper so he didn’t nick me with that brimstone-and-haloxite scythe. Bunches of souls glimmered in the darkness here and there like ripe grapes on the vine. One bunch on a street corner with Nazis waving torches. Two clusters on a rooftop, however they’d gotten there. Four groups in a line going into a boutique that was half-burning and spilling light everywhere.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I led him to each soul bunch and we harvested them, making our way to the boutique. I pointed out a demolished synagogue with almost a hundred souls about two blocks away from the fracas. Nazi men and women both in uniform and in street clothes poured out of the synagogue with molotov cocktails, clubs, and guns in their hands. Stained glass peppered the pavement beneath each window, where souls wandered in circles around the outside and inside.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“We’d better hurry and harvest that group there,” I called to The Reaper. “Fire can’t hurt us, but I am not buying a new wardrobe.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap looked where I was pointing, then took to the air without the need for wings. “I thought you would relish another trip to Inner Pleonia.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I actively avoid the Fourth Circle. Don’t care how fancy the shops are.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Avarice employs the best tailors and clothiers."</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1">"Sure," I snarked. "It would look great if we lined the enemy's pockets."</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1">"All her legitimate businesses are there.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“So maybe <i>you</i> should go there and get some new duds.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“These robes have served me well as long as I can remember. They will do.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>We flew over the rioters and entered the synagogue’s front door, which was splintered in pieces and piled against the wall on the left where a fire was already crackling. I flapped away from it and landed among the pews in the center. If the fire those rioters had started engulfed me, I’d lose my Folio and the chemical-toed boots I hadn’t gotten to use yet.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>While The Reaper swept his scythe through soul after soul, I gazed at the ceiling that hid us from the Seraphs, the overturned pews where hungry fires burned, and the bodies in the far corner. Then I froze when I saw the uniform on the woman standing over the still-living humans.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride sank a triangular trench knife into a victim who screamed and collapsed, twitching as the blood ran freely out of the wound. Moments later, the Jewish woman expired and her soul stood up from her corpse, life force radiating from her toes to her tormented face. Pride straightened her spine and raised her chin high. My former martial arts instructor examined every inch of her black-and-gold Convictionist uniform to make sure no blood had spattered onto it. Then she reached out a hand and drank the life force from the fresh soul.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>This had been the first time I’d seen Pride in decades, and at the time, I sure as hell didn’t want The Reaper to know anything about her or us. Let him be distracted by the hundred or so souls he was harvesting in the area. While my boss circled the synagogue outside, I blitzed at Pride and drew the haloxite knife from inside my blazer. Fury and pain fueled every wingflap. Red slivers swirled behind both eyes.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I wanted to cover up that pain by killing its source.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride pivoted on her back foot at the same moment I swung the knife blade at her neck. She seized my arm with one of hers, whipped me over her head, and hammered me down onto the shattered brick of a destroyed windowsill.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride touched the remaining brickwork with her other hand and cut loose with her white collar power. Re-Glorify. The recently wrecked brick re-formed around my hand and head, trapping the rest of me in plain view of the Seraphs overhead on the outside of the synagogue.</span></div>
<br />
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">That left me trapped with the Septuplet I’d hoped never to see again. </span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-12990216334763082772017-08-27T18:04:00.000-07:002018-02-11T20:16:00.746-08:00Case 11 - Ep. 1: Bandwagon Pride<div class="p1">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm6ItataQaGoZ4ca-TqRTleRjsQdFM-k7YSlE6fGLWbndyTFUixqkHB17b5A6NZk0Z7NHtYQGBxKzbvqcMG6aHcIhGZp8-08sQ3m83tb4gQMsaAyw2H5Y2wkQETgEDH0k18_LgDgj-4m4/s1600/Ohel+Yakob+Synagogue.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm6ItataQaGoZ4ca-TqRTleRjsQdFM-k7YSlE6fGLWbndyTFUixqkHB17b5A6NZk0Z7NHtYQGBxKzbvqcMG6aHcIhGZp8-08sQ3m83tb4gQMsaAyw2H5Y2wkQETgEDH0k18_LgDgj-4m4/s320/Ohel+Yakob+Synagogue.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A World For A Secret by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="s1">“You never told me Jack Te-Konos shot your toe off in the Spanish Civil War, Avaline.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I eyeballed The Reaper the way a death-fearing human wouldn’t. “What about your leg during The Battle of Amiens? You never mentioned you had surgery either.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>We entered The Reaper’s re-built office and he sat behind his new glass-topped desk. “I went to Abel Memorial Hospital in Eden. Bones are easier for them to rejuvenate than the whole flesh package.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>His modern vernacular was getting better. Or worse depending on whether you saw the obvious joke or not. I tossed my crimson hair, then wiggled my toes in their chemical-toed boots. “One toe is a lot easier to rejuvenate. How’d you get your leg back?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Myth Medicine. You?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“I sat on my ass and chugged life force from motes for two weeks so it’d heal on its own. Didn’t you ever wonder why Contressa ran double shifts after Madrid?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>When The Reaper shook his head, the firelight LEDs overhead flickered and lent his shadowy skull even more shadows. “You are a responsible demon. I presumed Niariel helped you or you’d gotten surgery on your own.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>The old bag of bones respected independence. One reason I enjoyed working for him. I smirked. “I’ve only been to Heaven recently. Something about self-righteous angels and the SPD’s snobby attitude keeps me away usually.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Ah,” Reap replied. “Your new angel with benefits.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Yep, his modern sensibilities were getting too fine-tuned. Reading subtext was now on his list of powers. I strolled over to the filing cabinets that lined both sides of his office and opened a drawer. Removing pen, paper, and folders, I took the bundle to the desk and sat in one of the chairs in front of it. “You and Nia are way too interested in him. What’s the deal?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>The Reaper waved the ebony bones of one hand at the bay windows behind him, where dozens of usher angels and banker demons ran fresh souls through The Soul Fountains below. “To use your own words, ‘There is only one angel I trust.’ Now there are apparently two.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Reap,” I drawled, dragging out the “e” sound for a couple seconds. “It’s Thursday. We just harvested from a million-plus city. You sure you aren’t strung out after Sydney?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Who are you talking to right now?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Maybe having the old job-obsessed Reaper back would be better than the Reaper that’s come out since we started writing these Case Notes. I rolled my eyes. “Okay, okay. Maybe you’ll meet Terrence after we get done writing these things. Nia's got a surprise for you tomorrow, so don't wear yourself out too much." </span></div>
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<span class="s1">I dropped the big point like a word bomb. "Seems to me you’re looking for whoever plots things out for The Pneuma Coalition.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>When The freaking <i>Reaper</i> stared at you with his mandible hanging low, it meant you’d genuinely stunned him. I pressed on. “You said The Motery Center or someone plots our cities and when to harvest from them. Last night you asked me to recall Madrid, and that was the night we discussed route plotting before Avarice sicced Jack Te-Konos and his infinite rifle spell on us.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Nodding his skull, The Reaper rasped a dragon’s whisper. “Yes, Avaline, that is on my agenda, but do NOT write that. In fact, I confess I threw away your final page from last evening. Musings that seem true will mis-direct any Coalition members who catch onto what we’re seeking. I left those in.”</span><br />
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I cocked an eyebrow at him. “So you’re an editor now?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>The Reaper raised five black phalanges and counted off on them. “It is public knowledge that you detest cellular phones.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“For a damn good reason, yes.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Rumor has spread at The Down South Lounge that we are training new bodyguards.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“We shouted that one out to the whole floor of gamers there.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>He ticked off his last three bone digits. “We’ve been seen in a destroyed office more than once. It is known we don’t like being interrupted while you and I are alone here. And finally, no Seraphs have been seen here at the Motery Center since we began.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I did the mental math and came up with an equation I hadn’t known The Reaper was balancing this whole time. “You conniving genius. We’re <i>luring </i>The Pneuma Coalition here. That’s why you wanted me and Nia to sneak in the ingredients last time. Once the mastermind in their ranks sees we’re ‘weak and vulnerable,’ they’ll come to this office themselves to try and end us while the SPD is ‘gone’ and no one’s paying attention.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>If The Reaper had lips, they’d be sliding up into a cheshire smirk. He purred, “And you thought your boss was angry yesterday for no reason.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I snorted a laugh. “Hey, you got a hug from Nia. She’s genuine with those who are genuine with her. You were <i>actually </i>pissed.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“Of course I was. I remain as angry as ever. If I had more time among harvests and writing with you, I’d be plotting a better system for harvesting souls."</span></div>
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<div class="p1">
It was the chilly office that made me shiver. </div>
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It wasn't the guilt digging itself up from the mental grave I'd buried it in.</div>
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<span class="s1">The Reaper didn't seem to notice and he continued. "A system where the Seraph Police Department could keep The Coalition away from our souls indefinitely.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Crossing my arms, I said, “Do you even want the brimvisibility for your own protection?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>The Reaper waggled his carpals in a yes-and-no gesture. “It is also a trap we may need to spring at a moment’s notice. Have the vials mixed and completed as soon as you are able. Now let us discuss November 9th and 10th, 1938.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>I raised the pen. “So we’re going over the Convictionists again, huh?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>“They gave rise to The Coalition according to you. This next historical event requires the eyes of someone who’s experienced in how they worked before The Industrial Revolution shook The Three Domains.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>Fear and embarrassment sparked a fire in me and I flinched. The Reaper had just proven he was an excellent planner. Had he read into my lies and reviewed the Case Notes when our shifts were over? </span></div>
<br />
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"></span>G-O-double-D I hoped not. No way was I going back to what I was before The Industrial Revolution. I’d die before that happened.</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-79477572008193467652017-08-19T11:02:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:18:36.716-08:00Case 10 - Ep. 3: The Reaper's Regression<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuBm0zZ3fjHe6l1Zg9CbZmm4oduqLJVoHNM7UUowYcWQqW7AGCLOYdlnCCXlj4n3bx-tjc_UJkeDX5l2UBO00DVqJiB2fQxfBjO98deoheWT3AhxTr4QtlXTyzQqWHajvKXhbO0_uohNs/s1600/She+does+not+fear+the+Reaper+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuBm0zZ3fjHe6l1Zg9CbZmm4oduqLJVoHNM7UUowYcWQqW7AGCLOYdlnCCXlj4n3bx-tjc_UJkeDX5l2UBO00DVqJiB2fQxfBjO98deoheWT3AhxTr4QtlXTyzQqWHajvKXhbO0_uohNs/s320/She+does+not+fear+the+Reaper+%25281%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sincerity And Sass by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">I slapped my bleeding hand to my chest and The Reaper’s back, then shoved outward with unguided Blood Magic. Hundreds of Spanish Nationalists led by Avarice and Jack Te-Konos fired a storm of haloxite rounds up at us. Using the unguided Blood Magic, I shoved the both of us in opposite directions and plastered us against the two buildings on either side of the Madrid back alley. The glowing wave of death whipped right past us into the open sky. Since 1939 Madrid was a big city in the middle of a civil war, I’d assumed the SPD had cleared the place of Coalition thieves and left so we could do our job harvesting fresh human souls. That was how Avarice and Jack had found us.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My eyes darted to the lone Nationalist general among the Spaniards and I knew instantly how they’d done it. Just a few summoners, who’d summoned only a few demons, were taking orders from Avarice to band some men together and hunt us if they saw us. That’s why Avarice could order him and the few other summoners in the city around. No one else nearby had summoned any demons, and I’d bet those the others had summoned were flying our way right now.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Since I still had the bomber plane pictures in my good hand, I risked it and flew back over the alley-o-death again to get to The Reaper’s side. “Jack’s gun can only fire one shot, and those soldiers can’t fly. Let’s lose ‘em.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper cackled and tore skyward with Seversoul tight in his grip. Then he right-angled over the rooftops and I flapped hard behind him. Nighttime air whisked through my hair and Reap’s robes fluttered ahead of me. He flew maybe ten blocks and caught sight of another cluster of souls at street level where a skirmish had left a whole lot of corpses. Salty odors of copper and blood wafted up while we landed and started harvesting in a hurry. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“You must be disappointed you didn’t get to use your secret-toed boots again,” The Reaper rattled while he swiped his scythe through dozens of souls.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“We’re too good,” I answered. “Don’t need them apparently.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I was only watching the sky for a moment or two when Jack Te-Konos and Avarice arced above the same rooftop we’d flown over half a minute ago. The fallen angel belted out two French words and held his right hand over his head, his palm red with a glow like a mote’s. A rifle zipped down the building’s facade and into his hand. Its stock shone with a French word carved into it like the one I’d seen moments ago.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My eyes shot wide as gates. Brimstone and haloxite ammunition went volatile near demons and angels. All gunpowder near any of us went off at once if we fired one shot. Jack Te-Konos had found a way around the one-and-done nature of gunpowder. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Sighting on me, he fired and I leapt high into the air with a hard wingbeat. The haloxite round tore through my big toe and pain bit upward from the spot. Powdered haloxite poured out of the hidden space in my right boot while I screamed and flapped skyward in earnest. Reap spun in midair at the sound of my caterwauling, corkscrewing headfirst toward the fallen angel. Jack summoned another rifle to him, fired, and missed. Then he squealed and pumped his wings in a mad dash to get out of the way of The Reaper’s brimstone ram’s horns. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Another cackle and Reap swung Seversoul in a diagonal arc downward at Jack’s head. He back-bent like a limbo champ and dodged the two-toned scythe blade, but it sliced the ruff off that ridiculous shirt of his.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Glancing from my throbbing lack of a toe to the other shoe, a laugh snuck in among the groans. I still had one boot left intact, and now my palm and my foot were bloody with orange fluid.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>While Jack righted himself, I slapped a picture of a bomber to the bleeding palm. Then I hauled air to get between him and The Reaper. Duty called, and I wanted that duty handled ASAP. Pumping both wings, I flung a side-to-back-side kick at the off-balance Jack.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">My left foot cracked into his neck and the powdered brimstone in the toe burst forth. It coated his face and got in his eyes. He might have screamed. A little.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>When my right foot connected, I knew my blood had soaked his shirt and I plastered the bomber picture to the same spot. I’d bled too much to use the spells I wanted, but one last surge of guided Blood Magic sent the fangel spinning away from me over the rooftops and out of sight. Literally spinning. Like the propellors on the plane in the picture.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Hey, magic is not a toy, and I didn’t use it like one.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper cackled behind me and I landed on the cobbles, then turned to find Avarice using her white collar power on him. Soliduction. Any one object that wasn’t magical or alive was hers to conjure over and over, including rinds, riches, and raiment. She slung bolas at The Reaper and tangled his legs, arms, and hood with them. A volcano’s eruption contained more mirth than my boss’s cackling and I flew at Avarice, not hiding the fury for her that I’d nursed so long.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper hit her first. He didn’t need wings to fly, and I’d bet that slipped her mind in the heat of how awesome she thought she was. My boss speared her with his spinning tackle and soared away with her so fast it looked like terminal velocity worked upward as well as down. </span>Show off.</div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>By the time I caught up to The Reaper in the skies above Madrid, Avarice had vanished. No smoke lingered in the atmosphere, and I knew he wouldn’t have ended her without some Seraphs to witness Avarice’s violation of Heaven Law first. Demons swarmed the streets below us, snatching up hundreds of souls and absorbing their life force. The Pneuma Coalition had won the overall battle even though The Reaper and I had defeated our own opponents.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Avaline,” The Reaper said. “Could you please untie me now?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I sliced off the bolas that bound him with my horns, having lost the haloxite knife somewhere during the fighting. Embarrassment shriveled me where I flapped. I’d done my job, but I hadn’t done it. The Reaper was safe, but stopping The Coalition’s soul thievery now would be certain death with that many demon thieves down there. Jack and Avarice had the planning on their side, that was for sure. Judging by all the soldiers back there, I’d bet good motes Jack had hundreds and hundreds of Incanted rifles he could summon at a moment’s notice. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>A memory nipped at me through the pulsing pain in my foot and hand. Reap said earlier that the cities we visited were planned for us. That thought hadn’t meant anything in 1939 and I’d dismissed it so we could fly back to the Motery Center and recover. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">But here in 2015 as I write this? </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>If someone’s job at The Soul Fountains was to schedule mine and Reap’s harvests, then someone had to be doing the same for The Pneuma Coalition all along. Whoever it was, they had to be manipulating human leadership as well. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Great Depression Seattle, World War II Paris, and Spanish Civil War Madrid each had crazy-powerful figureheads leading humanity that behaved in ways they shouldn’t, and the results were perennial soul stashes or wars that erupted like weeds.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span><i>That’s</i> what The Reaper wanted to learn by writing these Case Notes.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He wanted to find the planning mastermind behind The Coalition.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Right?</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-30531512727010882772017-08-12T10:38:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:18:23.134-08:00Case 10 - Ep. 2: The Reaper's Regression<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuBm0zZ3fjHe6l1Zg9CbZmm4oduqLJVoHNM7UUowYcWQqW7AGCLOYdlnCCXlj4n3bx-tjc_UJkeDX5l2UBO00DVqJiB2fQxfBjO98deoheWT3AhxTr4QtlXTyzQqWHajvKXhbO0_uohNs/s1600/She+does+not+fear+the+Reaper+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuBm0zZ3fjHe6l1Zg9CbZmm4oduqLJVoHNM7UUowYcWQqW7AGCLOYdlnCCXlj4n3bx-tjc_UJkeDX5l2UBO00DVqJiB2fQxfBjO98deoheWT3AhxTr4QtlXTyzQqWHajvKXhbO0_uohNs/s320/She+does+not+fear+the+Reaper+%25281%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sincerity And Sass by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Souls gushed forth from Madrid in early 1939, and the Seraph Police Department was so overloaded that the Chief Seraph herself had called Reap’s office. The Pneuma Coalition’s flocks of demon thieves had swelled to include more fallen angels. Everyone on their side smelled the war on Earth coming like a delicious meal someone else was cooking. The Reaper and I finished up with the Chief Seraph and took the Motery Center’s hell divide, flying out the other side into Madrid’s University City area.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Fresh souls and bullets peppered the Spanish street below, permeating the air with the odors of hot gunpowder and blood and salt. We soared over the raging shootout between the human Nationalists and Republicans, with me in my usual blazer and blouse, and The Reaper spinning Seversoul to catch the deceased souls as soon as their bodies expired. The skies were empty of demons or fallen angels. No Seraphs were around to keep an eye on the place either. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Back then, it made me nervous as all get out, but now I know a few things to look for while writing this.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I flapped in a circle around three city blocks, drawing a haloxite knife and expecting demons to blitz out of a building or a residential area. Wind whipped at my hair and blazer, the noise lost among gunfire and The Reaper’s cackles while he harvested souls by the dozen. Metal rounds bounced off both of our bodies and clothes while we worked. Thank you, brimstone horns. Once the main streets were harvested, we drew up and hovered in a back alley. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I drew the Blood Magic folio out of my inner blazer pocket and flipped to the space between the ‘strength’ and ‘weight’ sections. “They’re shooting the hell out of each other and no Coalition thieves are around? This sounds exactly like Avarice or Jack set it up.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper’s hood had fallen off during the flight, and he raised the brown cloth over his ram’s horns and ebony skull. “Those two take advantage of mass amounts of death in unexpected places.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Unexpected?” I asked, gouging my left hand with the haloxite knife and wincing while the orange blood welled up. “They come for us every few years. It’s always on battlefields or outside the major Earth cities. They go there because the Seraphs <i>aren’t </i>there.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“No Seraphs are here either. When we harvest big cities, the presence of the SPD is strong enough to make our work a simple matter of plotting fast routes through the urban sprawl.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Love those four hour work days.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper glanced at the carvings on both sides of his two-toned scythe. “The cities we scour are scheduled for us. We adhere to our own plans when it comes to harvesting the individual city.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Wait, I thought <i>you </i>knew where the most souls were on Earth. Like it was an instinct or a white collar power like the Septuplets work with.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He shook his hood. “You think I have time to visit each human city and analyze the soul count myself? Never.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I took a handful of bomber plane pictures from the Folio and pocketed it. “So someone high up in the Motery Center scouts the cities for us, and <i>then </i>we go there and harvest.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>If The Reaper had eyebrows, he’d have raised one. “Someone with the abilities of a Septuplet must do the same type of duty for The Pneuma Coalition.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Wait, you took almost sixty years to tell me that someone else scouts the cities. Is that why the Chief Seraph was so eager to work with us? For first knowledge of where fresh souls are located?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Listen, Avaline. Knowing what you just learned does not change your job description. You are my bodyguard, and you work for me alone. Not the Motery Center, not the Volunteer Guardian Angels, and not the SPD. Think about what I just--”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Spaniards charged through the street next to us and flooded into the alley. Unless they prayed or summoned recently, they’d never be able to see us. The Pneuma Coalition had stopped using summoners for decades now, so I waited patiently while they ran. Soon another group would pursue them, followed by a shootout and then the harvesting business as usual.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>All of the men were Nationalist rebels. They were the ones charging into Madrid and gaining ground with every hour that passed. I’d seen that much while The Reaper and I harvested back on the main streets. More and more Nationalists poured into the space and before too long, I couldn’t see the brickwork of the road.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>One more man in the uniform of a general rounded the corner, waving two fliers into the cramped alley. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Avarice and Jack Te-Konos. Avarice had ditched her flouncy lolita dress for an off-white night gown unbuttoned so far you could see her cleave from England. Jack shed his torn blazer and flew next to her in just his ruffed shirt and slashed dress pants. A red aura around his left fist died out almost before I noticed it. He dove for the nearest soldier’s rifle and snatched it at the same moment I readied the Blood Magic.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<br /></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack twisted the rifle to hide the crimson words etched on the stock and Avarice bellowed at the general. “Fire skyward, now.”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-36682532099436065752017-08-05T04:06:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:18:09.547-08:00Case 10 - Ep. 1: The Reaper's Regression<div class="p1">
<div style="text-align: right;">
</div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBQSHWUPHFXgluUq6kwOU20lTf-pwQFlnZQpCrEtZ530c0cfFMwrVGvSHVgSKlfOW8WOOuyqkGhswBp7rHVzIzJ0K5tTr8myYPoW5xB0JhuGV0IP4gcRUuso1yjKABhz4PwZZuDXPSSHs/s1600/She+does+not+fear+the+Reaper+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBQSHWUPHFXgluUq6kwOU20lTf-pwQFlnZQpCrEtZ530c0cfFMwrVGvSHVgSKlfOW8WOOuyqkGhswBp7rHVzIzJ0K5tTr8myYPoW5xB0JhuGV0IP4gcRUuso1yjKABhz4PwZZuDXPSSHs/s320/She+does+not+fear+the+Reaper+%25281%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sincerity And Sass by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="s1">Every window of The Reaper’s office was shattered.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I flapped closer to the Motery Center in downtown Fountainia and darted looks at every inch of the urban sprawl. No fleeing demons or fallen angels were flying over the neon signage on the hell side of town. A lone angel pumped her wings and arced toward me from the fancy architecture that made up the heaven side of the city. Chills pricked my skin under the blazer and blouse like mosquito icicles.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Hildariel had let her guard down for one minute and someone had murdered The Reaper.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I alighted on The Reaper’s half-wrecked office balcony and sucked in a lungful of brick dust by accident. Spluttering, I readied the Blood Magic folio and the haloxite lancet pen I carried everywhere I went. No magic of mine could fix the jagged holes in the brick facade or the windows and the office door that had been sliced to pieces. I would definitely end whatever Coalition member had found out we were writing these Case Notes. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>A haloxite crescent whipped through the air inside the decimated office, its sharp glow flashing from golden to red-black and back. “Reap?” I shouted. “Who’s in there?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Granite-grinding snarls burst amid the crashing of wreckage. “It should be working by now. I have wielded Seversoul for as long as I can remember. Was it the Convictionists? The Coalition? The Graziers before them?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Relief soaked into all my muscled and I relaxed. The Reaper wasn’t dead. Just pissed off. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He proceeded to swing his scythe around and around in the tiny office space. A file cabinet tumbled out onto the balcony, shorn in two. No papers fluttered out of it and I thanked the little luck I had that he hadn’t destroyed our ten days’ work in one freak-out. So far.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The angel I’d seen earlier touched down next to me and I jumped a foot in the air. Nia wasn’t in her usual bar tending getup. Her icy-blue blouse was unbuttoned at the top, showing a leather mote necklace with a white mote glowing full-force against her collarbone. Stone dust started to cake onto her blue suit coat and tailored pants, and her halo’s golden glow made it look like dandruff. I doubted her two-inch Aurora heels concealed weapons the way my shoes did, but Nia wasn’t in the business of asskickery.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Holding out a handful of vials to me, she kept her wide eyes on The Reaper. “Is he going to be okay?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">The Reaper practiced his golf swing on a desk chair.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Dunno,” I replied, cradling my Blood Magic stuff in one wing. “He’s been losing his temper a lot since we started writing.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>An arm and a leg soared past us and plunged thirteen stories to the busy street.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“The Reaper needs a hug,” Nia said.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I snorted. “Go right ahead.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My best friend shook her head. “I mean, I’d offer to hug him, but--”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>A second file cabinet whipped past like a semi truck burning nitrous. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“--I didn’t plan facial reconstructive surgery today. Did you bring the ingredients?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I drew out a sealed bag of powdered brimstone and several more containing sulfur and an invisible ingredient, among others.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia puffed out a breath. “Thank G-O-double-D.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>A laugh burst from me and I pocketed the bags and vials. “If you weren’t around, Nia, I wouldn’t laugh as much.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I’m all kinds of fun. Now, go help him out before he levels the whole thirteenth floor.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I switched the Blood Magic folio from wing to hand, readied the lancet pen again, and stepped into the space where the door frame used to be. “Hey Reap, it’s me. Could you please chill out? I brought the ingredients we talked about.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Dust and debris peppered the floor and half the file cabinets were upended against the right wall. He hadn’t slashed out the lights overhead, and I kind of wished he had. It’d feel less like a creepy mausoleum that way. The Reaper panted amid the rubble, his hood half off, hanging from one ebony horn. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He stepped toward me and Nia, breathing desert wind and gripping his scythe. “We are not finding what we need, Avaline. Sifting through my memories was supposed to make the answers clear.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I reached into my blazer and produced the bag of powdered brimstone and a vial. “We need to keep you protected. Hildariel’s training will go more smoothly once you’re invisible to all eyes and not just human eyes.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper’s breathing slowed and he dropped his scythe. “You and Niariel are the genuine item. Helpful and straightforward.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That’s because we give a shit.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Give a <i>crap,</i>” Nia corrected from the balcony. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I threw an over-the-shoulder eyebrow raise at her. “How are you not a fallen angel yet?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That’s not a swear word,” she said, her grin oozing with lascivious. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Did G-O-double-D confirm that?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper cackled and brushed half a desk chair aside with his black bony foot. “I suppose I should be more patient. The memories will come back on their own. We just need to persist.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That does seem to be the way it goes. Keep plugging away.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nia walked in and waved her wing at The Reaper. “Get in here you old fart.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap tilted his skull as he stepped up to her. “Avaline is fortunate to know you.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I almost laughed again when Nia hugged him, wings, arms, and all. She was at least a foot shorter than he was. Nia turned around a second later and said, “That’s another story for the bar. Now I can say I glomped The Reaper.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I’d known for centuries that my best friend could manage a bar in Hell and not fall. That right there was another shining example of why she could be who she was. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I raised a wing and saluted Nia. “See you at the Lounge sometime.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Bring your angel with benefits sometime.” With that, she crossed to the balcony and took off toward the Heaven side of town. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper took up his scythe, picked up his hood, and said, “Discussing World War II isn’t working. We must go back a ways.” He looked around at the rubble and added, “And is there anyone on our staff who can fix this?”</span></div>
<br />
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I nodded and dug pen and paper from the pile. “Same angel as before. I’ll let her know.”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-6100761606059076552017-07-29T08:14:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:17:48.551-08:00Case 9 - Ep. 3: Proud As Parasites<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZQB7jLdzrhyphenhyphenCxiBSAPP0f_CO8MzvQIPdXAqqOs3GgBuID5xx0zizE7r8wL7xV_GWBJRDm0h2Cr1k-B5fkPEua-SfJzpLpbxvbdcuV4qf1evDOEW98FkPA60uECMoEeFvCGHot6jRzt7o/s1600/Pride+w+armband.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZQB7jLdzrhyphenhyphenCxiBSAPP0f_CO8MzvQIPdXAqqOs3GgBuID5xx0zizE7r8wL7xV_GWBJRDm0h2Cr1k-B5fkPEua-SfJzpLpbxvbdcuV4qf1evDOEW98FkPA60uECMoEeFvCGHot6jRzt7o/s320/Pride+w+armband.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Convictionist Pride by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">“I’m not protecting the German Chancellor,” I hissed at Pride. “I’m destroying the demons around him.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride’s black and gold uniform radiated authority as she straightened her spine and pointed a wing at me. “That is the same as defending him.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Nazi soldiers and French politicians stood at the edges of the ranks of humans on both sides of the Fuhrer’s train. His decorated train car gleamed like it was brand new, despite its decades-old body and parts. Smoke and sweat tainted the breeze that blew between the pristine Parisian buildings. Men shouted orders to each other nearby and in the distance. One of those men bellowed in familiar French words. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I forced myself to focus on the task at hand. The German Chancellor had to have some reason to preserve the cityscape and not raze it to the ground. The flocks of demon thieves The Reaper and I had wrecked must’ve been under Pride’s command. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“You work for the Coalition,” I said. “Of course you’d think that. The demons that Reap and I slew were stealing the souls that lawfully belong to the Soul Fountains.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride smirked, her sharp-boned face tightening. “Look at the uniform I wear, Avaline.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My eyes leapt to the coiled braid at her shoulder and back to her mahogany eyes. “Yeah, you re-constructed it with your white collar superpower. You Septuplets are so spoiled and self-righteous. That thing doesn’t mean jack since the Industrial Revolution is done.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper stepped forward and tilted his skull at her from beneath his hood. “You Convictionist bitch. What have you found? Tell me what you know or my scythe will devour you and your life force.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I rounded on Reap and clutched the last paper square of my Blood Magic spell in my left hand. He’d never out and out <i>hated </i>anyone whether they were with the Pneuma Coalition or not. Harvesting souls for the life force within them had been his obsession since he’d first hired me. The Soul Fountains came first. For both of us. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Why did a Septuplet from my past that he’d never met set him off like that?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I remember you, Reaper,” Pride said, voice rich as silk. “I’d bet good motes you don’t remember me. I’ll tell you that <i>I </i>haven’t found anything. Why do you feed Heaven’s agenda?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“The Three Domains need the mote system we’ve built.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“You are referring to the parasites that take advantage of both your system and the Coalition’s. They hoard motes <i>and </i>steal life force when The Coalition calls on them. I have never been a parasite. Everything you see around us has been Re-Glorified back to its most proud condition. Parasites do not do such things.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I ripped my eyes from Pride’s and glared at The Reaper. “Wait. Parasites? The Soul Fountains allow parasites?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper gestured around the street with his scythe. “Those who mooch off of others do not lead. They do not think for themselves, these stalking saps.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride nodded her agreement. “One cannot be proud of what one is handed. Only of what one builds or restores under their own direction.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Then tell me why you are here. Do you oppose The Coalition? Support it?” He lifted Seversoul and prepared to lash out at her.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Tingles flooded my mind and I froze in place. Sharp-dressed French politicians lined up in front of Nazi soldiers and walked solemnly toward the German Chancellor’s train car door. One of them pushed his hair back off his forehead, then ducked his head low. So what if the humans worshipped or killed this Fuhrer. I was here to make sure the souls the SPD was <i>supposed </i>to be protecting made it to the Soul Fountains. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Wait one second.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>French orders shouted to a German<i> </i>army?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Buildings in perfect shape despite the human war going on?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>No Seraphs nearby in an urban center they actively watched?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I slapped the last shred of the elephant picture to my bleeding left palm and fired up the Blood Magic. Trumpeting erupted into the air and I aimed the spell at the fallen angel who’d hidden among the Nazis. That would stop him from shouting out Incantations or from starting up the ones he’d already scratched onto nearby surfaces. The gun-toting humans nearby covered their ears to shelter them from the racket.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Shedding his no-doubt stolen uniform, Jack Te-Konos took to the skies and pivoted in mid-air to wave his wings at the train car. Jack. Freaking. Te-Konos. Had Pride sought him out, or did Jack offer her something better than her position as Dean at Phlegethon-U?</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>An angel in full Seraph uniform stepped from the now open train car, raising a wing to Jack in acknowledgement. She was thin as a stick and her brown hair looked like it took up just as much space as her torso. I recognized her from her days as a Volunteer Guardian Angel. The Reaper hissed next to me and I knew he automatically assumed the worst. I dropped the spell and spoke into the quiet. “Hey Lyndsarial. Did you get promoted or bribed?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She ruffled her sand-colored wings. “I answer to the Chief Seraph now, and she would agree that you were only defending yourselves.” Then she cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted up to Jack. “You are wrong, Mr. Te-Konos. Every false alarm you raise decreases the value of your word.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Some pieces slapped together in my mind and I addressed Lyndsarial as formally as the anger pounding through my veins would let me. “Jack’s with The Pneuma Coalition, and he and Pride tried to make The Reaper and me break Heaven Law.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Seraph opened her mouth to reply and Jack’s bellow cut her off. “Ava and The Reaper have a reputation for murdering demons and Septuplets. We’re all next on her--”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>When the rest of the pieces twisted into place, I let fly with the Blood Magic and turned the elephant trumpeting up as high as it would go. Then I waved for The Reaper to follow me and I dove for Lyndsarial, dragging her skyward by her halo and flapping as hard as I could. Seconds later, The Reaper shot past with Seversoul at the ready, expecting the same attack I was. I cut the Blood Magic and put up my guard, ready to kick the first thing that came at me.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Only silence met with us in the sky above the Fuhrer’s fancified train car. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Two streaks flew south away from Paris, one in a half-shredded blazer, the other in a black and gold uniform that I hadn’t seen since the Soul Fountains were built.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Heart thudding, I let go of Lyndsarial’s halo and grimaced at the blister that had formed because I’d squeezed it too hard. “You left the Volunteer Guardian Angels and didn’t tell us?”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Her voice was double-dipped in shyness when we’d worked together a couple decades ago. Now when she spoke, it was with practiced formality. “My responsibility is to the Chief Seraph. Jack approached her with a haloxite round coated in your blood. He said you’d used it to attempt murder on him and on Avarice last year on the Khalkin Gol river in Outer Mongolia. I was just here to follow through on his advice that you would strike again.”</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I mouthed wordlessly at her. Jack had twisted the events from a lot of our past encounters into a bullshit pretzel, and the Chief Seraph had devoured it and sent Lyndsarial to watch us from the Fuhrer’s train car. And since The Reaper had killed Rage, and I’d gotten fired once for attacking a Septuplet, that had given him even more chips for the bullshit-throwing contest. Pride and her history with me was the dijon mustard on the bullshit sandwich.</span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>This was the last time I’d be underestimating Jack Te-Konos. </span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper hovered level with me and Lyndsarial and pointed down at the train car, where the German Chancellor was inviting the French politicians inside to sign France’s surrender. My boss pointed at the train car and the buildings nearby. “Pride’s function was to disguise the explosive Incantments on the train car and the tenement buildings. They could have blown it. They could have destroyed you and claimed we attacked first, thus ending the Fuhrer and producing hundreds more souls for them to feed on. Pride does not need magic to re-construct objects.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“We have the Septuplets’ powers on record,” Lyndsarial interrupted. “Voracity causes addictions, Avarice generates itemized copies, and Pride re-builds. As long as the materials they use aren’t magical, the sky’s unlimited to them.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper cleared his vertebra. “Our attack was in self-defense. You saw how those demons came at us. That ought to be enough evidence to prove The Pneuma Coalition is breaking Heaven Law.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Yeah, like a piggy bank,” I chimed in. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“It’s enough for me,” the Seraph said. “You’ll have to convince thousands of other Seraphs. I hope you got what you wanted today. We’ll need bigger harvests as this war goes on.”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-35098650312059795212017-07-21T22:26:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:17:38.269-08:00Case 9 - Ep. 2: Proud As Parasites<div class="p1">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZQB7jLdzrhyphenhyphenCxiBSAPP0f_CO8MzvQIPdXAqqOs3GgBuID5xx0zizE7r8wL7xV_GWBJRDm0h2Cr1k-B5fkPEua-SfJzpLpbxvbdcuV4qf1evDOEW98FkPA60uECMoEeFvCGHot6jRzt7o/s1600/Pride+w+armband.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZQB7jLdzrhyphenhyphenCxiBSAPP0f_CO8MzvQIPdXAqqOs3GgBuID5xx0zizE7r8wL7xV_GWBJRDm0h2Cr1k-B5fkPEua-SfJzpLpbxvbdcuV4qf1evDOEW98FkPA60uECMoEeFvCGHot6jRzt7o/s320/Pride+w+armband.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Convictionist Pride by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="s1">“We don’t have time to call the SPD,” I shouted to The Reaper. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He swung his scythe through a hundred souls and they disappeared into the Hellblessed blade, life force and all. The haloxite side glared gold in the overcast lighting, and he spun it to point at me like a nun’s ruler. “Heaven Law is what allows us to harvest in the big cities unimpeded by the Coalition. If we destroy the demon thieves surrounding that train car, then we forfeit control of the harvesting process to the Chief Seraph.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He pointed down the ladderwork of metal and wood we’d been following on our days-long harvest along the train’s route into Paris. World War II meant a deluge of wartime souls in places outside big cities, and we hadn’t seen an urban environment the whole trip until now. A train undulated down the tracks and a demon in some kind of marching band uniform zipped in the air above it. Why hadn’t he attacked us yet?</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I pointed a wing at the train. “The Chief Seraph needs to give us a vigilante license.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper cackled. “I concur, Avaline. However, we <i>are </i>the Soul Fountains. Killing demon thieves means fewer demons to convert to our mote system. The Chief Seraph is relying on that.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Conversion's her job. We’ve helped her a ton. This time, our goal matters more than Heaven Law. If those parasite demons don’t see the Soul Fountains are better than the Coalition’s entrepreneurial b.s., that’s their fault. Force them to attack us. Then it’s self-defense.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He shrugged under his brown hooded robe. “Fine. We will risk destroying the demons only if no SPD agent is nearby. I will watch for Seraphs while you entrap the thieves pursuing that train car. Then I will end them.”</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span> I scanned the cityscape around the railroad tracks leading into downtown Paris, France. Gunpowder and smoke permeated the air and I breathed it in, glad for the smells of home and the abundance of souls around us. Whipping my Blood Magic folio out of my blazer pocket, I tore a magazine picture of an elephant into a couple dozen pieces. Many of them stuck to my sweaty palms when I put the folio away and I cursed. It’d be just a little un-good if the spell I had in mind entangled me by mistake.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap flew skyward without needing wings and arced along the tracks a hundred feet up, dragging Seversoul and its two-toned scythe blade with him. I pounded air with both wings and followed him toward the mechanical chugging of the German train that was slowing down half a mile up the track. Nia’s new mote bracelet clung to my left forearm above the Hades watch. I drew life force from the red motes it held there while we flew. I guess the fact that I could even wear her leather creation <i>and </i>plug motes into it made me more fortunate than most demons. I’d need all the honestly-earned life force I could get. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>On June 22nd, 1940, we were killing the demons surrounding the German Chancellor.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>All the thin lines we were walking flashed through my mind as we flew over brick-and-stone facades and streets with light poles that stuck up over thousands of marching Nazi soldiers. </span>As long as no Septuplet or Seraph was around, The Reaper and I did the job the way we’d always done. We ended fools.</div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I was guessing the lack of Seraphs in Paris was because they’d lose too many angels that way. When The Coalition came out en masse like they did in WWII Europe, law enforcement cost the SPD too much. Go figure.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The German train car slowed to crawling speed as we approached. Hundreds of soldiers formed ranks on either side of it. None of them saw the flocks of demons diving down and sapping life force from the newly deceased French souls amassed there. I guess prayers and summonings were beneath the German military. They’d be able to see all of us otherwise. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>When The Reaper and I touched down on the pavement a hundred yards away from the train car, I switched the fistful of paper squares between hands. I dried both palms, then drew out the haloxite knife I always carried. One small stab plus one hot stinging pain equaled orange blood that welled up from the left palm. Most of the paper squares stayed in my right hand, stacked there like a tiny deck of cards ready for the dealing.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap would never ruin our reputation of following Heaven Law. When he turned his back on the thieving varmints and presented them a target, it had to have been because he was thinking about contacting the SPD. I swear.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The demon parasites ditched the souls and pelted at the juicy prey twenty or thirty at a time. </span>Excitement thrilled through me at the thought of maybe getting to use my surprise-toed boots in combat at last. </div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap’s last-second snarl was a wildfire and he spun back around, scythe at the ready. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I put up my guard. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Then I opened the left palm and swatted aside the first demon’s haloxite-knuckled punch. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>One blood-sticky square clung to the attacker’s arm and I cranked out the Blood Magic. Her arm, shoulder, and body plunged downward as the spell’s weight crushed along the whole length of her. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Grinning, I slapped another square to the seeping blood of my left palm and ducked the next attacker’s kick. One open-hand strike later and his leg rushed to meet the cement along with the rest of him.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Five, ten, fifteen, twenty demons assaulted me from all sides and I pancaked each one of them to the ground with a magic-spiked block. The Reaper roared behind me and the staccato scrape of Seversoul against the cement pierced the air again and again. Mix my Blood Magic with The Reaper’s scythe work and you get a trail of dead demons with a don’t-screw-with-us garnish. Clouds of smoke billowed forth from each demon The Reaper finished, and a sharp yell mingled with the hiss of steam as the train car halted.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>No German Chancellor emerged. A single uniformed demon swooped down from the skies and alighted on the street in front of us, the cloth braids on one shoulder bouncing as she did. So I’d mis-judged. It wasn’t a he, and it wasn’t a marching band uniform.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Pride?” I blurted without thinking. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The only Septuplet who hadn’t changed her name during the Industrial Revolution came forward with her chin in the air.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap rasped, “How do you know her?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Stupid brain farts. I leaned toward The Reaper’s ram-horned skull. “Old Dean of Phlegethon-U. My alma mater. Pride’s the whole reason the Military and Assassin Combat programs exist there. We erm, we sparred a lot.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I kept an eye on her while she approached. Her chocolate hair matched the dark swirled color of her horns and wings. Corded braids draped from her right shoulder to the chest buttons on her uniform. I’d seen that uniform encased on her office wall while I was a student. No explanation needed as to why. The reason still hurt too much.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper growled, “Black and gold uniform. I thought those had all been destroyed after The Industrial Revolution. Was she a Convictionist?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Involuntary shudders slammed into me and I blurted, “Shut up about that, Reap!”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pride stopped a few feet away from us, her booted feet spread in parade rest. Or a concealed fighting stance. Her voice brimmed with a richness that rang like poisoned nostalgia. “Hell’s kind are foolish to keep mum about the Industrial Revolution. It happened, Avaline, and it is happening again.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Red tinged my vision and I spat on the ground at her feet. “You’re stealing from the Soul Fountains and inspiring demons to keep doing it.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She tsked and replied, “So many years I spent training you and you still make those snap judgments of yours. Nobody said I was working with The Pneuma Coalition.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“So you’re <i>defending</i> the German Chancellor out of the goodness of your heart?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“A system is only as good as the fuel that feeds it,” Pride lilted. “Why do <i>you </i>safeguard the worst dictator Earth has known?”</span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-76148677531866473582017-07-15T07:14:00.000-07:002018-02-11T19:16:51.341-08:00Case 9 - Ep. 1: Proud As Parasites<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWq03Ra4W-gDOgcrTjRUkbx7JwecoOeIjFjd3lI-XXrslvGYYBvtv41Y4nulQHHhpofLhyypG52j_iJB-26GaWBrvnAw-VzKH31TvOXQ27XuJLfx0mFCZFZ5hH7sZ2wrlhKtjt69lSQGk/s1600/Pride+w+armband.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWq03Ra4W-gDOgcrTjRUkbx7JwecoOeIjFjd3lI-XXrslvGYYBvtv41Y4nulQHHhpofLhyypG52j_iJB-26GaWBrvnAw-VzKH31TvOXQ27XuJLfx0mFCZFZ5hH7sZ2wrlhKtjt69lSQGk/s320/Pride+w+armband.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Convictionist Pride by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">The Reaper and I ascended up the side of the Motery Center in Fountainia, leaving behind the souls we’d harvested during Hildariel’s morning shift. I eyed his shadowy skull during the flight. He didn’t cast me any wary glances while we landed on his office balcony to find Hildy waiting for us. Her skintight tracksuit held fewer than half the crossbow bolts and switchblades she’d shown off at The Down South Lounge a couple nights ago. My boss hadn’t allowed her to see the unloading ritual we performed to empty the fresh souls from his scythe’s two-toned blade.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I wiped sweat off my face with a sleeve of the pinstriped blazer I’d worn to work. “Do you see now why you can’t use those exploding arrows when you’re in close during a fight?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>She yanked snarls out of her dyed-blonde hair and ruffled her wing feathers. “Get off my halo, Ava. They performed fine when The Reaper was behind me. I fly point, I clear a path, and he harvests.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap clacked toward her on his ebony, bone feet. “Your initial strikes into the swarming demons isn’t what concerns me. When we are surrounded, your choice of weapon forces us to retreat skyward, lest I catch haloxite shrapnel to the dome.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I was so proud of him, weaving modern English vernacular into his speech. It only took him a century and change.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Hildy shook her head. “Demons typically bow to what I demand once they see their first group of buddies die from an Incanted arrow.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Incanted. Heaven’s magic required words. I’d had enough experience with Jack Te-Konos and The Coalition to infer that. Hell’s spells required blood. Blood Magic. I stuck a mental post-it on my mind so I’d remember to ask Hildy more about Incantations later.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Bouncing for Nia is different than bodyguard duty,” I said. “Well paid winos behave differently than broke demons.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Hildariel scowled at me. “You insult my intelligence? Bar goers have something to lose, and they pay with their motes and their respect. Those are two of the weapons I use against troublemakers at The Lounge. Your enemies have no such respect for anyone.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“No one lives on respect alone. That’s the difference. Keep training with me during our shifts like you did today and you’ll get the hang of it. Going in arrows blazing’s just going to slow down the harvests.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“You are asking me to violate Heaven Law <i>and </i>do things your way.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I shrugged. “It’s part of the job. Three Domains of demons and angels depend on us to keep the motes flowing and full. We only kill demon thieves when there’s no way to call the Seraphs.” I might have left out a thing or two about how The Reaper and I did business. Tiptoeing around the SPD was in the job description.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The angel unfurled her wings and hissed, “Thin line to walk.” With that, she launched into the sky and flapped over downtown Fountainia, veering north toward the Heaven side of town. Her b.o. from the day’s work wafted at me and I waved it away with a wing. Trepidation skittered up my skin beneath the blazer and blouse. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I faced The Reaper, searching his hooded skull for signs he was suspicious. “Not sure how long she’ll be working with us.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He nodded once. “If we stopped harvesting the instant we spotted a demon thief among souls, Hell and Heaven would already be starved.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“And I refuse to carry a cell phone. Demons are so violent they’d stalk my friends if they got their hands on it. I’m your bodyguard. If the SPD wants us to follow their laws, <i>they</i> can enforce them on the level they seem to want <i>us</i> to do. With their <i>own </i>angels.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap cackled, crossed to his office door, and pulled it open with his free hand. “Right you are. We must discuss that extra defense you mentioned before we begin writing.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Huh. Seemed like he hadn’t read the writings we’d done last night. The job itself always did distract him to the point of obsession. Maybe he wouldn’t fire me or kill me for stealing souls. That <i>was</i> almost a hundred years ago.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I entered The Reaper’s ultra-modern office and flicked the lights on. Words carved into the switch plate shimmered and firelight emanated from the LED bulbs overhead. File cabinets lined both brick walls, chocolate wood flooring lent a homey feel to the renovated dungeon atmosphere. Out the far window, life force from the Soul Fountains spouted up to eye level and fell again into the haloxite-rimmed marble bowls. Crimson and ivory motes sopped up the life force and floated in strings onto desks I couldn't see beneath The Reaper's office window. Beyond The Fountains, the glass-and-steel skyscrapers gave way to an unspoken dividing line where neon signage marked Fountainia's south side, and pristine architecture shone on the north side.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>One more slip like the one I’d made a week ago and I’d never see this view of the city and system I fought for again.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper passed me and sat down at his glass-topped desk, then placed his scythe on top where it clanked to a standstill. “While you ready your pen, explain the added layer of security you have planned.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Tidying up my blazer, I pulled folders, pens, and paper from the file cabinet drawers. “Phlegethon University is my alma mater. The Assassin’s Combat professors still remember me from my decades of martial arts work there. I’m going to get ingredients from the Brimstone Chemistry department next door to my old dorm.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper crossed his arms, the elbows and wrists clacking together. “Doesn’t Brimstone Chemistry exist to cause explosions?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I snorted. “Brimvisibility fluid is also available there if you learn and work the recipes right. I’ll have batches ready in a few days as long as Terrence doesn’t distr--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Amused rasping burst from The Reaper’s jaws. “It was my assumption you were either spending all your time off at The Lounge, or you were getting some.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Bemusement flushed through me and heat radiated from both cheeks. I’d covered a career-ending crime only to toot a brain fart.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper rapped his carpals on the desktop. “I’m surprised you haven’t rubbed it in before now. You are the one with the actual parts to--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Whoa,” I blurted, the laughs flooding out of me. “I’m not trying to think about--wait, you’re a virgin. You have to be.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Stifling his cackles, The Reaper jabbed a finger at the papers I’d scattered on his desk. “And you have a responsibility to write. We have another shift after we document the Paris harvest of World War II.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My hackles raised at that and I slithered into my chair, crossing both arms. “Pride was a--” The word and its memories choked me and I tried again. “She was a Convictionist. What are you looking for this time? Some hint about a pre-Industrial Revolution insurrection?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“The Convictionists,” Reap hissed, “wanted to preserve prayers and summonings as the core of our lifestyles. Angels who received prayers got life force for their work. Demons summoned by humans devoured life force once they destroyed their target.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>A thought wave surged into me and I blurted, “You’re curious about the job of reaping. Of harvesting the souls of the dead. Didn’t you just harvest ghosts all the time before the Industrial Revolution wrecked us?”</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper gripped both horns and snarled an earthquake’s snarl. “We do <i>not </i>have time to dissect everything. For now, it is about the Convictionists and the Fountainians. Now write.”</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-14861624832309475252017-07-08T09:16:00.002-07:002017-07-08T09:17:55.653-07:00Case 8 - Ep. 3: Blind Faith's Soul<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikbCeQaTxhYz3rSA0cYz22bV3z5CJvioD1Rtu-OQ-uv62D1bwcwe_a3Mr3ueNwR5QUWCe5J3I1ceQQkvEF9M5NKxAabHEhujfSSgSSPxOdGfpBgGtOBdGzOXHJNvRLbbXJnguDnPzreAA/s1600/Submission+and+Starvation+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikbCeQaTxhYz3rSA0cYz22bV3z5CJvioD1Rtu-OQ-uv62D1bwcwe_a3Mr3ueNwR5QUWCe5J3I1ceQQkvEF9M5NKxAabHEhujfSSgSSPxOdGfpBgGtOBdGzOXHJNvRLbbXJnguDnPzreAA/s320/Submission+and+Starvation+%25281%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Submission and Starvation by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">Pinned beneath tons of World War II Russian tank.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Taunted by an old enemy and her new fallen angel pet. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>No haloxite for me to use to cast any Blood Magic.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Starving for life force because I’d worked more than a double and hadn’t touched a mote in almost 24 hours. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>There was only one way to save myself: I had to get shot.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Take these,” Avarice spat, standing above me. She passed a fistful of haloxite revolver rounds to Jack Te-Konos, who slipped them into an inner pocket of his combat-shredded blazer. The sharp golden-glowing cartridges fell from a hole in the pocket and scattered in the mud around his shoes. Avarice’s lolita dress swished as she stepped away from Jack, pointing her finger first at the revolver in his hand, then at the rounds on the ground. “Get some functional clothing, Jack. You’ve got more than enough motes after what The Coalition is paying you.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I glanced at Avarice’s do-me-now boots and the formidable cleave bulging from the dress’s bust. “Ha, ‘functional’ clothing.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack, who’d assumed his pocket worked properly, was peering at the hundreds of demons harrying The Reaper in the skies above the Khalkin Gol river in Outer Mongolia. Clouds of smog that used to be living, fighting demon thieves obscured the sun the way millions of midges would. I sucked in a breath and nearly choked on the metallic odors of blood, earth, and rust on the air. I knew what was coming next. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack gritted his teeth and grunted, “Jack did not realize The Reaper had been trained in martial arts. More than half of our--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Both of Avarice’s horns whipped down and butted Jack in the head for the second time in five minutes. I flinched involuntarily, hissed through my teeth, and forced my eyes off the ghosts and the lone scrumptious soul fifteen feet away on the river banks. My old enemy’s shrieks hit plane-engine levels. “Incompetent slave. Give me that revolver.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Pearly white blood dripped from Jack’s bruises that had torn open on Avarice’s second blow. He passed the gun to her on his flat palm, his eyes wider than I’d ever seen them in the years we’d fought each other. Then the fallen angel scrambled to retrieve the rest of the haloxite rounds he’d dropped. His shoes squelched in the muck and he stumbled in his hurry to obey.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I wriggled my left wing and claws, the only limb I had free that could help me escape this shit sandwich. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Avarice batted Jack aside with her wing, loaded the haloxite round she held into the revolver, and fired at me the same instant I whipped my free wing up from the ground. Hot agony sliced along the ridge of the wing and I seized the pain with my voice and will. Blood Magic flowed unguided and I shoved it with every ounce of effort I had left. Bullet, gun, and shooter launched skyward along the line of blood I’d smeared onto Avarice’s revolver and arm. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Gasping, I flipped my wing around and slammed the bleeding ridge into the tank that trapped me. Then I dragged it from left to right at an awkward angle. The smear I left was sloppy, but enough of my orange blood had slathered the metal for me to unleash a surge of unguided Blood Magic that covered most of the tank’s side. The tonnage tipped up at an angle and I pumped both wings, expecting to fly free. I’d been so hungry for life force I forgot to direct the Newtonian kick-back that came every time I shoved something with Blood Magic. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Instead of soaring out from under the tank, I rolled in the mud like a drunk demon falling off his barstool. Human blood and churned soil from the recent Russia vs Japan battles caked my skin all over, squeezing into my boots and tangling my scarlet hair. When I struggled to stand straight, the ground-shaking thud of the tank landing on its treads wrecked my balance and sent me sprawling again. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack face-planted too, and I couldn’t get my limbs to move for me to get the jump on him. </span></div>
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<span class="s1">Life force starvation. I had maybe ten minutes. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The fallen angel sprang up, shook mud from his tar-colored wings, and took in everything happening around me. Then he stepped closer and crouched down, bringing his crimson halo whipping down at me. Pain crackled and burst at the back of my skull. Swirls lit up in my field of vision. All I could hear was Jack’s seething voice. “You are seconds from starvation. Your Reaper will return to find a cloud of dead Ava, or a hypocrite who’s forced to maintain a lie for her life’s sake.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Feathery wing flaps pounded the air. Then nothing.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>It might have been one minute or nine, but consciousness came charging back in time for me to register a small group of human ghosts had wandered close by. One isolated soul thrummed with life force. I swear I could hear each chiming pulse of it, and I drooled without meaning to. Blood surged through my pounding heart, oozing out the wing wound and onto the dirt. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Life force. An arm’s length away.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span> With both arms, I propped myself up and squinted skyward.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>There were no more demon thieves in the air above the river.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper descended from on high.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He was probably too far up to see me.</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-68326293191184009062017-07-01T09:53:00.001-07:002018-02-11T19:17:22.170-08:00Case 8 - Ep. 2: Blind Faith's Soul<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikbCeQaTxhYz3rSA0cYz22bV3z5CJvioD1Rtu-OQ-uv62D1bwcwe_a3Mr3ueNwR5QUWCe5J3I1ceQQkvEF9M5NKxAabHEhujfSSgSSPxOdGfpBgGtOBdGzOXHJNvRLbbXJnguDnPzreAA/s1600/Submission+and+Starvation+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikbCeQaTxhYz3rSA0cYz22bV3z5CJvioD1Rtu-OQ-uv62D1bwcwe_a3Mr3ueNwR5QUWCe5J3I1ceQQkvEF9M5NKxAabHEhujfSSgSSPxOdGfpBgGtOBdGzOXHJNvRLbbXJnguDnPzreAA/s320/Submission+and+Starvation+%25281%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Submission and Starvation by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="p1">
<span class="s1">The tank flying through the air at my face was a pretty good reminder I screwed up. Jack Te-Konos bellowed French words that echoed around the Outer Mongolian battlefield and I reacted slower than a salted slug. Tons of armor plated Russian tank barreled into me, landing on top and pinning me to the blood-soaked mud. His Heaven brand of magic couldn’t make mundane materials penetrate the protection of my brimstone horns unless it was haloxite that brought the pain. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Not that it made the space beneath the tank more comfortable or anything.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Khalkin Gol river flushed past me twenty feet away, the banks swollen with rain and debris from the fighter planes and ground troops who’d died here. Burned out husks of a hundred tanks lay in the murk the way dead june bugs do. A late August sun beat down on the land like a burger joint heat lamp. Delicious souls bursting with life force peppered the entire landscape, and The Reaper darted among demon thieves in the skies above me, trying to carve an opening in the swarm with his scythe. For every bunch that burst into smog as he slew them, another cluster filled in the space and slung Blood Magic as they did.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Words were carved into the side of the tank just above my head. “Piege,” and “Prendre” and some others. French words on a Russian tank just <i>had </i>to be part of Jack’s magic. Craning my body up in a sit-up, I scratched the words off the metal with my left horn. The tank kept sitting on me, but the movement had given me space to wrench my left wing out from under me.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack rounded the tank’s upended side and waved behind him for someone to join him. I yanked my wing back down and jammed it a little way under the burned out machine, as though it was still held down. The fallen angel strode a whole lap around the metal monster, tidying up his blazer and waistcoat and indicating the tears and bullet holes in them. “See those, Ava?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“What, you mean cojones? Nope.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He whipped out a revolver from his torn blazer and shot me in the cheek. The blast echoed in my hearing and I knew the bullet struck me, but it was metal jacketed, so it bounced away into the mud and buried itself. I didn’t feel a thing except the jolts of fear that flooded my every nerve. If that round had been haloxite, no more me. I locked both eyes on the nearest cluster of souls and found they’d all expired or been drained by the swarming demon thieves, turning them all into ghosts. Except one. Sweat poured down my face and I swallowed. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack emptied the rest of the metal rounds from the chamber and loomed over me. “So many beings have tried to kill me that I wear their murder attempts with pride. This border dispute between Russia and Japan is about to go full war, here. After today, you’ll be nothing but another slash in the wardrobe.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Another figure stepped past the tank, kicking muck off her do-me-now boots. Avarice was decked out in a lolita dress and wore a Japanese naval officer hat at a jaunty angle on top of her deep blonde hair. The Septuplet that had it out for me most crossed to Jack’s side and towered over my left shoulder, with Jack above my right. Avarice’s horns were brimstone, and Jack’s halo, haloxite, so I couldn’t even handle the bigger threat with the one wing I had free.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Something. Had. To. Give.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Why were you so slow to react?” Avarice purred, crouching down. “Is Jack learning your secrets better than I did?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I shoved the sharp words and the history I was about to spit to the back of my mind. I already knew that my haloxite knife, Blood Magic Folio, and something-toed boots were all stuck beneath the wrecked tank. No way to get blood for a spell. They’d known of course that trapping a demon like me was just as effective as killing one.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Jack yelled over The Reaper’s screeches overhead. “Every nation on Earth will be part of this new World War, and your ridiculous Seraph Police Department will be spread so thin enforcing their new T.V.T. laws that The Coalition will--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Avarice horn-butted Jack faster than I could blink, and her horns penetrated the protection from Jack’s halo. He might be a fangel, but that halo’s still made from haloxite. Bruises bloomed on Jack’s forehead and cheek and he twitched away from Avarice. She hissed, “You are useful to us only as long as you delay The Reaper. Blabbing helps them.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Jack Te-Konos has already proven he is superior,” the fallen angel babbled. “I am only stating facts. We cannot kill The Reaper, so we target--”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>He twitched away again when Avarice leaned her head back for another head butt. Then she produced a handful of haloxite revolver rounds from her schmancy dress and I tore my gaze away from the lone soul to focus on the only method of escape I had.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Septuplet’s eyes locked on mine and she grinned like a demented fox. “Ah, you have not touched a mote today. Did your precious mote system fail you? You must be so close to starving from life force deprivation."</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6949637348914062727.post-69408252621186475662017-06-24T08:36:00.000-07:002018-02-11T18:56:30.402-08:00Case 8 - Ep. 1: Blind Faith's Soul<div style="text-align: right;">
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<div class="p1">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2nrzPYUhN9E5ZQaz3jWSXfVvKDAyHVPL3hfR-n-7Gg9EJ2OPVUuCtBnDKXLE99W2zkLh-IIm8k0DGsteDXNLV6ocQQrb7wUiOuPsu9Q0KV1KgiGLK3_mP7sUSImtVhiBETUBYQk07oXc/s1600/Submission+and+Starvation+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1387" data-original-width="1600" height="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2nrzPYUhN9E5ZQaz3jWSXfVvKDAyHVPL3hfR-n-7Gg9EJ2OPVUuCtBnDKXLE99W2zkLh-IIm8k0DGsteDXNLV6ocQQrb7wUiOuPsu9Q0KV1KgiGLK3_mP7sUSImtVhiBETUBYQk07oXc/s320/Submission+and+Starvation+%25281%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Submission and Starvation by Beki Yopek</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span class="s1">Demons and angels didn’t need to sleep, but that didn’t stop most of us from being late to work on Monday mornings. We had brimstone horns and haloxite halos that protected us from pain and harm caused by anything except the opposite material. On top of that, the magic we worked with could re-build cities in days and made human science into rules we broke just for kicks. Over thousands of years, we’d survived apocalypses, rebellions, and The Industrial Revolution. </span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Mondays were one evil we’d never magic our way out of.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Warm tingles rippled through me as I leaned against The Reaper’s balcony railing and took in the Fountainia skyline. Heaven’s extravagant architecture to the north, Hell’s neon signage to the south, and The Soul Fountains directly below me in the middle where the two halves melded. Besuited angels bustled this way and that around the Fountains, leading the last of the new souls into the splashing waters at the base and ushering the drained ones into the hell divides and heaven lanes that led to their fates. Crisp, fresh water and life force floated up and filled my nostrils and I grinned.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Yeah I had an awesome and helpful job, but today I’d rather be running my hands along the muscles and cornrows of the Seraph I’d had to leave behind in bed. That warmth swelled to a gush from lips to hips and I shuddered at the goose bumps spreading across my skin. Uniforms did something to--</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Hildariel needs training,” The Reaper rattled somewhere behind me.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I twitched up off the railing and spun to face the solid black skull in the hood that faced me, hovering at eye level three feet off the balcony. “You sneaky bastard, my guard was down.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Cackling, The Reaper soared overhead and clacked down onto the balcony with Seversoul tight in his grip. “Be happy I am not Avarice, or a ninja.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Thoughts blended in my head like a bad wop at a college party. “Uhm, that’s a good--ehh, why are you late too?”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Reap tilted his skull at me and I bit my lip. Stupid brain farts. I blame <i>them </i>for letting things slip. The Reaper tapped his bony foot and I answered the implied question. “I’d have been here sooner, but I got busy at home.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>My wings tensed at the ridiculous word choice, but The Reaper must not have picked up on it, because he said, “Working around Hildariel’s explosive weapons causes delays. Harvesting souls in the field is already hard enough with the T.V.T. law still in place. Now I cannot rely on our new bodyguard to cover me while I harvest.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Since The Reaper was spitting business talk, I shook off thinking of my angel with benefits and crossed my arms. “Is Hildy really that bad at combat? Working as Nia’s bouncer probably made her complacent.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“It is not her behavior that limits her, but her choice of weaponry.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I remember all the knives and arrows she had hidden under her track suit. Thought she was an amazon woman or something.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper shook his skull. “Amazons did not bring explosive weapons to the battlefield.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Leaning against the railing again, I adjusted my blazer and rolled both wings. “Please, elaborate.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Incanted arrows and blades that explode are available on the Vice Market in the Third Circle. Hildariel fired on demons with copper-coated arrows that burst with brimstone or haloxite upon striking a target.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Ah, so the shrapnel would catch you if Hildy came out shooting at demon thieves that got close.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“That is the problem. Individual haloxite arrowheads are too slow, and she relies on the magic without considering the consequences.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“It sounds like she’s a good enough bodyguard, but she has no foresight on how tactics and magic mix.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Odd, considering she is also employed at Niariel’s bar.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I shrugged both wings. “I’ll work with her. Might be she just needs different tools, or better timing or technique.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>The Reaper rattled deep in his throat. Spine. Neck. “New tools will be problematic. The Vice Market is in Voracity’s Circle. He works for The Pneuma Coalition.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Go figure,” I said, groaning. “It’s always The Coalition or Heaven Law getting in our way.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“Heaven supports the mote system a lot, but offers no angelic assistance to me personally.” Reap gestured to the angels working The Soul Fountains. The words ‘Vanna Black’ flashed through my mind as he added, “They send mote bankers and soul ushers to run the financial and distribution aspects, but we do the important job with no support.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>I counted off the work we’d done without any actual Heaven assistance. Soul Harvesting. Route planning across Earth. Building The Volunteer Guardian Angels. Busting Septuplets who worked for The Coalition when the Volunteers were too busy. We even had to call the Seraph Police Department in when Heaven Law forced us not to bust Coalition members ourselves.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>“I’m sick of stealing humans’ cell phones to call the SPD while we’re harvesting,” I blurted. “Blind faith makes hypocrites of the faithees. C’mon, Reap. Let’s get this next Case written so we can train Hildy.”</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>Crossing the balcony, I held The Reaper’s office door open for him and cranked my hearing up to eleven. Sooner or later he’d drop a hint about his plans beyond ending The Pneuma Coalition. Then maybe I’d learn what scared The freaking Reaper so much he’d keep secrets even from me.</span></div>
Jabe Staffordhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01785597309345593669noreply@blogger.com0