Chapter V - Brimstone
Posted: Wed May 02, 2018 2:09 am
December 24th, 2025
Archie's heart swelled at the sight of the decorations that had slowly crept around the mansion. Low, golden lights and Christmas trees, decorative boxes in gleaming wrapping paper and topped with artful bows, his mother's carefully preserved collection of porcelain dolls now artfully scattered around the offices and remaining sitting and reading rooms, mistletoe scattered here and there - and mostly strategically placed around archways and doorways...
Of course, what tempered his fondness for the season was the fact that work was now increasingly split between Holden Hall, Magnus Tower and the now recently-christened new headquarters for George Gammell's Toybox. Tom's highrise was large enough to justify the creation of a few fairly well-stocked security points, staffed by either one of the incubi or one of Melmoth's own men. If you drove down to Magnus Tower and stuck to the first twenty floors, you'd be forgiven for assuming that the spot was an otherwise mundane confluence of shops, condos and rental offices. Go any higher, and you started to spot horned heads or Eldritch features - notably that of Saroise Lachlan, also known as Sariel - Seducer by birth and licensed therapist by trade. Several of the previously scattered odds and ends in town now had a foot in there, starting with Bob's Garage now operating in the parking space below the tower, and Ephesian and Associates having been made to establish a satellite office just below the city's newest and closest analogue to Mertown.
In a sense, Holden wasn't sure if his mansion would continue to serve as sufficient space for those he now called his friends and family. To compound the issue, his home was now linked to Vernon Haskill's Frosthall, which meant even more space to get lost in. Anjali's games of hide-and-seek had briefly taken a turn for the agonizing, a run that would've started in the library ending in Haskill's billard room. Both were technically in the same physical space, but the little girl's ease at crossing planar barriers consistently stood as a reminder that the ambient cheer was a thin veneer spread over the increasing tension the local vigilantes and the cops were the only ones to feel.
Possession events hadn't stopped, they'd only grown more frequent. Infernal runts poking through someone else's flesh and blood to taunt the do-gooders and count down on the hearings' end, the Goat more than relishing in his now agreed-upon sharing of Ephesian's body, sometimes caught smiling a too-slick smile for the cameras after a day spent in the courtroom, Ephesian's conscious mind surfacing ever more infrequently and ever more violently... The Goat wasn't used to someone who could kick him into the ropes, but it also exhausted Leonard's young and imperfect grasp of his new abilities. When he resurfaced, it was usually to drink or smoke. He didn't exactly take to a Buck-worthy level of despair, but he'd certainly grown cynical and bitter. Never towards his friends and would-be saviors, thankfully - but towards the world at large and the newer perspectives his nature allowed for.
Sometimes, they'd all get lucky. Sometimes, Jubal Whitney emailed them from Nacogdoches, telling them of a confused and seizing man or woman who'd wander into town and into his, his son's or his wife's arms, voice distorted by demonic power - and despair. The Gentlemen's Southern Sanctuary now harbored five confused souls who'd somehow managed to flee the Pit without knowing to reach for Hope or Tom Magnus, and who'd fallen in with the first helpful crowd they'd found, shivering and starving. Sometimes, that happened in Hope. Demons who buckled and contorted the flesh they wore not out of some desire to shock or scare, but because they didn't know any better and desperately needed to cry out for help. They joined Sariel's clients and were inspected by Bob for the sake of truthfulness and security.
Some of them failed. Some tried to kill those outstretched and helping hands. Enemy spies revealed and quickly dispatched.
Joy to the world, indeed.
Tinsel might've overtaken the workplace, work proper didn't cease. It had taken a while for Three to get used to having both Volker and Mister Kramp around, one of them a hard-bitten cynic with a chip on his shoulder for every new caseload that came with a need for a degree of force, the other a gleeful sociopath only held in check by Oberon's yoke and the bond currently keeping him within Meris' good graces. The Christmas Demon looked like he would've enjoyed the raid from earlier more than the sometimes rather strange cases of supernatural social case-work that now routinely followed along with Holden Hall's schedule for the day. Anjali was the only one who'd barely noticed anything, Archie routinely returning to both her and Crystal for support. Holden hadn't forced the young incarnated soul on the werewolf, either, Crystal's involvement initially framed as casual and then left to deepen on its own. The Bhatia girl really wasn't hard to like or get along with, her decent grasp on maturity allowing her to express enough self-reliance to not entirely rely on the Deputy Chief for further mothering. While she genuinely liked Crystal, it was clear that the girl still was the stick to Archie's glue, the slightest downtime being used to cadge a smidgen of attention from the Clank. Her childlike games could've been expected, but some of her questions were tantalizingly mature in tone. While innocent, Anajali looked to be the type to lose that innocence not in successive traumas, but rather in a gradual sense of understanding. All three Clanks in the mansion delighted in that curiosity, the girl sampling everything from entry-level ethnobotany books in Jocasta Holden's room, Bagley's bookkeeping ledgers or Bucky's dog-eared copies of the Hagakure and of the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. She'd sit by Neasa and the steam-powered samurai and listen to them talk, sometimes smiling at one of Shamus' turns of phrase while pretending to read something of her own.
The merger might not have happened in any official capacity yet, but it would've been hard to notice it if you'd been anyone between one of Meris or Archie's friends. Demons and angels came and went from the Hall, the Frosthall and Magnus Tower as though they'd always been there. Someone with a pair of horns or wings was always around to ask for additional details, provide a situation report or simply check in on the only mortals in the tri-State area with any real ability to do something in the face of the coming turmoil. They weren't always who you'd have expected, either...
* * *
Three didn't look like he knew what to make of what had been asked of him. His eyes flitted between the beaked gargoyle that sat in the chair opposite his desk and his computer's screen, the struggling and plodding pace of his thoughts almost visible between his furrowed brows.
"So, let me just make sure I've gotten everything down correctly, here," started Aidan. "Your boss, who used to be the Goat's fashion counselor before we blew up the Spire and torched his wardrobe, tried to possess a fashion designer over in Milan, and you missed the transplanar window that would've allowed you to materialize in Italy in time to make sure Gianni Versace pulled a Reagan McNeil. Your boss' plans consequently failed, and he took it out on you."
The demon's voice was a series of croaks. "I don't know who Reagan McNeil is, but I think your assessment is correct, mortal.
- Try Mister Drake, thank you... So you missed that window, and Dantalion used Melmoth's Eldritch pay system to dock your, well, pay. In this case, your basic power base. You're arguing that he's knocked you past what qualifies as indigence for a low aristocrat, and effectively forced you to use Club Ishtar's portal to come here. By foot."
The demon bobbed its beak. "Naked. In the cold. Without boots. I'd like to know if I have a case on my hands. And, er, where I might claim sustenance for the next several days."
Three blinked. "Human hunger's settling in?"
The demon nodded. Three sighed. "Well, for starters, you kinda blew a major load once you brushed off Tom and Aislinn's attempts to help you, Nickar. I wouldn't have advised pulling the Aaaargh, wretched mortals! card in front of an armed security detail when you barely have enough power left to spook a cockroach. That said, you never were in with Tom's friends, so I understand you didn't know any better."
Nickar's beak clicked. "I have never been so humiliated before in the past six thousand years. I find it displeasing. I did not expect to suffer the Glorious Circle of the Security Detail's wrath."
Three had to blink at that. "Paimon coined that, right?"
Another nod. Another sigh.
Nickar looked up. "Do I have a case, mister Drake? More importantly, does someone have a towel? Modesty is proving to be a new, if rather strange concept..."
Tom had spared as many Club Ishtar uniform sets as he'd could, but Three had quickly taken to stopping by the dollar store to pick up an armful of inexpensive fleece towels and bathrobes. He reached behind himself and handed Nickar a folded bundle. "You're likely to turn into another case file on Judge Mantus' Night Court waiting list, your former boss' boss loves chewing the scenery. We're two weeks past the final summation's delivery date and he's keeping the jury hanging."
Nickar grunted, his spaded tail swishing nervously. "Well, he is a goat, after all.
- Ten to one that he has Mantus call for a hearing on Christmas Eve and that Hell comes down on midnight sharp."
The demon's beady little eyes blinked. "Are you ready?
- We've been ready for the past two weeks," replied Drake. "There's a garrison of angels twiddling its thumbs a plane away and right outside Club Ishtar, and we have intel showing there's Infernal massings where we expected. Lyman's intel is good. We're ready.
- What if he lies to you?"
Three smirked at that. "Lyman? He's gained sixty pounds in three weeks and spends his time greasing the same palms the Goat's looking to corrupt. He's too attached to his creature comforts to risk losing it all. If he shafts us, it'll happen well after the merger's stabilized. If the Earth goes Blasted Hellscape, he's losing out on the bi-weekly double gnocchi plates at La Donnola's and he's literally burning his sociopolitical clout. For now, we're thick as thieves."
Nickar looked outside. Right across from the Hall, a doomsayer in ragged clothes was shaking a poorly-written sign, howling extreme misinterpretations of Shield's efforts and casting them as signs of the End Times: the Summer and Winter houses planning a wedding in spring, Holden Hall receiving dividends from the Arcane Stock Exchange to fund hitherto undisclosed programs, hedge Infernalists making a comeback and the city now supposedly sheltering shadowy beings...
To someone with a partial and distorted view, the recent events might've seemed prophetic. Nickar replied to that sight with a look of unease.
"How safe are we, really?" he asked.
Three looked outside for a moment and shook his head. "I don't know. I wish I did, but I don't. All I know is we're doing our best-"
The soldier stopped, frowning as some sort of clamor grew near the front door. Bagley was trying to keep someone calm, someone else was grunting, and Bucky was trying to explain things - and failing. All that really jumped out at Drake was when the Clank called out for Neasa.
"Um, Ness - a lil' help, here? I'm tryin' to give the rundown to Captain-"
A grunt and the sound of an attempted jab. A wordless grunt he somehow recognized as Azardad's.
"Peter Smirnov," said the first voice. "Sandhill P.D. My boys caught this thing nosing around Goliath's industrial park; I figured he might be one of your demons."
That was enough to make Three's eyes go wide and bolt past Nickar. What if the Israelian Void Weaver had blown a gasket and lobbed some Black Speech at what effectively was Hope's least orthodox police captain?!
Archie's heart swelled at the sight of the decorations that had slowly crept around the mansion. Low, golden lights and Christmas trees, decorative boxes in gleaming wrapping paper and topped with artful bows, his mother's carefully preserved collection of porcelain dolls now artfully scattered around the offices and remaining sitting and reading rooms, mistletoe scattered here and there - and mostly strategically placed around archways and doorways...
Of course, what tempered his fondness for the season was the fact that work was now increasingly split between Holden Hall, Magnus Tower and the now recently-christened new headquarters for George Gammell's Toybox. Tom's highrise was large enough to justify the creation of a few fairly well-stocked security points, staffed by either one of the incubi or one of Melmoth's own men. If you drove down to Magnus Tower and stuck to the first twenty floors, you'd be forgiven for assuming that the spot was an otherwise mundane confluence of shops, condos and rental offices. Go any higher, and you started to spot horned heads or Eldritch features - notably that of Saroise Lachlan, also known as Sariel - Seducer by birth and licensed therapist by trade. Several of the previously scattered odds and ends in town now had a foot in there, starting with Bob's Garage now operating in the parking space below the tower, and Ephesian and Associates having been made to establish a satellite office just below the city's newest and closest analogue to Mertown.
In a sense, Holden wasn't sure if his mansion would continue to serve as sufficient space for those he now called his friends and family. To compound the issue, his home was now linked to Vernon Haskill's Frosthall, which meant even more space to get lost in. Anjali's games of hide-and-seek had briefly taken a turn for the agonizing, a run that would've started in the library ending in Haskill's billard room. Both were technically in the same physical space, but the little girl's ease at crossing planar barriers consistently stood as a reminder that the ambient cheer was a thin veneer spread over the increasing tension the local vigilantes and the cops were the only ones to feel.
Possession events hadn't stopped, they'd only grown more frequent. Infernal runts poking through someone else's flesh and blood to taunt the do-gooders and count down on the hearings' end, the Goat more than relishing in his now agreed-upon sharing of Ephesian's body, sometimes caught smiling a too-slick smile for the cameras after a day spent in the courtroom, Ephesian's conscious mind surfacing ever more infrequently and ever more violently... The Goat wasn't used to someone who could kick him into the ropes, but it also exhausted Leonard's young and imperfect grasp of his new abilities. When he resurfaced, it was usually to drink or smoke. He didn't exactly take to a Buck-worthy level of despair, but he'd certainly grown cynical and bitter. Never towards his friends and would-be saviors, thankfully - but towards the world at large and the newer perspectives his nature allowed for.
Sometimes, they'd all get lucky. Sometimes, Jubal Whitney emailed them from Nacogdoches, telling them of a confused and seizing man or woman who'd wander into town and into his, his son's or his wife's arms, voice distorted by demonic power - and despair. The Gentlemen's Southern Sanctuary now harbored five confused souls who'd somehow managed to flee the Pit without knowing to reach for Hope or Tom Magnus, and who'd fallen in with the first helpful crowd they'd found, shivering and starving. Sometimes, that happened in Hope. Demons who buckled and contorted the flesh they wore not out of some desire to shock or scare, but because they didn't know any better and desperately needed to cry out for help. They joined Sariel's clients and were inspected by Bob for the sake of truthfulness and security.
Some of them failed. Some tried to kill those outstretched and helping hands. Enemy spies revealed and quickly dispatched.
Joy to the world, indeed.
Tinsel might've overtaken the workplace, work proper didn't cease. It had taken a while for Three to get used to having both Volker and Mister Kramp around, one of them a hard-bitten cynic with a chip on his shoulder for every new caseload that came with a need for a degree of force, the other a gleeful sociopath only held in check by Oberon's yoke and the bond currently keeping him within Meris' good graces. The Christmas Demon looked like he would've enjoyed the raid from earlier more than the sometimes rather strange cases of supernatural social case-work that now routinely followed along with Holden Hall's schedule for the day. Anjali was the only one who'd barely noticed anything, Archie routinely returning to both her and Crystal for support. Holden hadn't forced the young incarnated soul on the werewolf, either, Crystal's involvement initially framed as casual and then left to deepen on its own. The Bhatia girl really wasn't hard to like or get along with, her decent grasp on maturity allowing her to express enough self-reliance to not entirely rely on the Deputy Chief for further mothering. While she genuinely liked Crystal, it was clear that the girl still was the stick to Archie's glue, the slightest downtime being used to cadge a smidgen of attention from the Clank. Her childlike games could've been expected, but some of her questions were tantalizingly mature in tone. While innocent, Anajali looked to be the type to lose that innocence not in successive traumas, but rather in a gradual sense of understanding. All three Clanks in the mansion delighted in that curiosity, the girl sampling everything from entry-level ethnobotany books in Jocasta Holden's room, Bagley's bookkeeping ledgers or Bucky's dog-eared copies of the Hagakure and of the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. She'd sit by Neasa and the steam-powered samurai and listen to them talk, sometimes smiling at one of Shamus' turns of phrase while pretending to read something of her own.
The merger might not have happened in any official capacity yet, but it would've been hard to notice it if you'd been anyone between one of Meris or Archie's friends. Demons and angels came and went from the Hall, the Frosthall and Magnus Tower as though they'd always been there. Someone with a pair of horns or wings was always around to ask for additional details, provide a situation report or simply check in on the only mortals in the tri-State area with any real ability to do something in the face of the coming turmoil. They weren't always who you'd have expected, either...
* * *
Three didn't look like he knew what to make of what had been asked of him. His eyes flitted between the beaked gargoyle that sat in the chair opposite his desk and his computer's screen, the struggling and plodding pace of his thoughts almost visible between his furrowed brows.
"So, let me just make sure I've gotten everything down correctly, here," started Aidan. "Your boss, who used to be the Goat's fashion counselor before we blew up the Spire and torched his wardrobe, tried to possess a fashion designer over in Milan, and you missed the transplanar window that would've allowed you to materialize in Italy in time to make sure Gianni Versace pulled a Reagan McNeil. Your boss' plans consequently failed, and he took it out on you."
The demon's voice was a series of croaks. "I don't know who Reagan McNeil is, but I think your assessment is correct, mortal.
- Try Mister Drake, thank you... So you missed that window, and Dantalion used Melmoth's Eldritch pay system to dock your, well, pay. In this case, your basic power base. You're arguing that he's knocked you past what qualifies as indigence for a low aristocrat, and effectively forced you to use Club Ishtar's portal to come here. By foot."
The demon bobbed its beak. "Naked. In the cold. Without boots. I'd like to know if I have a case on my hands. And, er, where I might claim sustenance for the next several days."
Three blinked. "Human hunger's settling in?"
The demon nodded. Three sighed. "Well, for starters, you kinda blew a major load once you brushed off Tom and Aislinn's attempts to help you, Nickar. I wouldn't have advised pulling the Aaaargh, wretched mortals! card in front of an armed security detail when you barely have enough power left to spook a cockroach. That said, you never were in with Tom's friends, so I understand you didn't know any better."
Nickar's beak clicked. "I have never been so humiliated before in the past six thousand years. I find it displeasing. I did not expect to suffer the Glorious Circle of the Security Detail's wrath."
Three had to blink at that. "Paimon coined that, right?"
Another nod. Another sigh.
Nickar looked up. "Do I have a case, mister Drake? More importantly, does someone have a towel? Modesty is proving to be a new, if rather strange concept..."
Tom had spared as many Club Ishtar uniform sets as he'd could, but Three had quickly taken to stopping by the dollar store to pick up an armful of inexpensive fleece towels and bathrobes. He reached behind himself and handed Nickar a folded bundle. "You're likely to turn into another case file on Judge Mantus' Night Court waiting list, your former boss' boss loves chewing the scenery. We're two weeks past the final summation's delivery date and he's keeping the jury hanging."
Nickar grunted, his spaded tail swishing nervously. "Well, he is a goat, after all.
- Ten to one that he has Mantus call for a hearing on Christmas Eve and that Hell comes down on midnight sharp."
The demon's beady little eyes blinked. "Are you ready?
- We've been ready for the past two weeks," replied Drake. "There's a garrison of angels twiddling its thumbs a plane away and right outside Club Ishtar, and we have intel showing there's Infernal massings where we expected. Lyman's intel is good. We're ready.
- What if he lies to you?"
Three smirked at that. "Lyman? He's gained sixty pounds in three weeks and spends his time greasing the same palms the Goat's looking to corrupt. He's too attached to his creature comforts to risk losing it all. If he shafts us, it'll happen well after the merger's stabilized. If the Earth goes Blasted Hellscape, he's losing out on the bi-weekly double gnocchi plates at La Donnola's and he's literally burning his sociopolitical clout. For now, we're thick as thieves."
Nickar looked outside. Right across from the Hall, a doomsayer in ragged clothes was shaking a poorly-written sign, howling extreme misinterpretations of Shield's efforts and casting them as signs of the End Times: the Summer and Winter houses planning a wedding in spring, Holden Hall receiving dividends from the Arcane Stock Exchange to fund hitherto undisclosed programs, hedge Infernalists making a comeback and the city now supposedly sheltering shadowy beings...
To someone with a partial and distorted view, the recent events might've seemed prophetic. Nickar replied to that sight with a look of unease.
"How safe are we, really?" he asked.
Three looked outside for a moment and shook his head. "I don't know. I wish I did, but I don't. All I know is we're doing our best-"
The soldier stopped, frowning as some sort of clamor grew near the front door. Bagley was trying to keep someone calm, someone else was grunting, and Bucky was trying to explain things - and failing. All that really jumped out at Drake was when the Clank called out for Neasa.
"Um, Ness - a lil' help, here? I'm tryin' to give the rundown to Captain-"
A grunt and the sound of an attempted jab. A wordless grunt he somehow recognized as Azardad's.
"Peter Smirnov," said the first voice. "Sandhill P.D. My boys caught this thing nosing around Goliath's industrial park; I figured he might be one of your demons."
That was enough to make Three's eyes go wide and bolt past Nickar. What if the Israelian Void Weaver had blown a gasket and lobbed some Black Speech at what effectively was Hope's least orthodox police captain?!