Noon
Gerald Dean stared from the second story The Lockdown, mild disgust barely hidden beneath his otherwise blank expression. To anyone else, he was just another owner surveying his own personal Sodom and Gomorrah, but those anybodies were nobodies. Concealing emotion was a discipline he both strove, and failed constantly.
Below the cast of dancers was much different than when he began, when Judge Grifford purged the monsters that preyed on Driftwood's lowlife underbelly. Now, the Inquisition sinned in their absence, valuable hunters shedding their clothes for the next conjurer to fall prey to such deadly seduction.
At least the monsters were honest about what they were.
Here, the widow's of fallen hunters bared everything to lure those drunk on power to their doom. From the door, to the stage, and the stage to the private dances. The last pseudosexual encounter the filth would ever have. Over the course of years since he took the helm at The Lockdown, he collected well over twenty hemp cords bearing small faceted shards of that oily black glass.
That sinister Black glass.
Only glass in name. The lore behind the glass was far more sinister, a tale worthy of ancient mythos, but one he was forced to believe, for the thing that revealed its secrets was Ammielle, daughter of the principalities, the ruination of both Reverend James Wallace, and James Wallace, Junior. A demon not for some war in heaven, but because it chose to fall, than follow; not a servant of The Lord; not a servant of Lucifer, but irredeemably evil all the same. Ammielle with her ageless, flawless olive flesh, in whose very stride held the universe in awe; Ammielle whose hair seemed to hold all the stars in its shimmering black locks.
Ammielle, who like the Vampire Crimson, and the Succubus Blanca, begged for anything but being cast into the land of the dead god, Taal; Taal, the fallen, whose size was so great, he was cast into the unending lands, who burned as he fell, and whose fires were quenched by the sands of the unending lands, even as his very touch corrupted forever the land around him; whose white fires scorched that land, and melted that sand, bearing the oily obsidian that came when sand turned to volcanic glass.
Taal who slept in an everlasting coma, and dreamt with belief, so strongly that belief made manifest to physical form; made real a host of terrible creatures whose existence plagued the unending lands, serving the will of their sleeping master.
Ammielle, who feared Taal, for Taal was cast out of heaven for making a choice, and she for choosing nothing at all.
Gerald shuddered, his eyes reluctantly fixed on the naked Chlöe, whose true name died with her fallen husband only three years before. Chlöe, ever graceful, ever brutal, and ever deadly, gyrating shamelessly to the delight of a witch whose attempts to impress her with the spontaneous generation of wealth was going to be the end for him. She would lure him, and lull him, and while she gave him the gift of one last primal, private dance, would steal his life, and turn his shard over to Gerald.
One a week was the house goal. It did not always happen, and in the weeks past, with Chlöe, it happened at least twice, sometimes trice in a week.
Gerald scowled. They were doing The Order's good work, hunting the enemy, but they were no longer hunters. They were opportunistic predators... not even predators. They were like carnivorous pitcher plants. Sitting around and waiting.
Gerald wiped his brow, and rubbed his eyes with the palms of his hands. This was supposed to be a reward, but it felt like a punishment. Desk jobbed in such a place of iniquity. Subjecting these women to this lifestyle.
...still. Witches still came, monsters were still willing to shell out money, and the enemy was funding the war against itself without even knowing it.
The Lockdown was one-hundred percent defensible, and staffed by some of the deadliest people the world would never know.
If only his son were by his side to rule this seedy underworld.
✟ ☧ ✟
3:33 AM
To say Gerald sat in his office, counting the absurd sum of wealth collected over the course of the week would be an absence of truth; Gerald woke in his office, showered in the dressing room shower, and washed his laundry in the housekeeping facilities.
He spent less time at home these days than he did running The Lockdown, and without any of the benefits afforded to workaholic club managers I'm his industry. He did not drink, or partake in any particular narcotics (not even aspirin for a headache); he didn't sleep with the merchandise - the dancers - and the money meant nothing. Meanwhile his "retirement" pittered along collecting arcane shards of infernal glass from the girls' prey.
The club was literally making a killing off whatever stray conjurers, or monsters walked in under the pretense of humanity. It was a service to the order, but somehow still a slap in the face.
Gerald yawned, stretched, and stood up, leaving the carefully stacked money to crowd his desk as he left his office, and made his way down the wrought iron spiral staircase.
The club was quiet still, empty, and would not open for another hour and a half. These were cherished times anymore. No grinding music bouncing off the concrete floors, or walls; no bickering dancers - because for some reason, dancers seemed to enjoy bickering - and no DJ reminding patrons to tip when they sat at the tip rail (that's why it's called a tip rail).
There was heavy pounding at the front door. Gerald Dean ignored it, at least until the heavy pounding began to sound more like heavy thunder. The front door, the fire exits, and the back door were all very strong, very thick vault doors.
Gerald hurried toward the entrance, and the pounding stopped. Gerald approached, one light slow step after the next.
No dagger on his hip. The shotgun was in the office.
The heavy steel door shook with another rhythmic assault. This time, Gerald could see convex dents the size of fists appearing every time the door shook.
Son of a bitch. It's him. "Son of a bitch. It's him."
Gerald turned on the heel of his dress shoes. They cost more than a mid-sized sedan. The pounding stopped for a moment, and so Gerald did as well. There was one more loud, groaning sound as the door shook of its hinges, metal tearing away from metal, the steel door frame, tungsten bolts stripped away from the hinges, tearing pieces of the door frame along with it. The door crashed into the concrete wall from across the doorway, bent it on itself, sliding down the concrete in a small shower of sparks.
Gerald ran as the silhouette stepped into the hallway through the doorway. Through the swirling motes of dust, concrete, and rust, Gerald saw his eyes, the fabled green eyes.
Fabled no more.
Gerald broke into a sprint, and the monsters was quickly behind him. Gerald dodged left, and right, weaving between bar tables, pulling chairs down behind him as he passed.
He reached the wrought iron stairwell, ascending as quickly as he could. He reached the top, stating down the spiraling metal steps. Bane moved toward the staircase, and stepped back.
Bane stared up at the second floor, staring Gerald in the eyes.
Gerald laughed. "You're too big?"
Bane reached out with gloved hands and wrapped his large fingers around the handrails. Still staring at Gerald, he began to pull. The spiral staircase groaned, twisting, the support wires snapping one at a time as the giant slowly tore the stairs down from the second floor.
"I'll blow your fucking head free from your shoulders, monster!"
Gerald turned, and ran for his office.
He still had his shotgun.
✟ ☧ ✟
4:00 AM
Judge Randall Grifford strode into the the battered entrance, stepping over the smoldering wreckage strewn inside the remains of The Lockdown, covering the lower half of his face with his sleeve. He coughed. "Get these fires out."
Behind him, two much younger men nodded, and rushed past him.
"...and find me Gerald Dean!"
Grifford stood in the smokey hallway, the faint, lingering smell of burned flesh told him what they would find before they made it to the end of the hallway. He felt cold in the out of his stomach.
"Tell me why I shouldn't execute you simply for existing."
L.C. walked casually through the warped entry of the doorframe. "Hey, I'm just some Joe comin' in to see a little tits'n'ass."
"After closing hours? Why is it you always turn up? I doubt anyone called this in."
"If you didn't want me here, judge, you'd have me dragged out of here, or worse. I take it the kitchen's closed this morning?"
"I'm willing to admit The Lockdown will be closed for refurbishing."
"Want me to call it in?"
Grifford removed his gloves, pocketed them in his long, black duster, and rubbed his eyes with bare, scarred palms. "Yes, detective. Call this in. I would say a massacre warrants police presence."
"Mind if I check it out before your boys remove the evidence of my guy?"
"Do whatever you want. Don't take anything, don't do anything to lose the trust of... our arrangement."
L.C. coughed, and cleared his throat. "Like I want the department to latch onto Bane."
"There is no Bane."
"No, you're right, Judge. Admitting there's a monster on the loose could just save a few lives."
"I don't like you, Polovatski. I've never liked you."
"It's because I'm way too charming for you blue coat types."
"Yes, clearly that's it. You're an effective blunt instrument. Now get out of my personal space, and go find me a monster that doesn't exist."
"I was wondering when you'd shuttup."
"Oh, and Loose Cannon?"
"Yeah, old man Grifford."
"Could you take that thing alive?"
"I don't know if he'll let me, but I'll ask real polite-like."
"Fuck off, Polovatski."
"Consider me fucked. Off I go."
✟ ☧ ✟
L.C. was careful, stepping over the debris, and crumbling remains of overturned bar tables. he made his way to the tip rail, and sat, placing his hands on the soot covered red oak. Largely, it was unharmed, except for a broken portion where a portion of the red oak tip rail was broken away. Still, it was in relatively good condition, which was more than he could say for the rest of the club.
He stared at the dancer's pole, blackened and a little warped, the remnants of Gerald Dean bound to it, a heavy wrought iron spiral staircase wrapped over his dismembered torso like cheap ribbon, his limbs - his arms and legs - piled neatly beneath his torso.
L.C. closed his eyes, inhaling deeply through his nose, the smell of burned wood, hot metal, and the warmth of the dying embers. He cleared his throat, and concentrated. It was a long time since he last attempted Deep Ellum, and rather than go fully into the mindfield - the last place in any realm he would ever want to go - he allowed himself to exist both in Driftwood, and the place in between.
It was a long time since the last time, with good reason. More, and more Driftwood fought him, was less cooperative.
Show me.
The world became clear to him, and he could see the bar as though his eyelids weren't there.
Show me.
No.
I am Detective Frederick Polovatski, a son of the sons and daughters of Driftwood, and by right, blood, and soul, I am you, and you exist in me. Now. Show me.
There was only silence, the sound of Grifford's cronies inspecting the wreckage. L.C. furrowed his brow and felt the tide - the life stream current of Driftwood - ebbing and flowing around him, over him, beneath him, actively avoiding him. He reached out, willing his mind into the expanse of the broken Lockdown. He caught the tide, and felt it pull, and struggle.
You will show me.
No!
L.C. grimaced, the pressure in his head increasing. He felt the warmth in his face, and the wet trickle of warm blood spill from his nostrils. He clenched his jaw. He hated this part.
He really hated this part.
You will show me.
Suddenly, time froze around him - not frozen, but slow. Slow, and then still... and then the winding nausea that came with chronometric disassociation, and his mind ticked back the seconds, the minutes, the quarter, the half, and then in hours. Driftwood fought him, and he fought back harder. His nose bled, from a trickle, to a flow. L.C. wiped the blood away with the sleeve of his jacket, and placed his hand back on the tip rail, gripping the wood now with force.
You are mine. Show me.
You were supposed to be mine. To be ours.
I belong to no one. You belong to me. You are going to show me, or I will hurt you. I will find your sons and daughters, and I will break them to the last one, and you will know suffering. I will extinct your entire fucking flesh and blood progeny. I will, so help me God, end you.
Silence.
Time peeled back, and the bar began to rewind at speed, the blur of movement so fast he could not track it. The fires reignited, and then burned in reverse until there was none. The tables, the chairs, the bar began to reform into its former state around him as he sat until...
L.C. stood abruptly, feeling the sensation of weightlessness. He stared down at his body sitting at the tip rail. There was a loud crash in the entry way, and he willed himself present.
Gerald stood in the entryway at the door as it dented inward with powerful force.
"Son of a bitch. It's him."
L.C. watched Gerald turn on the heel of his dress shoes, and bolting from the entryway as the door collapsed inward through a shower of sparks, the giant Bane ducking through the doorway, and stepping into the entryway behind the fleeing Gerald. He watched Gerald steal a glance behind him.
Fabled no more. Gerald's thoughts rang through The-In-Between as loud as any voice.
L.C. willed himself back into the dance area, staring past his own body, watching Gerald hurry up the spiral staircase.
Bane followed behind him, deliberately, slowly. He reached the spiral stairs, and stared up at Gerald from the floor below.
L.C. watched Gerald's nervous laughter. "You're too big?"
He watched Bane reach for the stairs with tattered black gloved hands, and pull at it until the support wires, struts, and bolts began to pop, groaning, and twisting until he pulled it free from the top, and bottom floors.
L.C. felt a chill run through his entirety, the incorporeal form he was when in The-In-Between. Bane was bigger, and stronger than their last encounter. Than anything he could hope to face directly himself.
How the hell was he supposed to stop that?
Bane threw the heavy spiral staircase behind him, and it crashed through three bar tables, and broke off a portion of the red oak tip rail.
"I'll blow your head free from your fucking shoulders, monster!" Gerald yelled, running for his office.
Bane leapt almost clearing the second floor, and caught the railing, pushing himself over, and onto the floor. Gerald reappeared firing a shot from his shotgun, a six foot trail of fire following the blast. Bane shielded himself against the flames with his leather duster. The fire set to the carpeting immediately. Gerald fired the second shot, and Bane leapt from the trail of fire, rolling toward the railing. Gerald aggressed on Bane, fire a third shot. The shot hit Bane in the center of the chest sending him backward over the railing. He caught the rail, and it tore away from the upper level. Bane fell, and crashed through the bar tables beneath him. Gerald aimed his shotgun, drawing a bead on the massive masked killer. He fired, and the shot went wide, hitting the tables, and carpet.
Bane groaned, his voice muffled beneath his mask.
L.C. found himself hopeful for Gerald, even knowing the outcome, and was surprised to see Bane shy away from the fire. Not fear, though. Something else. Something from Jonathan.
It wasn't Bane he felt in the tides of The-In-between. It was Jonathan. There were remnants - echoes - of the boy in that monster. Not the boy himself, the tragedy of potential, but a scar he left behind. Things became clearer, so much clearer to L.C.
(So, this is what you've been keeping from me.)
(It is not for you to know, traitor.)
Gerald leapt from the second floor, through empty space, and landed on Bane's chest. The Monster made a loud sound, and L.C. heard ribs cracking through the smoldering kevlar vest strapped over Bane's torso. Gerald buried the muzzle of his shotgun beneath Bane's mask, the hot metal searing the flesh of Bane's throat.
"You're finished."
"You talk to much." Bane rolled sharply to the side, and Gerald lost his footing even as Bane reached with impossible speed, gripping the hot barrel of the shotgun, and pulling it away from Gerald's grip. Gerald landed poorly, falling onto the angled tilt of the toppled, broken bar table.
L.C. winced as a sharp portion of the broken table pierced Gerald through the back.
Gerald coughed, sputtering blood.
Bane stumbled to his feet, and dropped the shotgun. He cast off his duster, and then the kevlar vest.
He pulled Gerald onto his feet. Gerald coughed a mouthful of blood, and collapsed.
"Get up." Bane pulled him back to his feet, and produced a blade the length at least a foot long.
(Finish it, already.) L.C. grimaced.
(You know that is not how this goes.)
Bane flipped the blade in his hand, and offered it to Gerald. "You will not die with your mouth open."
Gerald took the blade from Bane, who then drew a second.
Bane lunged forward, and Gerald stumbled into him, plunging his weapon into Bane's chest as Bane plunged his into Gerald, missing his mark, and sinking the full length of the blade into Gerald's shoulder. Bane stumbled back, grasping at the grip of Gerald's dagger as Gerald collapsed over his shotgun.
"Good." Bane grunted, and pulled the blade free. "Now, you understand."
"You talk too much." Gerald half-grinned-half grimaced. He rolled weakly to the side, and drew up his shotgun, aiming it at Bane with shaking arms. He fired, but the shot went low, igniting the carpet beneath Bane who lunged immediately through the fire, leaping in a long arc, and landing on Gerald, his blade sinking into the man's chest, into his heart. Gerald struggled beneath the giant, but in vain. Bane pulled the blade lodged in Gerald's shoulder, carving its way through flesh, sinew, and bone, and Gerald's arm came free, attached only by a few lingering threads of muscle. Gerald coughed, and reached for the dagger in his chest. Bane caught his hand, and pulled it away.
Gerald died there, with Bane staring down over him, nodding.
Panting.
Gerald hurt him. Winded him. Wore him down. Bane was strong, but not infallible. Whatever monster lived in that body, it lived in a mortal body, no matter how preternatural it's abilities.
(That thing will be the death of you.)
L.C. ignored the nagging voice of Driftwood, even as he felt the tides of The-In-Between pulling away from him.
L.C. opened his eyes. There were cracks, and indentations in the tip rail where his reddened hands still gripped the hard red oak, cramping painfully. He let the tip rail go, and flexed his hands, opening, and closing them. "Son of a bitch."
He stood from the tip rail, and faltered a moment on his feet, exhausted from his time in The-In-Between. L.C. checked his watch. 4:10 AM. Of course. In mere minutes he saw the entire length of their fight. If you could call it a fight. Still. Gerald hurt him. It. Him.
Whatever.
He could see the pattern now. When Bane wasn't killing coven, he was -
✟ ☧ ✟
"-hunting our hunters?" Grifford slapped L.C. across the face with a gloved hand.
L.C. smiled politely. "You get that one for free, Judge. If that ever happens again, you will understand why I am who I am."
"You're getting very cavalier with your threats, detective. Regardless of who we are, each, I am still a judge, and you are still a cop. Do you think your threats frighten me? Do you need me to remind you what happened to the last man of your kind to help The Order?"
"The part where you betrayed, and murdered him, or the part where the rest of us know you betrayed and murdered him?"
Grifford was quiet a long time. He sighed deeply. "I don't want a war with you too. Not you, not your people. Things were different then, they're different now. We have a common enemy. Something not quite your world. Not quite mine. Still... your allegations aren't only dangerous, they're demoralizing. Coven? Hah! Coven. Sometimes we kill them. Sometimes they kill us."
"Well, now you've got something else."
"Yes, it would seem. Imagine Detective, if you can, what it would mean to the order if they believed that an unstoppable monster was picking us off one at a time. What's his motivation? What's his end-game?"
"His end is your end. I felt him. I heard him."
"The monster."
"No. Jonathan Walker."
Grifford raised a hand, and L.C. smiled. "Remember Judge. The first one was free. There's worse things I can do then striking a judge."
Grifford considered it a moment, and lowered his hand. "Jonathan Walker is dead."
"Now there's two of you saying that." L.C. yawned, and stretched.
"What?"
"The creature, I know what it is. Or was... and I know it has scars."
"Well it's been stabbed, shot, and burned. I don't see what it has to do with -"
"-not physically, your honor." L.C. raised his hands up, still red, and a little bruised now. He brushed at the dried blood beneath his nose, bits of it flaking away. "The creature is scarred from the soul, out. Whatever happened, however it happened, there are pieces of Jonathan that are still in there. Echoes."
"Then if what you say is true, why is it killing my people, and not helping? The Order could have rallied around a creature like this..."
"Hypocrite."
"Aren't we all?"
"Haven't you noticed at all? He - it - has been killing your enemies. Maybe too well. Well enough to cause war with Lillian Plow, and her allies. To raise up a newer, deadlier enemy in Coven."
"How do you..?"
"I hear it. Some things I can ignore. Some things, things from... other places... I can't. Things like the Black Glass. Things like the Dead Giant. A tree, and its creatures."
Grifford hissed with a sharp draw of breath. "Shhh!"
L.C. nodded. "You get it. You've always gotten it. It scares you, doesn't it?"
"What scares me is a little boy who used to build a bridge with his building blocks, and an ancient tree beneath it, a toy from a model engine set. What scares me is the teenaged David Walker wandering the wastes of an expanse that went into forever, in all directions. What scares me are things from that side seeping into my side."
"You do know. Good. Then you know that this creature isn't remotely human. It is changed, but not a mortal man. Maybe it isn't what it was, right? It's not like us. Not like them, those coven you've been fighting since Oyer and Terminer. You have a new enemy, don't you? The same that burned your lodge to the ground... and what did you do?"
"That was my brother's affair! What could he do? An enemy like that, changed like that... what could he do? What could I do? I'll tell you what I could do: learn the new enemy. Find new ways to beat them."
"...and you can't. Not without casualties." L.C. leaned against the wall beside the crumpled security door. He stared down at it.
"I had The Lockdown. It was working."
"I didn't expect you could foresee a monster that could bend, and break steel with its bare hands. Tear down wrought iron like it was cheap cloth. I don't blame you for what's happened to Gerald, Judge. I understand your war, and why you are compelled to do what you do, what your people do. I blame you because you refuse to admit - to accept - that there is an enemy bigger than your war. My people see the threat. They understand the threat."
"You don't think I understand? Incredulous whelp! I have to deal with the possibility of death in our ranks daily, thank God none of the hunters were here to fall victim, and I can see very plainly that there is a clear, and very present danger. You're not offering solutions! You're not helping."
"I can't help you, Judge! You! You help you, help your people for God's sake, before there's no one left to help! Jonathan is in that thing, and that thing is killing you because it hates Jonathan. Those blank cowls, those cloaks, those blades... everything that wakens the echoes of that boy only make this creature angry. Coven. Hunters. You're all the same to Bane."
"There is no Bane."
"Well, your honor." L.C. stared past him, into the parking lot as Detective Fallon pulled in. "So long as there is no enemy, your people have no one, and nothing to target. No defense. So long as you play cloak and dagger with the fates of your people, you're all damned. Can you live with that?"
Grifford sneered. "Can you?"
"Don't give me your dirty laundry, and ask me to wash it for you. I saw that thing. It's fast. It's stronger then any of us. It's stronger than ten of any of us. Stronger than ten of me. My kind. You have two threats from the other side poisoning our city. My city, and I can feel it in my blood. I can feel it like a cancer growing in my heart. That poison will destroy us all. If you want to stop it, you'll need to take action."
"Action." Grifford frowned, and furrowed his brow. "The Rogue."
"The what?"
"Rogue. Expelled from the order, or vigilantes who take up arms without admission from The Order. The Rogue. The ones who hunt without license, for lack of a better word. They could help."
"You'll sacrifice others."
"...before I sacrifice my own? I'd sacrifice a million. These are my people."
L.C. nodded. "It's war. I'm an exile... but I can't say I don't understand. If I had to choose between my own, and you? A million of you would die, first."
"You and I could be friends, Polovatski."
"Why would I want to be friends with you? You scare the hell out of me. Good afternoon, Judge. My partner's here. The rest are on the way. I have a date."
"Who the hell would date you?"
"The Mighty Samwhich."