part0015

Their night moved slowly. It all took too long, but objectively given the logistics of it all the night went fine. She just felt like they should move faster. It took time for the agents to arrive with the coroner’s van, and they had to keep the site secure until then.

They lost forty-two humans that night, to the enemy’s predations. It made her angry, but realistically with so many to hunt they couldn’t keep everyone safe.

The president did give a speech, and short of what they hadn’t told him, about the specifics of their powers, their origins, blood sharing, and their extended lifespans, he pretty much passed on all they’d told them. They also said they were in the process of creating legislation to deal with the new world as they knew it, and he spent a lot of time assuring the country that nothing had changed. That these monsters had existed since the beginning, and so had those that hunted the monsters and protected them.

Time would tell what the backlash would be for that. Not only in the states, but worldwide.

They did manage to finish off all the groups. Unlike the first time, they didn’t engage in conversation, but instead they took them down fast, and did their best to leave at least one alive but unconscious for her and Allison to rummage about in their minds looking for Asmodai’s true plans. They succeeded enough with that last part, but they didn’t discover anything new or any indications of Asmodai’s end game.

All of them had been told the same story. It was absurd of course, that they believed it. Samael and by extension Asmodai wanted humanity destroyed, not just to make it easier for soul eaters to hunt humans for eternity on Earth, which is really what the soul eaters wanted.

They took them out in groups of two to four soul eaters throughout the night. At the end of the night they’d taken down twelve groups, and thirty-five soul eaters, leaving just twelve loner soul eaters remaining in the city when they retired to the hotel. Grant and Jessica had needed to get some rest, and in truth so did they. The soul eaters and two rogue shifters left would have to wait.

They eight of them were in a hotel suite that had four bedrooms, and Caroline was still with the DC coven. They were around the table eating a large breakfast before they went to bed for a few hours. It was a half hour before dawn.

Jacob said, “Not a bad night’s work. The council is sending two more teams to help in the city, they should be here and hunting before we wake up. Lily, before we go to sleep can you map out the last twelve? We haven’t made any headway on our primary mission, which is to find and remove the warlock to banish Asmodai back to hell. Once that happens, we’ll have most likely thwarted whatever plan the demon was working on, and hopefully we’ll have time to work out with the humans how things are going to go forward before anything else breaks.”

That was true, it was possible the enemy would keep on with Asmodai’s plans, but it didn’t seem likely they knew what that even was. It was good operational security on Asmodai’s part, but also meant it was far too likely his plans would die on the vine when he was taken out. She also doubted the enemy would continue to cooperate in large numbers without a strong leader to keep them in line. Soul eaters just weren’t interested in ending the world anymore, not like they had been in the past. Warlocks and the demons they summoned were the big danger that way.

“I can do that.”

She finished off her plate, and she felt full and satisfied for the first time since they left home. The pizza last night really hadn’t been enough, and they’d been up for twenty-four hours. She could slow down her body so it didn’t burn so many calories, but not while she was hunting and fighting, and it wasn’t really safe for her to stop the magic use and shields she had going. That all needed a lot of fuel.

She pulled out her phone, and then started to map them out. She believed they were all done for the night, hopefully they wouldn’t move. If they were lucky the hunter teams coming would take care of them before they even woke up. She imagined they’d be sleeping to at least noon.

Her mind was stuck on the warlock, where he or she could be, and how they could track him down. She was at a loss though, and none of their targets that night had that information. She let it go though, when they all retired to their rooms for the night as four couples, and she was a bit bemused by that. It seemed Carl and Allison were closer than they let on, but then Carl was a private person and Allison was shy, it shouldn’t have surprised her that they didn’t show their affection in public.

Then she was in Jacob’s arms, and she didn’t think or worry about anything. She felt consumed, loved, and was sated by his attentions before they found sleep.

Jacob pulled her against him and she sighed into his neck.

It was just after noon, and she’d woken up maybe a minute ago. She’d been hoping for a morning reprise of last night, but what she’d felt had killed the mood.

“There are over a hundred soul eaters in the city, and Asmodai is back. He definitely went recruiting last night. I’m not sure what to do, even with three teams it would be suicide to attack him, and he’s got thirty soul eaters and six more witches with him. The other seventy some odd soul eaters are spread around the city.”

Jacob frowned, “Time to get up then.”

He kissed her quite thoroughly, and she felt a twinge of desire when he broke it and stared into her eyes.

“We’ll figure it out. Maybe the humans will help.”

It took a moment for the words to sink into her sleepy and lust fogged brain. She wasn’t really sure where he stood yet, and she knew that moment wasn’t the time to delve into personal desires and their plans as a couple and where they stood.

But she wanted too. She was pretty sure where she stood, she wanted him for this lifetime. She believed he was on the same wavelength, and wanted her for life, but it was also obvious he hadn’t completely resolved the question of who she was with her memories. It’d take time.

“Right, the humans.”

He asked, “Are you sure we can’t fight him? Maybe if they put enough bullets in him, or blew him up, we could take him out.”

She shrugged, “Maybe? It would be risky as hell. We’d still have to find the warlock though, or he’ll just summon Asmodai back if we manage to destroy his current body enough to banish him, and the warlock would just kill another hundred humans or so to do it.”

They rolled out of bed, and then got into the shower. They didn’t talk about it anymore for a while, stealing just a few more moments of intimacy with each other. She felt a little more relaxed when they got dressed and joined the others for breakfast, or lunch really, but it was still the first meal of their day.

She updated them all on what she’d discovered, and it was silent for a while as they all absorbed it. They needed a solution, to be proactive, but for the moment they seemed to be stuck with putting out fires. Taking out a soul eater for any reason was a good thing, and one less to prey on humans, but it still felt like a waste of time, and being reactive. They were still allowing the enemy to dictate the terms of battle, that’s what truly bothered her, but what else could they do? It was a big world, and the warlock could be anywhere.

Daniel said, “I’m going to join one of the other teams. Last night drove me crazy.”

Meri smirked, “Love you too.”

Jacob nodded, “I understand, do what you have to do. Any ideas on what to do? The warlock is in an unknown location, but we can go after the demon. For all we know the warlock is right there with Asmodai, and there’s only one way to find out. It’s a risky idea, but maybe with three teams and human help we can get it done.”

Carl asked, “Human help?”

Jacob shrugged, “Sniper rifles, swat team, maybe even heavier ordinance. Take the building out with a drone strike, it would kill all the soul eaters and witches, and might severely harm the demon.”

She frowned, “There’re humans around them, although maybe not in the same building. I’d like to get close to it if I can, I’ll be able to sense weaker demons and a warlock if we do.”

Jacob was about to answer, but someone knocked on their door.

Allison said, “It’s Grant and Jess.”

Meri jumped up to go answer it.

Both agents were grim faced when they walked back in with Meri. Without saying a word, Jessica walked over to the television and switched it on. It took her a moment to get it on a news station.

“Shit,” she breathed.

The demon, Asmodai, was giving a press conference. The problem was immediately obvious, he didn’t look evil, he looked like an angel. It was only in the story books that evil wore the proverbial black hat. Red horns and black wings, the real world wasn’t so clear cut. He was smiling, his white wings were glowing, and his voice and presence was compelling, even over television.

Like his father, Asmodai had a honeyed tongue as he spoke of the mistreatment of his people, and the black lies told by the so-called hunters who were the real spawns of hell. It was ballsy, and unbelievable to her, as he turned everything upside down in his speech. Good was evil, evil was good, and he humbly begged the people of Earth for support against the evil shifters who were persecuting his own people.

Asmodai would’ve made a hell of a politician, and he looked like an angel. Even his aspect as the principality of wrath didn’t harm his speech, as he looked and spun it as righteous anger for the shifters trespass against his people. It shouldn’t have surprised her, she had more reason than anyone else to know evil had a deceptively honeyed tongue to mislead humanity and lure them into destruction, but it did.

It’d been many years, since she’d had to deal with Samael after all, and even he couldn’t have reached the whole world with one speech. The implications staggered her.

Jessica sighed, “This is just a replay of it, his speech was an hour ago.”

She said, “Well, at least we know his plan. He’ll try to turn humanity against us, and then against itself as some humans will inevitably embrace the truth. Then he’ll destroy whatever is left. Call it what you will, divide and conquer. It will also take a very long time, but he’ll enjoy all that suffering as countries are torn apart, and they face off against each other.”

Grant frowned, “People aren’t that stupid.”

Allison said, “Some of them are, at least in large numbers. A person is smart and can be convinced with facts. A crowd however will get caught up in emotions, so logic and reason will be discarded, and they’ll follow the stampede in whatever direction it runs. Keep in mind he also has witches working for him, some of those rogues we told you about, it wouldn’t be hard for a witch to push a high-powered human in one direction or another.”

Lily said, “She’s right. You need to understand this deep in your gut. Demons, fallen angels, hate you with everything in their being. Samael has been trying to destroy humanity since the first moment Adam and Eve were created. Those are the stakes, and why we fight so fiercely. If we don’t stop him, and stop him soon, his words will resonate with some humans and cause a schism. I’m not surprised he’s starting his campaign here at all either, America is very powerful, but the government is corrupt and split starkly by two party lines. In other words, the two groups are already used to disagreeing about everything.”

Grant frowned, “What do you suggest?”

She replied, “He’s still in the city, and he has thirty soul eaters and six more rogue witches with him. He was recruiting last night, and he came back to the city with over a hundred soul eaters. We should hit him with everything we can muster. For us that’s three teams, we’re hoping you can supply weapons and people to join us. If we can destroy his body, he’ll be banished back to hell. I also want to get close enough to feel them directly first, if the warlock is with him we’ll target the warlock instead.”

Jessica said, “You said that was suicide yesterday.”

Jacob nodded, “That about sums it up, yes. It’s risky, but we have to stop him. Taking him out might be our only choice, we have no idea where the warlock is. Our people are looking for signs of other sacrifices, but they haven’t found any yet. We were actually hoping you could get a drone strike to take out the building, then we run in the rubble and take out whatever survived.”

Grant said, “The military can’t act on our soil.”

She frowned, “That’s not exactly true, the military can’t act as police, or against their own citizens. I’m fairly sure you can classify Asmodai as an invasion from another country, hell, he’s from another dimension.”

Grant nodded, “Essentially correct, although it’s not quite that simple, but I’ll make a call.”

Jacob said, “We’re going on a scouting mission, to get Lily close enough to tell if the warlock’s there. She’ll also need to get close enough to identify where they are, if you do manage to get approval to use a missile strike of some kind. Otherwise we’ll have to make do with FBI tactical teams, or swat. We can’t face them alone, not with three teams.”

Jessica asked, “What about the other soul eaters?”

Meri said, “They’ll scatter like roaches and flee DC if we take the angel out, if we can’t take the angel out than it’s all moot anyway. At least, it is for us.”

Right, because she and the rest of the team would be dead, along with two others. Best case, they take out the warlock that started all this, before the angel took over. Still, she’d take it if they could banish the angel and at least spike their plans for a while. It would give them some breathing room to find the warlock.