The Abyss Stares Back - 07
The front door to the apartment building was flung open and out from the darkness within stumbled Sloan dragging Wulf after her, smearing a bloody trail behind them. The female watcher followed suit behind them, dispelling the orb of daylight as they pass into the gloomy sunlight outside.
The sight of them was horridly spectacular enough to draw attention from passersby. Humans, halflings and a few half-elves too, all fine and proper imperial folk now gawked at the bloodied display.
“Hold on, Wulf.” Said Sloan as she sat her liaison down by the carriage’s wheel. She then locked eyes with the nearest person, a halfling woman of southern descent. “Fetch the watchers! Now!”
The woman flinched before running up the street, her bonnet flopping as she did. The horses whinnied as they too clearly sensed the present danger.
“I’m sorry Sloan.” Muttered Wulf, deliriously. His eyelids were heavy and he struggled to maintain consciousness. “I’m not a fighter.”
“You did great.” Said Sloan rummaging through her luggage, hoping she brought the vials with her. “You pulled the core out of a flesh golem. You can tell all your mates you stared in the face of a demonic monstrosity and didn’t even blink.”
Wulf chuckled weakly. “No…I blinked…”
But while Sloan was busy going through the luggage she brought with her, the female watcher stood alert with her eyes affixed upon the building’s front door. Looking up she could now see much of the upper floor windows had been covered either with curtains or newspapers.
Sloan returned to Wulfgang and knelt down. In her hands she held what looked like a barrel-less firearm. The dark metal contraptions had a grip and a trigger to pull but where a metal cylinder would reside to hold bullets there was instead a casing that Sloan opened. With one swift motion she pulled up a small vial with a brackish red liquid and a label wrapped around it that said “Birkenmire Solutions”. This was what the common folk would call a potion of healing and for regular people ingesting such a potion would stitch wounds and aid in general recovery over time. Wulfgang was certainly a regular person but right now they didn’t have the luxury of time. That’s where this device, the bloodshot, came in.
Sloan inserted the vial into the contraption and closed the lid. Then she placed it up against Wulfgang’s neck and pulled the trigger. A small needle shot out of the device and into the watcher’s neck, injecting the concoction directly into his veins. Wulf gasped as the solution’s healing properties began to take hold, soothing his pain. And soon, with a smile of relief upon his lips, he fell into unconsciousness. Sloan sighed as the fear began to subside. It had been hard enough to cut down the thralls, she didn’t want to be responsible for his death too.
It was then that she looked at the other watcher who had saved them.
“And who exactly are you?”
The woman, confident that none of the thralls had followed them downstairs, finally turned to face the blackguard.
“Watcher Maeve Browlin.”
Sloan furrowed her brow suspiciously as she opened the bloodshot and ejected the empty vial.
“I remember you from the watchtower, you know.” Said Sloan as she pulled out another vial. This one unlabeled and filled with a crimson liquid that had a strange shimmer to it. “You seemed very interested in our investigation for a regular street level watcher.”
“The inspectors weren’t exactly eager to investigate these crimes. But some of us have been aware of them for a while and pushed for further investigation but to no avail.”
“U-huh.” Said Sloan as she injected the crimson liquid into her neck and soon the wounds began to rapidly close up. “And you just happen to know the daylight spell? Who are you really?”
The woman smiled before twirling a finger and suddenly the illusion of the female human watcher began to dissipate. In her stead Sloan found a human woman of high hyperian descent, reddish brown skin and coarse black hair. Her eyes were a striking golden brown and her gaze was intense. She was dressed in fine but functional clothing, a protective leather vest enveloping a white shirt and overlapped under a well tailored maroon coat. Her pants were simple but fine, her leather boots were made for travel, and around her waist she wore a leather belt with multiple pouches attached, including the blade Sloan had noticed earlier. But most notable was the leather bound book that was attached to her waist.
There was no mistaking it, she was clearly well trained and not afraid to get her hands dirty.
“You can call me Ophelia.”
“Well, that doesn’t tell me much.” Said Sloan. “But judging by your capabilities I’d assume you were a state arcanist, and yet you wear no uniform.”
“Some of us work in secrecy.” Replied Ophelia as she now leaned down to check on Wulf.
He was still unconscious but it seemed that his condition was stable. His slow but steady breathing proved the solution was working.
“Not in my experience.” Continued Sloan, taking a few steps back and looking up at the apartment building for any signs of activity. “Almost every single state arcanist I’ve met have always been very interested in swinging their meaty authority around, given the chance. If I didn’t know any better I’d have guessed you were a whisperer from Valghast.”
Sloan turned to catch Ophelia roll her eyes at the insinuation. She chuckled.
“So what are you doing here?”
Ophelia stood up and turned to face the blackguard. “I’ve been investigating these recent murders. There have been rumors floating about that they might have infernal connections so I came to take a better look.”
Sloan nodded in feign approval as she slowly sauntered to the luggage compartment of the carriage. “Oh yes, very diligent of you. And yet for some reason you saw fit to mask yourself as a lowly imperial watcher, even at the watchtower. That wouldn’t get you very far when you could also just show up in uniform and demand everything they had on these cases. So why didn’t you do that?”
“That’s none of your business.” Ophelia’s steely gaze was locked on the alabaster woman with an expression of distrust and deflection.
“Oh but I beg to differ. Dark magic and infernal activities are my business. My state sanctioned business, one might say.”
“Blackguards don’t operate under the kaiser’s authority.”
“And yet we have standing agreements that allow us to operate here, assigning all infernal matters as our domain.” Said Sloan with a shit-eating grin. “So I ask again, why are you being so secretive.”
A realization dawned on Ophelia. “You think I had something to do with this?”
Sloan shrugged. “Who’s to say? All I know is that we have demonic killings taking place around this part of town with an entire apartment building floor succumbing to demonic influence and possessions, not to mention the infernal flesh golem we just fought. And on top of that we have a very capable arcanist disguising herself and pretending to be someone else. That is mighty suspicious, if I say so myself.”
“If I was behind this I would’ve just left you there. You were outnumbered.”
“True, and I honestly don’t think you are behind this specifically because of that point alone. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t something extremely fishy about your presence here.”
Ophelia furrowed her brow and curled her lip for a moment. “I’m not here on official business, that’s the reason for the secrecy. I’m supposed to be on a job in Asogate.”
“And yet, here you are.”
“Here I am. So do you want my help in purging this infestation or not?”
Sloan gave a shrug with her eyebrows alone before turning to look at the apartment building.
“The situation is far worse than I could’ve anticipated. So I guess I’ll take all the help I can get. And the local watchers aren’t any help, in fact they might just get in our way.”
“Like this one?” asked Ophelia, motioning towards Wulf.
Sloan regarded the unconscious watcher still resting up against the carriage. “No, he was surprisingly capable for a nobody. I probably wouldn’t be here if he hadn’t…no he’s good. The rest though might not understand what needs to be done.”
“That they all need to die?”
There was a knowing silence for a moment as they both understood the magnitude of the endeavor.
“Demonic possessions are extremely difficult to untangle.” Explained Sloan. “Typically requiring a very powerful cleric, and even then they need to step in before the influence robs the victim of their agency. The people up there have been gone for a long while now.”
“What about the rest of the building?”
Sloan paused for a moment. “We’ll take care of the hostile ones, then we’ll have to sort out the rest later.”
“That’s it? No careful inspection? I’ve heard of cases where violent possessions have been reverted.”
“There are cases. Three to be exact. Three cases in the past 8.000 years or so. Not exactly cause for careful inspection.”
Ophelia scoffed. “That’s it? I thought the blackguards had more refined methods than that.”
“We’re trained to step in and resolve situations like this before they spiral out of control. By any means necessary.”
Sloan solemnly gazed upon the cobblestone street as she said it. This was the burden they were forced to carry.
“I guess it’s true what they call you. The ‘bloody butchers of Citadel Karak’. No room for subtlety.”
The blackguard grinned unkindly. “8.000 years ago demons ravaged our world so catastrophically that our entire cosmology was almost destroyed. The ancient draconic gods abandoned us and sealed themselves away because we fucked up. Because at the end of the day it was a group of hyperian and lorian arcanists who created demonkind.”
“I’ve heard the stories.”
“You’ve heard them and yet you failed to listen. If we let infestations like that fester for too long then we begin the spiral of destruction all over again. Subtlety isn’t in our playbook because we can’t afford it. So? You still willing to help purge the infestation with me?”
Ophelia inhaled deeply, contemplating if this was a line she was willing to cross, before nodding.
“Good. We’ll make our way to the fourth floor and slowly and systematically make our way down. Something caused this infestation and we need to figure out where it originated. We’ll have the watchers bar the doors so that none may escape.”
“Speaking of which.” Said Ophelia, motioning up the street where a small squad of imperial watchers can running down, weapons at hand.
“Leave the explanation to me.” Said Sloan. “I have a badge.”
