Tokyo Demons Book 3: Chapter 4, Part 1

The house was dark on the inside; it lacked even the hazy glow of the porch lights. Ayase spread herself thin and wide across the high ceiling. She could make out the shadows of furniture and some moving bodies below her…

A flashlight suddenly snapped on, running a quick line over her on the ceiling. She recoiled against the bright light.

“Code Omega!” somebody shouted below her. “Move the package to the west bedroom for retreat, now!”

Package? Ayase didn’t know if they meant Zero, or Pitch, or anything else–but the call for retreat was damning enough. She needed to keep them in place until Nakajima could get to them.

She swarmed down after the voice and his bobbing flashlight. He looked like an armed guard–and he had two more people following him. Ayase rushed into a tighter column and zipped up the hallway, desperate to catch up.

She exploded into the bedroom right behind them, immediately spreading herself thinner to attack all three at once. The men cursed and swatted at her, but one of them yanked at a large switch on the wall.

SKREEEK

As Ayase frantically stung any skin she could find, her compound eyes picked up the glint of metal around her. Strange metal panels scraped out from the reinforced frames of the room’s windows. Someone slammed the door shut behind her just as another panel scraped up in its place.

They were sealing off the room.

Hoping beyond hope that Nakajima could break into a panic room, Ayase just focused on subduing the guards. One of them fell to the floor, screaming, but another one dropped beside him and attached something to his face. He angrily swatted at Ayase and cursed under his breath, grabbing and throwing fistfuls of her away from his face before attaching another contraption to his head.

Gas masks.

Ayase went cold. The third guard, blocking her by throwing a blanket over his head, stumbled to a large canister against one wall of the room. She buzzed up and under the fabric with as many bugs as she could, but he’d already put on his mask; he only twitched as she dug her mouth stingers into him in wild panic.

She stung and stung and stung. With his swiftly swelling hands, he still managed to turn the knob on the gas tank.

***

Blinding pain shot through Jo’s right hand. He choked, the bat slipping out of his trembling grip as cries erupted around him.

The guard in front of him dropped her gun as her trigger finger spasmed. Jo rushed her, his mind white, and punched her hard across the face with his left fist.

thwip

He heard the other guard scream. By the time Jo had slammed his opponent against the ground, Kiyoshi had crookedly buried an arrow in the male guard, his four uninjured fingers dragging a new arrow from his pack. Takeshi grabbed the guard, covered his mouth, and cracked his head against the side of the house.

Jo blinked spots from his vision and gingerly flexed his right hand. The pain was subsiding, although he heard an edge to Zayd’s whispered prayers over his headset.

“St-standby,” Takeshi said, grinning through his cold sweat. “Cover our backs, Red.”

Kiyoshi shakily put the arrow to string and scanned the gardens around them. From somewhere inside the house, a long, low thrum started up–like the noise of an industrial machine. The throbbing vibrated the wall beside Jo.

“Shit,” he whispered into his mic. “Who’s in the house? It sounds like they just started some kind of machine.”

“Like a bomb?”

“There’s no ticking.” Jo pressed his ear against the wall. “But I think I hear…hissing.”

There was a moment of silence on his earpiece, and then Mitsuko’s voice crackled on.

“I’m inside with Adam. Clearing the rooms from east to west–no sign of Zero yet. Most of the guards are gone.”

crackle

“Nakajima,” Shouri said. “Where are you in the house?”

Silence.

“Nakajima, tell us where you are!”

There was another faint buzz, and then some male voice made a muffled scream.

The sound chilled Jo to his bones, but Adam murmured something a moment later, confirming it wasn’t him. Jo glanced back into the woods to make sure Miki and Zayd were still there.

“If you found Zero,” Shouri insisted, “then tell us, you crazy bitch!”

Nothing. Nakajima’s microphone only picked up labored breathing and the faint sound of a man’s broken whimper.

Jo tried to ignore it.

Takeshi looked around the corner of the house, waved Jo on, and then slipped around to the back of the building.

“Got a good visual on the back door,” Takeshi whispered through the earpiece. “Do you think we should breach it?”

Jo heard Miki grunt in his headset, the sound half-buried under the industrial thrum nearby. “They fucking know we’re here by now,” he answered darkly as Jo followed Takeshi around the edge of the house.

BLAM

Takeshi jerked back a step before collapsing to the ground. Jo scrambled backward around the corner.

“What the hell was that?!”

Kiyoshi rushed over, but Jo stopped him in a panic. “G-gun,” he blurted.

“Takeshi?!” Miki cried over the line.

Jo, his heart in his throat, could hear wheezing from around that corner. The world slowed as he got to his knees and carefully peeked past the edge of the house.

Takeshi lay on the porch a few meters ahead, a dark stain blooming across his black shirt. He was alone in the hazy light, sprawled in almost tranquil solitude, the thundering of the house beside him a separate world of chaos.

Kiyoshi was suddenly peering from above Jo. “Sniper,” he breathed.

Takeshi coughed up blood, but it almost sounded like a laugh. “Tell Ban,” he gurgled, “that I died…cool.”

Jo grabbed Kiyoshi with shaking hands and pulled him back around the corner, Miki’s choked curses in his ear.

***

Ayase clawed at the knob with her insect legs, butted it with her heads, slammed it with her bodies. She felt a helpless parallel to trying to uncap that acid vial on the roof. Gas hissed from the canister, filling the room with a chemical that irritated her antennae.

The guard under the blanket slipped away, leaving the fabric to fall heavily; it trapped her against the canister and the floor. As she tried to buzz her way free, her insects on the other guards zipped away from them, toward the blocked windows. She tried to squeeze past the edge of the metal panels, but they were embedded in the wooden frames. She zipped back, toward the sealed door…

As strength began to drain out of her.

She buzzed crookedly in the billowing gas, panic streaking through her consciousness. Was it a sedative? Was it poison? It didn’t matter–as pieces of her succumbed to the gas and dropped to the floor, the guards crushed her under their feet. Her fire-burned bodies cracked easily under the pressure.

Pieces of her vision blacked out: snap snap snap.

She flew to corners of the room, pressed against the ceiling, flattened against the walls. But the drugged fatigue dragged her toward the floor and imminent death. She could feel her collective consciousness slipping away as more pieces of her blinked out.

Help! she silently screamed, her mind racing to its farthest points.

She’d scattered after facing the flamethrower, so her other insects buzzed in fragmented darkness. Her countless eyes took in trees, the roof, the porch, the ground. She opened her mind to the cacophony of sounds and sensations that flooded her receptors. The overload dragged her in every direction, smearing everything together. Screams, gasps, curses, dying.

where

who

please

Somewhere, somehow, she felt the sensation of skin against wings. A brief flash of Shouri’s eyes.

“Ayase,” said the woman’s fuzzy voice, rushing past Ayase’s awareness like a car on a screaming freeway. “What’s happening?!”

Break open the west bedroom! Ayase begged, the bloom of gas sucking her thoughts down a hole.

“Ayase?!”

But as Shouri’s voice popped and then melted back into the thickening sludge of Ayase’s mind, Ayase knew it was hopeless. The smear of everything dripped down, down, down, into the suffocating fog of gas, into the distant pain and crack of shoes crushing her into blackness.

No one could hear her.

Not without Kadoyuki.

***

“T-Takeshi stopped moving,” Jo croaked through the lump in his throat. “We can’t…cover the back of the house.”

There was a moment of eerie silence over the line, save for grunts and breathing. Jo pushed the back of his head against the wall behind him, that mechanical thrum and hiss bleeding through his skull.

Kiyoshi, to Jo’s surprise, crouched on the porch and sketched something invisible on the wood. His lips moved silently, his dark eyes locked on his non-existent drawing in fevered focus.

“Maybe…” He got flat on his stomach and crawled past Jo. When he peeked around the corner of the house, Jo grabbed at him crazily and tried to pull him back.

“What the hell are you doing?!”

Kiyoshi jostled, trying to shove Jo back with one hand. “Just…give me a sec!”

“No! Are you out of your goddamned mind?!”

BLAM

Kiyoshi abruptly pulled back behind the house as greenery exploded in the garden. Jo fell back, his heart racing, as Kiyoshi twisted his head toward the landed bullet.

“Kiyoshi,” Zayd’s voice ordered over the line. “Stay where you are.”

“We can’t get a visual on the back,” Jo said weakly. “If we try to look, they’ll shoot again.”

Kiyoshi stared out at the garden, then drew an arrow from his pack. As Miki swore a blue streak through the line in Jo’s ear, Kiyoshi set his arrow to string and drew back.

thwip CRACK

One of the garden lights snapped out, softening the already dim light. Kiyoshi jumped into the garden blocked by their side of the house, turned at a precise angle, and shot another arrow past the edge of the building. Another light cracked and vanished in the garden closer to Takeshi.

“Kiyoshi–” Before Jo could say more, Kiyoshi fired at the porch light near Jo’s head. It exploded, making Jo jump out of the way of glass shards in the new darkness.

“Sorry,” Kiyoshi murmured. “Should’ve warned you.”

“What are you doing?!” Jo demanded.

“The light’s bad out here, so he’s probably got a night-vision scope. But I’m still trying to make things harder for him.” In the blanketing darkness, Jo barely made out Kiyoshi jumping back onto the porch. “Combined with that twitch that makes him shoot too far left half the time.”

“Who are you talking about?”

“The gun otaku. The sniper that trained me.” Kiyoshi bent to quickly retie his sneakers. “I’m gonna take him out.”

Cold dread rose in Jo when Kiyoshi scooted closer to the edge of the house. No, he thought, the word strangled out of his throat.

“The gunfire was loud, so he’s gotta be close–shorter-range rifle. One more shot and I can guess where he is, then I’ll go up behind and get him with an arrow–”

“No.” Jo’s voice finally punched through his closed esophagus. He grabbed Kiyoshi’s arm. “No, no.”

Kiyoshi absently shrugged him off. “I’ll run into the forest. He can’t pivot that far in a tree, and he’ll have a crap shot with all my cover–”

“Kiyoshi,” Zayd warned over the line. “It is too dangerous. Stay where you are.”

Kiyoshi pressed the mute button on his earpiece.

The world slowed around Jo again, but this time, he wouldn’t let it leave him behind. As Kiyoshi pushed up against the building’s corner, Jo grabbed his bow arm with both hands, planted his feet, and dug his fingers into flesh.

“Fuck you,” Jo hissed, the words acid in his mouth. “I won’t fucking let you die.”

Kiyoshi’s arm muscles tightened as Jo’s nails pierced through fabric. But then Kiyoshi turned his head, stared at Jo for a long moment, and twisted away from the sniper’s path.

He threw his free arm around Jo’s neck and pulled him close.

Jo froze against the sudden crush of Kiyoshi’s shoulder against his face. He tried to breathe, numb against the faint thud of Kiyoshi’s heart through sweaty t-shirt fabric.

Kiyoshi yanked free of Jo’s weak grip and ran into the darkness.

“K…!”

In the faint light of the other garden lights, Jo could barely see Kiyoshi’s form duck into the forest in the sniper’s sightline. After an agonizing second of silence, Kiyoshi pushed past the edge of a tree and raised an arm in the sniper’s direction.

Jo saw the outline of Kiyoshi’s extended middle finger.

BLAM

Kiyoshi jerked back and fell to the ground.

Jo’s heart stopped.

Kiyoshi’s audio line clicked back on.

“Barely nicked me,” Kiyoshi murmured, adrenaline-fueled humor in his voice. “Now I know where he is.”

Jo choked out a breath as Kiyoshi’s shadow rose again. It ran deeper into the forest and out of Jo’s view.

Jo’s hands shook. He swallowed bile. As new orders and updates echoed through his earpiece, his eyes fell to his bat.

He grabbed it. His fear and grief and frustration twisting inside him, he turned to the nearest window in the wall at his back.

He smashed the base of his bat through the glass.

“They know we’re here,” he said through his teeth, bashing over and over into the metal panel behind the window. “So let’s pry that goddamn supervillain out of this deathtrap.”

The metal warped and groaned as he rammed circular indents into it. When he finally punched a semi-circle hole through the thin metal, some smoke-like substance swirled out, and the edge of something sweet tickled his nostrils. A fire?

I don’t care. He flipped his bat around, tightened both hands around the grip, and shoved the bat through his half-punched hole in the panel. He ripped his bat through the metal in a high-pitched skrrrrrrk.

***

BAM

BAM

Ayase heard pounding through her antenna, mixed with the drag of gas and blinding pain. She tried to focus her muddy, fading perspective to the room where she was dying.

She flew blindly toward the sound, spinning through the air on leaden wings. She crawled pieces of her weakly across the floor, suddenly spared a moment of those crushing feet.

BAM

BAM

One of the guards was running to a window. He shouted something through his gas mask, his gun in his hand.

WHAM

Something long, like a wooden post, burst through the metal panel from outside and rammed into his stomach. The man fell back, gripping his gut.

skrrrrrrk

A rush of clean, cool air rushed past some of Ayase’s antennae. She flew drunkenly toward the invading force that ripped a razor-edged maw across the panel.

She spilled bugs out into the cool night, scraping herself against metal and wood and skin and fabric. Her dizzy consciousness flapped through the darkness and wrapped around the familiar shape that stumbled back on the porch.

“Ayase?!” Jo blurted as she burrowed into his clothes.

***

The edge of a gun appeared through the ripped panel, amidst the swarm of fleeing bugs.

“Shit!” Jo hissed as he threw himself out of the way. But the gun fired awkwardly into the garden, missing him by a wide margin. He heard an echoing cry of pain as insects swarmed the hand holding the gun.

Jo scrambled to his feet, gripped his bat, and rammed into the hole again. He felt his bat hit soft flesh; something thudded against the floor. More insects crookedly flew toward him when he pulled his bat out.

His vision swam. He blinked his suddenly heavy eyelids and coughed on that sweet smoke. Unless it was…

“Gas?” he wondered aloud, into the swarm of wobbly insects circling him. “Ayase, did they gas you?!”

Jo heard a thudding from inside, followed by smashing and more cries. Coughing suddenly erupted from his earpiece.

“Dammit!” Mitsuko gurgled between coughs. “They flooded this place with knock-out gas!”

Jo quickly rammed his bat into the hole he’d made, widening the torn metal. “Ayase was in there!” he shouted. “And it only looks like half of her got out!”

A moment later, the hissing noise snapped off–along with the dull industrial thrumming that had blanketed the night. His ears ringing in the new quiet, Jo pulled back from the window to let the metal panel drag upward with a hum.

It got stuck halfway, blocked from its path from the way he’d warped it. He waved gas from his face and stuck his head through the half-open window.

Mitsuko lifted a dropped flashlight in the darkness, briefly illuminating herself. She had blood dripping down her forehead, but she looked okay; she flashed the light over a panting Adam and three unconscious guards sprawled on the floor.

Scattered around the fallen guards were…bugs. Hundreds of them. And although much of the sheet of insects still twitched, far too many were deathly still, or clearly crushed into the floor. Even in the dark, he could see smears on the hardwood separating random insect body parts. Jo swallowed.

He couldn’t guess how many she’d lost.

The sounds of a struggle crackled in his earpiece. Jo went rigid until Kiyoshi’s voice broke through.

“Sniper’s down!” Kiyoshi panted. “Back of the house is clear. I’ve got a visual, so I’ll hold it.”

One of the many knots in Jo’s stomach finally loosened. But struggling noises continued over the line, and Jo couldn’t tell where it was. He whipped his head back to the forest.

He saw shapes moving violently near Miki and Zayd. “Fucking…straggler tried to escape!” Miki hissed. “Zayd, kick that gun away!”

“Do you need help?” Mitsuko asked quickly.

Miki snarled like an animal, and one of the shapes hit the ground. More movement, and then Jo saw the flash of gunpowder as a weapon was fired. Someone unfamiliar cried out in pain.

“You like that?!” Miki roared. “I’ll shove this gun up your pisshole, you shit-stained cum rag!”

“Miki-kun–” Zayd tried.

“Tell me where your boss is!” Another gunshot, another scream. “TELL ME OR I’LL BLAST YOUR MOTHERFUCKING FACE OFF!”

“He doesn’t know,” Nakajima suddenly said, her voice cold over the line. “None of them do.”

Jo touched his earpiece in surprise. “Where are you?” Shouri snapped.

“Behind you.”

Jo automatically twisted around, but no one was there. When he heard Mitsuko cry out in surprise, he stuck his head back in the gas room.

Nakajima stood in the dark doorway, her fist gripped over the shirt of an unmoving guard. She dragged him across the floor and dropped him with a sound of disgust. The sickening stench of blood wafted over the last traces of the gas.

“Torturing them is a waste of time,” she said thinly. “No one knows where Zero sleeps.”

“It’s just a damn house!” Shouri argued. “You’re sure you searched everywhere?!”

“Yes. So he’s either in a secret room, or he slipped out the back door before we could cover it.” Nakajima looked up at the ceiling. “I assume this place is reinforced so it won’t burn easily, but smoking him out is our last choice. Did someone commandeer the flamethrower?”

Adam nodded and unstrapped the huge gun from his back.

“Wait.” Jo threw out a hand, his mind racing. “Did you guys search the servants’ quarters?”

“Yes,” Nakajima and Mitsuko said in unison.

Jo gritted his teeth. Think like Core, he ordered himself. Think like Core.

“And we all…kinda know what Zero looks like,” Jo thought aloud. “From that surveillance photo you showed us. But we’ve had barely any light since we got here.”

Nakajima snorted. “Do you think we wouldn’t recognize him if he were disguised as one of the guards?” she asked. “We all have perfectly good eyes.”

Jo ran a finger under one of the insects crawling over him. “Not all of us,” he murmured as he brought the bug to his face.

Proceed to Chapter 4, Part 1, page 3–>