Devil Ash Disarray (Devil Ash Saga Book 3) (42 page)

“Sir, yes sir!” the soldier barked like a good dog. “But umm…
where
should we tell them to find you, sir?”

“The royal throne room,” replied the Commander.

When Goddard arrived at his lab, he was greeted by the sight of a dozen big burlap sacks sitting outside his laboratory door. Each one looked stuffed, and stunk to high heaven. The dreary disappointment disappeared from his face as Goddard quickly unlocked his lab door and started hauling the bags inside.

Within minutes, Goddard was dumping bags of mismatched demon flesh out on the cold stone floor of his lab in an area he reserved exclusively for playing with demon guts. He threw on his green rubber surgical gloves and started handling miscellaneous parts he found to be interesting. Each organ oozed dark liquids, which Goddard would collect in a shallow tin pan. He separated each individual organ, every still intact limb, putting them each in their own special container. Sometimes he’d throw a smaller demon part into a jar of clear liquid.

He’d only sorted through two bags of the strange demon flesh so far. Some of it was covered in a rubbery black skin. Other parts seemed to be armored. There were even little bug-like legs strewn about. Clearly there’d be a lot to study and learn about here, and he wanted to chronicle each and every bit of demon biology he came across. So he went for his notebook and a feather quill to start taking notes.

Before he could write anything down there came a steady knocking on his laboratory door. Thinking it must be his team finally arriving to report in, Goddard called out “It’s open! Come in!” The Royal Advisor quickly snatched up a nearby dirty sheet and spread it out over the mess of demon parts.

Goddard turned around and saw someone enter his lab. Someone he was
not
expecting to see.

The Captain of East Hell.
Captain Miles
. A burly, barrel-chested man that stood a full head taller than Goddard. The Royal Advisor let out a disappointed sigh at the sight of the man.

“What do
you
want?” Goddard asked. His patience was limited. He needed to be either working or speaking to his team. Wasting time on this idiot was not a part of his plan. “While I’ve got you here, you haven’t noticed your Commander acting strangely, have you?”

The Royal Advisor turned his back on the man and removed his gloves. He picked up a nearby quill pen and started to write down some of his observations on the organ specimens he had laid out in shallow pans on his table.

He heard the wooden door to his lab close and the fumbling of the deadbolt lock sliding into place. He spun around, dropping his writing tools. Captain Miles had just locked the two of them in.

“What is the meaning of this?” asked Goddard.

Captain Miles lumbered closer. He paused, his eyes shifting from Goddard to the dirty sheet on the floor next to him. The Captain sniffed the air, taking two deep breathes of pungent odor that lingered in the air of the stuffy lab. His eyes widened in fury.

“
Oh, I see
…” said Goddard, following the man’s gaze. He stepped over to the edge of the dirty sheet. “You smell that?”

The Captain grunted a low, furious response.

“You want to see what’s under there,
Miles
?” Goddard asked. He reached for the edge of the sheet, never taking his eyes off the Captain. “You want to see if it really is what your nose tells you it is?”

The Captain had no reply but the sharp exhalation of his widened nostrils. Goddard obliged him by tearing away the sheet and tossing it aside.

“Here’re the remains of the enemy demons. Still fresh from today’s battles,” the Royal Advisor said, presenting the enemy’s blood-spattered remains.

Captain Miles growled like a wild beast, bearing his teeth at the Royal Advisor. The growl turned into a roar and Miles charged. Goddard reacted immediately and stepped to his desk. In one fluid motion, he grabbed a nearby beaker of liquid and flung it at the charging Captain.

Miles swatted at the glass beaker. Bad idea, as it shattered on impact with the man’s fist. The strange liquid inside sprayed all over his hand and arm. This gave him pause, as the liquid burned. In just seconds, it felt as if his flesh were melting off.

The Captain jumped back in a terrified mixture of shock and pain. He lifted his burning hand to his face and examined as his skin burned and bubbled. The man blew on the sizzling appendage trying to cool it, but to no avail. He roared and grunted and howled in pain.

“So my suspicions proved to be true,” said Goddard. “One of you poor bastards got possessed. That just increased the likelihood that Stryd was possessed, too.”

The possessed Captain growled and snarled an unintelligent response. There was no more doubt in the Royal Advisor’s mind that he was speaking to real live greater demon.

“So glad they could send one of you that can actually
communicate
,” Goddard said, rolling his eyes with sarcasm. “I was hoping I could learn something from you, but it looks like I’ll be the one teaching you.”

The Captain snorted.

“We’ll start with that beaker I tossed at you. The one that
burns
. That’s a little corrosive chemical cocktail I concocted. I’ve got all kinds of nasty surprises like that stashed around my lab. It’s how I deal with uninvited guests, like you.”

The possessed Captain’s hand finally stopped burning, his yowls of pain calming into a low soothing growl. The creature’s eyes rested on the silvery-haired man before him once again, his bared teeth now baring more of a resemblance to a demon. He snorted in satisfaction.

“Ready for round two?” asked Goddard. He turned away from the man and dug through the clutter on his desk to find another weapon. “You want to end up like your buddies back there?” He jerked his thumb behind him at the burlap sacks. “Then come and get me.”

The possessed Captain took a few cautious steps closer, confident enough until he saw Goddard handling another glass beaker. The Royal Advisor brandished the glass vial like it were a blade. The Captain came to a halt, locking eyes with his devil adversary. When Goddard made no move, the demon with limited patience charged like the mad beast he really was.

Next mixture
! Goddard chucked another beaker. The possessed Captain expected this and dodged accordingly, except this time was different. The Captain was not the target. The beaker crashed on the hard stone floor of the laboratory several feet in front of the enemy.

The Captain came to a halt as the contents of the broken beaker, a small puddle on the cold stone floor, underwent a chemical reaction. White steam rose off the puddle and filled the air. The demon inside the Captain paused and sniffed the air, as the creature would have done with any other unknown threat.

He inhaled through his nose sharply, drawing in a small amount of the gas. It burned his nose and stung his eyes until they leaked streams. Rubbing them didn’t help. The Captain backed away, confused, attacking the air trying to clear the gas away.

“That’s my next mixture. I call it
crying gas
,” said Goddard. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a collapsible fan. “As you can imagine, the gas is even more effective in high doses. Please, allow me to show you.”

With a flick of his wrist the Royal Advisor spread the fan open. He swung his arm once, blowing the cloud of gas through the air. After a few more swings, the cloud of crying gas blew straight into the possessed Captain’s face.

The man swung his arms, striking at the empty spaces around him trying to fight off the gaseous foe. His eyes reddened and felt like they were melting. Tears sprayed across the lab like sprinklers. His nose leaked a constant questionable fluid that sometimes dripped onto the floor, but most of it went straight into his mouth. He staggered backwards and his foot caught on something, refusing to move another inch.

“There are a lot of stones on the floor,” said Goddard. His eyes were directed at his opponent’s feet. “But there is only one stone I know to never step on. The one you are standing on right now.”

Through watery vision, the possessed man looked down to see where his foot was stuck. His black boot stood atop a dark stone marked by the devil’s seal. No matter how he struggled, he could not move his leg.

“It may be a small movement seal, but it’s enough to keep you from going anywhere for a little while.” Goddard stopped fanning the gas and moved on to his next trick. “Now would be a good time to leave that body. If you still don’t feel like exiting that man’s body yet, I’ll just have to make you change your mind.”

Goddard produced a small flame in his hand. His enemy was too busy crying, roaring as he thrashed about. The Royal Advisor took the opportunity to move his small flame across the room. His target was not his actual enemy, but the object that was hidden on the ceiling above his target.

Tied to the ceiling light was a small bag of powder. Goddard’s flames reached the bag and burned it open. The powder dumped all over the possessed Captain’s head and shoulders. It slid down the back and front of his armor, getting underneath his clothing. A handful wound up inside his underwear.

“
Itching powder
,” Goddard said, failing to conceal a grin.

That’s when the itching started. The beastly man scratched away at his armor, unable to reach the areas that needed relief. When no relief came, the beast began to thrash again, making things worse for himself. He pulled at the armor, struggling to remove each piece, only to become frustrated at the next layer of obstructive clothing.

“I’m a man of science, demon! This is how I fight! If you think you can handle more of it, get out here and confront me in your real body!”

Without tolerating another moment of torment in the crying, itching, burning body, the demon evacuated by shooting out of the Captain’s mouth. The demon’s body appeared as a long, thin black strand of flesh that stretched across the room and touched the floor only several steps in front of Goddard.

The dark demon flesh contorted and stretched, piling up before Goddard. It was like a furry brick wall rose up from the ground. In seconds all the Royal Advisor could see was the shaggy brown fur of his demon opponent. He hadn’t expected the creature to cross the room and be upon him so quickly. His mind raced to figure out his next move. His hand fumbled across the desk behind him for anything useful.

Before Goddard could do anything, the wildebeest-like greater demon swatted the man clear across the room. Goddard collided with a closed closet door and dropped to the ground. The unfamiliar sensation of pain shot through his back. The stones on the floor cooled his face. Goddard could tell by the pain in his side, at least one of his ribs was broken.

Idiot
, he thought. A weak grin spread across his face.
Putting distance between us was exactly what I needed. Now I’ll get him…
Goddard lifted his head and climbed to his feet just in time to see the enormous greater demon turn to face him.

The poor tormented Captain fell to the floor, unconscious as the greater demon left his body. The fully formed creature looked like a massive wildebeest-man. The demon scraped the ceiling with its massive head and horns. Every inch of its body was covered in long tangles of dirty brown fur. It stood on two legs that ended in large, black hoofs. Its head was that of a wildebeest, with long curved horns that spun and rotated.

TKKTKKTKKTKK
, the clicking, grinding sound the horns made when they spun.

The greater demon grunted, its way of introducing itself. It said “
My name’s Gnusek
,” though that’s not at all what Goddard heard. The language Gnusek spoke had no such reliance on actual words. His low throaty growls roughly translated to “
I work for Lord Jirosek and Prince Otozek. You should fear me, because I’m going to eat you.
”

Because the Royal Advisor had no clue what the demon was saying, all of Gnusek’s ‘words’ were lost on him. Goddard slid his arm into the closet behind him, his hand nervously fumbling around the shelf to find his next weapon. The man smiled weakly finding something that felt right in his hand.

Gnusek turned to look at the fallen Captain, still lying unconscious on the lab floor. The monster’s lips curled back revealing its nasty stained teeth. A smile of relief. Gnusek turned back to face Goddard and the smile left. The demon’s big beady eyes watched the Royal Advisor curious about what nasty surprise the crafty devil would spring on him next.