Lawley's pistol shot again and again. The bullets struck accurately, but the creature didn't even flinch.
It stood towering over the wreckage. Its lower half was that of a blackened goat, hooves slamming against gravel as it stalked forward. Its upper body was vaguely human, though swollen and stretched, muscles roiling under sickly gray flesh. But the head was a massive, filthy pig's, tusked and bristled, snorting with every breath like it could smell her fear.
And it carried a two-handed axe, rusted and chipped, but still sharp enough to cleave through bone.
Lawley backed up fast, slipping between two half-crushed cars, blood streaking from a gash along her ribs. She gritted her teeth, sweat running down her temple. Her empty magazine clattered to the ground as she fumbled for another.
The monster snorted once, then started forward, hooves clashing against gravel.
She slammed the new mag in and chambered a round, breathing hard.
Then
A blur of motion.
Felix.
He didn't hesitate to charge forward.
He hit the creature like a freight train shoulder-first.
The impact sent both of them crashing into a pile of rust and old engine blocks, metal screeching beneath the weight.
The axe flew from the demon's hands. The pig-headed thing roared in pain and fury as it slammed into the ground with Felix on top of it, dirt and ash bursting up around them.
Lawley blinked, still half crouched behind cover.
Then she exhaled.
"Kid," she called out, breath ragged, "about damn time you showed up."
"Sorry, I was a little preoccupied back there!" Felix replied.
Felix hit the ground hard but rolled to his feet in one smooth motion. His eyes scanned the wreckage until they landed on Lawley crouched between two busted sedans. She was bleeding, but upright. Nothing looked fatal.
Good.
His focus shifted.
The creature was still rising.
The familiar stank of rot and death, its aura thick like swamp air. It loomed taller than it had any right to. Easily six-foot-eight, maybe more with a pig's head that twitched and snarled above a bloated humanoid torso, all muscle and filth. The goat-like legs stomped at the gravel, kicking up ash and dirt flakes.
Felix grinned and cracked his knuckles.
"Alright, Shrek. Let's dance."
Blue fire sparked to life in his hand. In a blink, his obsidian dagger returned, jagged and cruel, flames licking along the edges.
The demon snorted once, bent, and scooped up its axe from the wreckage. It howled raw and gurgling raising the weapon high and mighty.
"Eww," Felix muttered, pinching his nose. "You need to go to the dentist. Immediately."
The creature roared in reply and charged.
It was fast.
Too fast for something that size.
Felix held his ground, eyes narrowing as the demon closed the distance in seconds. The axe came down like it meant to split him in two.
He raised his blade to meet it.
Steel hit obsidian in a spray of sparks. The force of the blow cracked the gravel beneath Felix's boots. His legs buckled slightly under the weight, but he didn't fall.
The demon grinned.
Felix smirked back.
"Oops."
He dropped low and slid under the locked weapons just as the axe came down hard, burying itself into the ground with a jarring thunk.
Before the creature could react, Felix was already on its arm, sprinting up the length of muscle and bone. He launched himself off the shoulder and twisted mid-air.
The kick slammed into the side of the demon's head with a satisfying crunch, sending it staggering.
Felix landed and didn't pause his assault.
He lunged again, blade flashing.
The creature snarled and reached for him, but he dropped into a slide under its grasp, kicked off the dirt, and carved his dagger across the back of its leg right across the Achilles.
The monster screamed.
Black blood sprayed from the wound, sizzling where it hit the metal and stone. Its leg gave out and it crashed to one knee, snorting and snarling, rage twisting its already grotesque face.
Felix straightened, spinning the dagger fancily in his hand.
"Let's see how well you charge now, bacon-breath."
The creature tried to rise, its hoofed legs trembling beneath its weight, but the slashed tendon wouldn't hold. It snarled, spit flying from its tusked mouth, one hand dragging behind it like a broken claw.
Felix was already moving.
The obsidian dagger pulsed with fire as he sprinted forward. The demon swung a meaty arm in terrible desperation, but it was too slow.
Felix ducked low driving his shoulder into its gut, and knocked it back into the gravel with a thunderous crash. It roared in pain, writhing like a stuck animal.
"Yeah, that's real cute," Felix said, planting a boot on the monster's back as it tried to crawl away. "You squeal like a busted Roomba."
It thrashed, snorting in protest, tusks scraping gravel.
Felix reached down, grabbed a fistful of bristled neck, and yanked its head up just enough to see the twitch of its beady, bloodshot eyes.
"You ever heard of irony?" he asked. "'Cause you brought an axe to a knife fight... and still lost."
His dagger flared in his hand, the blade pulsing with heat like it was in on the joke.
"No hard feelings," he added, then rammed the dagger into the base of the skull.
The demon spasmed, squealed one last time then dropped like a sack of potatoes.
"...Aaaand that's how you make pulled pork," he announced.
Behind him, Lawley approached with a limp, blood darkening her side.
She stopped when she saw the body.
Or what was left of it.
Felix didn't look at her when he spoke.
"Tell me that was the last one."
Lawley swallowed. "I hope so."
Felix pulled the dagger back into his hand with a flick of blue flame.
"Then let's get this over with."
They moved deeper into the junkyard, past rows of gutted trucks and crushed sedans, the air growing thicker with each step. The twisted towers of scrap seemed to lean in, warping the sunlight and muffling sound.
Then they found her.
Lily stood in the center of a wide clearing ringed with rust and ritual markings scorched into the gravel. Harry sat tied to a rusted frame, gagged but wide-eyed and alive. Nearby, Ana Cruz and the other two girls knelt bound, dazed but untouched, still breathing.
At the center of it all was Lily.
She looked like a ghost of herself.
Pale, trembling, eyes vacant as faint sigils burned in the air around her. Her hands floated inches off her sides, fingers twitching with every syllable she whispered.
Her lips moved in a low chant in a language that was alien to her.
Felix sighed in relief. "She hasn't finished it yet."
Lawley stepped up beside him, hand tight on her pistol. "Then we talk her down now. Before it's too late."
They approached, slowly.
"Lily," Lawley called out. "You don't have to finish this. Step away from the circle. No one has to get hurt."
The girl blinked once.
Then her eyes flared black, like smoke trapped behind her pupils.
Her lips parted and a voice that wasn't Lily's slithered out.
"Lily's not here right now," it sang sweetly. "But if you leave a message, I'll be sure to pass it along…"
She smiled.
It was wrong. Too wide. All teeth.
"…after I scoop out your lungs and wear them like a scarf."
She raised one trembling hand.
Before either of them could react, a wave of force slammed into them like a wrecking ball. Felix and Lawley were hurled backward and crashed into a wall of crumpled cars. Steel groaned and glass shattered.
They couldn't move.
Felix strained, pinned mid-air like a bug caught under glass. His back arched against invisible pressure, every muscle burning.
Lawley was beside him, flattened against a hood, jaw clenched in pain. "What the hell—?"
Felix growled. "Witchcraft. And it aint exactly beginner level either."
He looked toward Lily. Her body hovered just inches off the ground now, tendrils of red mist wrapping around her feet.
"…she's being fed power. A lot of it. Only high-level witches can manipulate magic like this."
Lily's head jerked at a wrong angle. Her jaw unhinged just slightly like a snake's then clicked back into place.
"Aw, you both came to save her," the demon cooed. "You're too late. She invited me in, you know. Cracked that door wide open and said, 'Come on in, what's the worst that could happen?'"
It giggled.
"Guess we're finding out."
Lawley grunted, trying to twist her arm toward her gun. "So what do we do?"
Felix didn't answer right away.
Inside him, something stirred.
A voice like laughter in a rotten attic bubbled up from the dark corners of his mind. High, sing-song, and giddy.
"Ooooh... somebody neeeeds me, don't they?" the demon crooned. "Pinned down and helpless like a couple of sad little meat puppets. How embarrassing."
Felix's eyes twitched.
"Let me out and play, Felix. Just a little. Just a taste. I'll make it so fast. So fun. We'll paint the sky red with her blood. I promiiiise."
Felix clenched his jaw, breath tight.
Lawley glanced over, eyes narrowing. "Earth to Felix! You got something. Anything?"
He didn't dare look at her yet.
Because the real question wasn't if he had something.
It was if he was willing to use it.
Inside, the voice only grew louder. It bounced off the walls of his skull, full of manic delight.
"C'mon, Felix. She tossed you like a ragdoll. What's a little help between friends? Between halvesies?"
"You know can't stop her like this. You're outmatched. Outgunned. Out of time."
Felix gritted his teeth, trying to push against the force holding him.
"You think I haven't noticed how weak you've gotten lately?" the voice went on, giddy and cruel.
"You're holding back. Always holding back. Bleeding yourself dry for people who'd throw you in a cage if they knew what you really were."
"But me? I'd end this in seconds. I'd break her and the demon inside her like wet paper. You know I would."
Felix's jaw tightened. His runes glowed faintly beneath the strain, flickering like fire trying to breathe.
"All you have to do is say it." The demon's voice turned syrupy. "Let me in. Let me ouuuut. Let me out!"
"Shut up," Felix muttered through clenched teeth.
The pressure around his limbs tightened like a vice.
"You'll die here, Felix," the demon hissed. "And so will they. All because you wanted to be the good guy."
Felix's eyes flared red.
He looked at the ritual circle, at Lily trembling with the power of a demon, at Harry wide-eyed and helpless, at the three tied up and traumatized highschool girls.
Then he turned inward and spat the words through the link between them:
"You don't get to be the hero of this story."
A beat of silence.
Then the demon sighed, disappointed.
"Buzzkill."
Felix forced his hand to move. It trembled, slow against the crushing weight, but it moved.
Flame licked across his fingers.
He turned his head to Lawley and muttered, "I've got it. Just hang on."
And with a growl, Felix began to burn hotter.
The weight pressing down on Felix didn't let up.
His limbs trembled under invisible hands. Every nerve screamed. His back arched against the hood of a rusted car, pinned like some failed crucifixion.
His breath came in short, shallow gasps, the pressure in his chest squeezing tighter with every second.
And all he could do was watch.
Harry, still bound.
The girls, still alive.. but for how long?
Lawley, bleeding and silent beside him, trying not to show how much she was hurt.
And Lily, a child wrapped in grief and agony.
Hovering like a marionette, her face hollow, her soul held hostage by a voice that promised miracles in exchange for ruin.
He couldn't move. He couldn't stop it.
He was helpless. Again.
Just like before.
Just like when he was seven.
In the bathtub.
In the dark.
Hands around his throat.
Pillow on his face.
His mother's trembling voice whispering, "I'm sorry. I have to do this."
His own screams swallowed by linen and bathwater.
His eyes flicked open.
His anger rose with the primal and raw fire.
Not this time.
Not again.
The pressure holding him snapped all at once as blue flames exploded from his skin. The air ignited, roaring outward in a pulse of raw heat that shattered the hood beneath him and sent rusted metal flying in every direction.
The force bent the air, warping it like glass in fire.
Felix dropped to his knees, smoke coiling from his arms. His eyes blazed blood-red.
He stood slowly, breath shaking, hand already raised.
With a hiss of power, his dagger formed mid-air, obsidian and burning, runes seething with flame.
He didn't hesitate.
He threw it.
The blade shot towards Lily screaming through the air.
And just before it struck, she flicked her wrist.
The dagger stopped mid-flight, caught in invisible grip inches from her chest.
But the moment of effort broke her concentration.
Lawley fell free from the invisible grip with a grunt, catching herself hard against the gravel.
She groaned and reached for her sidearm, already moving.
Felix's blade hovered, still caught.
But now she was vulnerable.
And he was just getting started.