Doom Story Update

4k words. I wasn't happy with my first few iterations of this exchange between our two killers, so I redid it from the ground up. Since there is overlap between this and the last update, I upped the wordcount. Enjoy :)

***

“Alright,” he groaned, staring at the gaping wound in the ceiling. Thick smoke trails rose into the sky from the library’s direction, curling at the top as the winds brushed them. “Alright,” he said again. “Time out.”

“That’s the least I deserve after being bombed all dammed day,” the Baroness huffed, her hands roaming to nurse her extremities. “Do you know how much of a toll it takes on the soul to heal such grievous wounds?”

“Cry me a river you demonic dickhead,” he muttered, reaching for his pack.

“So impudent,” Sharrya chuckled, lazing against the wall as she stared at him with those green eyes. She had no irises to speak of, no features, and he found it increasingly difficult to meet her gaze in the following silence. “Why don’t you remove that helmet?”

“The Hell for?” he asked, the muscles in his chest tensing.

“What?” she asked, tilting her head at the odd phrase. “No, not for Hell, for me. I wish to see your face, properly.”

“I don’t think so, Pinky.”

“My status as Baron affords me every luxury a demon can dream of,” she said, staring him down from her formidable height. “As such, it’s come with the slight caveat that I can get very angry when I don’t get what I want. You don’t want me to anger me, because I might just consider coming over there and ripping off your helmet and your limbs.”

Her tone was off-hand, sweet, but there was a deep hunger in her glowing, emerald eyes, one that made him all too aware that he was conversing with a higher demon of Hell. Her patience wasn’t finite.

“Alright, crazy horns, alright. You want to see my pretty face?”

After a brief pause, he raised his hands to his helmet, the demon’s head tilting once more.

“I hope you know what you’re doing…” Eva whispered.

“Relax, she would have killed me way earlier if she’d wanted.”

“That’s comforting…”

His visor rose from his neck, Andreas setting his helmet on the floor, the hot air washing over his features as Sharrya looked him over with a strange look on her face.

“Hm. Quite the developed little specimen,” she mused. “Nice scar on your chin there, not that I needed proof you aren’t lacking in battle.”

She leaned over, his muscles bleeding tension as she extended one claw his way, pressing it against his cheek. She turned his head to the side, those blazing eyes drinking him in.

“Your complexion is odd,” she noted, grinning when he slapped her finger away. “as is your accent. Are you from this country? This ‘Spain’?”

He considered lying to her, but what was the harm in it really? They’d already spilt one another’s blood, talking about home was rather tame in comparison.

“No, Romania,” he answered. “It’s not much different from this place, mountain chains on one side, the Black Sea on the other. I’d ask about where you’re from,” he added. “but I think I’ve got a good idea on what Hell looks like.”

“I’ll have you know that Hell consists of several differing environments,” she replied, turning her nose up at him. “Each one home to their own unique climes and landmarks, not unlike your own continents and countries.”

“And which of these cesspools were you crapped out of?” he asked.

“We call it Shattered Peaks,” she replied, staring at the ceiling dreamily. “It is a wasteland of blackstone towers rising from pools of lava, interspersed with canyons that run deep into Hell’s blighted heart. Loose rocks tumble from the caps constantly, making treks from peak to peak all the more arduous.”

“Sounds cozy.”

“Oh, it was! There was nothing quite like waking up to see the crimson skies reflecting off the lava lakes and… Oh, you were making a joke,” she noted, flashing him a sideways scowl. “And here I thought we were about to have a conversation that wasn’t us trading insults.”

“And why are we talking?” he asked. “I’m not your friend, and you sure as Hell aren’t mine.”

“I am one of the finest commanders ever spawned from the Peaks,” Sharrya began. “Hundreds of years and thousands of slain foes have seen me rise to the top of the demonic food chain, my authority has even surpassed other Baron’s from time to time.”

“You’ve got an ego, we get it.”

“My point is,” she growled, irritated by his comment. “Once you slice your way to the top, all who would stand in your way are no longer brave enough to try. As such, my status has left me in a position surrounded by those with all the strength of wet tissue paper. Every day sees me accosted by whelps who simp and fawn over me, imps that only grow spines once my back is turned, or cacodemons that… well, you can see how untalkative they are.”

“That must be so fucking bad, having servants drool at your feet. I feel so much for you, really.”

“You see?” she exclaimed. “That is why we are speaking. You are so refreshing! No one has ever talked to me the way you do, Andreas. You don’t shy away from speaking your mind, even if it’s going to be bad for your health. I haven’t felt this compelled to talk since m-my… my…” She creased her lip, masking her stutter behind a devilish grin, but Andreas saw it. Had she just hesitated?

“You intrigue me, Andreas,” she added. “Take that as a curse or a blessing, but either way, take it, use it. Few would ever have the chance.”

“Okay…” he said, skeptically. He wasn’t sure if she was challenging or inviting him into conversing with her, perhaps demons didn’t see a difference. The idea she was toying with him rubbed him the wrong way, but he’d take her words over her fireballs any day.

“How’d you climb up the food chain?” he eventually asked. “I thought Baron’s were automatically the top dogs.”

“Interested in my background, Andreas?” she cooed, crossing her long legs as she settled in. “If you think I was born into prestige, banish the thought. Reward is not given freely out in the Peaks. It is taken. And I was but an insect buzzing at the feet of gods when I was roughly your size,” she said, looking him up and down. “Each day I felt the brush of death, but it is the tribulations of the past that shape us into warriors of the future, and I was not found lacking in the former. Sometimes I went starved for food or souls, but the satisfaction I felt after every small victory was pure bliss.”

“So you liked getting your ass kicked?”

“Like? Of course not, but neither did I hate it, necessarily. There’s a greyness to being a small little newt, progressing herself out of the muck and into the Peaks proper. The challenges were great, but the reward mirrored the effort. What about you?” she asked. “How did you become such a troublesome little soldier?”

“Trying to get state secrets out of me?” he shot back.

“I am merely curious about your odd tactics,” she explained, listing off her points on her claws. “Rather than engage me directly, you employ hit and run attacks, relying on subterfuge and trickery to deal damage, using the shadows and your intimate knowledge of the environment when things go awry. You are like a knife with legs.”

“And this is the part where you say I’m a coward and should fight like a real warrior?” he asked.

“On the contrary, I find your ability to adapt spectacular. You and your whole species are outnumbered more than you think, yet your world has not yet caved despite our predictions. You just refuse to die, Andreas.”

“My friend Eva always said I had a thick skull.”

Sharrya chortled, touching a claw to her mouth as she composed herself.

“Funny little thing, aren’t you? And so stoic, as well. Will you not indulge my curiosity? One warrior to another?”

He was still hesitant to the answer, but in the end he caved. After all, there were no state secrets in his personal life.

“I used to guard demons before I killed them. Security officer for this base out in the Caribbean. Didn’t see much action until a couple subjects broke containment. Shot my first demon during the chaos. I evacuated my sector with minimal casualties, and someone up top took notice, cause next thing I knew I was offered special forces training.”

“Talk about a career jumpstart! How did you become a guard?”

“Security officer.”

“Yes, officer. Doesn’t sound so glamorous.”

“Well it was the only gig I could find after failing just about everything else. I tried becoming a lawyer like my brother, but as I said, thick skull.”

“Law-yer?”

“Someone who gives legal advice to people. You know, laws and stuff? Who am I kidding, you don’t have rules where you come from. Anyhow, turns out that whole saying about the pen and the sword was horseshit in my case, cause I was much better with a gun in my hand.”

“And so you climbed into the upper echelons of your military? Your story and mine are quite similar…”

“You could say that. Brutal training, but I got paired up with some of the best, and I got some sweet benefits plus a fat check. All worth it.”

“I’m glad you and I have that in common, though I cannot imagine this world’s brutality matches my own. What were your duties as a gua- officer, excuse me.”

“Well, I-”

“He made sure the mortally challenged stayed in their place!”

Sharrya recoiled in shock as she scanned the office. Seeing a demon almost jump out of her skin would have been funny if she wasn’t cradling liquid fire in her hands.

“Who was that?” Sharrya demanded. “Show yourself, interloper! Nobody interrupts my conversations.”

“Interloper?” Eva echoed. “You’re the one on our planet, you manipulative… manipulator!”

“Wow, I’ll have to remember that line,” Sharrya scoffed. “Am I going crazy, or is that voice coming from your helmet?”

“Ah don’t worry about Eva,” he answered. “She’s my… assistant,” he eventually said. Revealing too much about the AI was a line he wasn’t ready to cross.

“So you were telling the truth, you’re not alone,” Sharrya mused. “And how long have you been perving on our talk, Eva?” she added, gesturing at the helmet. “Eavesdropping is a horrible word where I come from.”

“Unlike warcrimes,” Eva replied. “Seargent, can I have a word? Away from the scary demon lady?”

Shrugging, Andreas stood, swiping the helmet under his arm. He spotted a room sectioned off from the office behind him, and he circled around the cubicles toward it.

“Don’t mind me,” Sharrya called. “I’ll be here, healing my fractures and burns and what have you.”

Glancing back to make sure she hadn’t moved, Andreas stepped into what appeared to be the break room for this place, with a vending machine in one corner and a fridge in the other, the smell of rancid food leaving a foul taste in his mouth.

“Something up, Eva?” he asked.

“Put me on.”

As he slid the helmet over his cranium, the visor closed over his face, cracking against his knuckle that happened to be in its path.

“Hey!” he exclaimed, rubbing his hand. “What was that for?”

“Explain yourself,” Eva demanded.

“What?”

“Don’t ‘what’ me, Seargent. You are exchanging life stories with a Baron of Hell!” She practically shouted those last three words, his ears ringing as the speakers struggled to compensate. “You’re colluding with the enemy!”

“C-Colluding? It was just a chat!”

“She’s probing you for information! Everything you’ve told her can and will be used against you! Just like in those movies you always go on about. You need to stop before she knows too much about you.”

“I wrangled some stuff out of her too! That whole thing about the Shattered Peaks? Reverse phycology.”

“That’s not what that was,” Eva sighed. “And as fascinating as it is to hear about how a Baron murders her way to a leadership position, I don’t see how that helps us right now. You need to kill her or leave, not chat.”

“That walking chilli pepper is practically invincible, Eva. You saw how she ate those rockets. Unless you want me to use another Shard to wipe her off this Earth…”

“I want you to get away from her. Oh, but look who I’m talking to! Why don’t you go back and relax, talk about the weather maybe? It’s not like we a have a mission to see through.”

“Alright, alright, quit your yapping, we’ll go.”

He reemerged from the break room, making his way back to the Baroness. He considered just giving her the slip, but he didn’t want to test the demoness by being rude. Crazy girls like her didn’t appreciate a guy walking out on them, he knew that from experience.

As he rounded the cubicle wall, there Sharrya was, right where he left her, the demon raising a hand in greeting.

“Ah, there you are, excellent. I was certain I’d have to chase you down again. Now where were we?”

“I think we were about to say our goodbyes,” Andreas replied. “I got places to go, people to see. You do to, I‘d wager, being the authoritative megalomaniac that you are.”

“Is that your idea, or your little girlfriends?”

“Eva and I aren’t an item,” he clarified. “She hasn’t got the body.”

“Like you do?” the AI muttered. The Baroness snorted, and Andreas realised Eva had used the external speakers to include the demon in the exchange.

“I suppose this little truce has gone on long enough,” Sharrya said, her horns brushing the ceiling as she stood. Andreas reached for his weapons, but Sharrya raised a hand. “That’s not what I meant. I’m saying I agree with you, and we both have places to be.”

“You’re not going to stop me?” he asked. “Why the Hell not?”

“You provided me with a few minutes of delicious entertainment. It’s only fitting I repay you with a few minutes of a head start. Call it… being a good sport.”

“Good sport? You serious?”

“Well, I also cannot feel anything from the elbows down, and there’s an odd stabbing sensation in my back. I’m not sure I’d be able to catch you regardless.”

“Don’t expect pity points from me,” Andreas said.

“I’d never dream of it, little prey.”

She must get some sick sense of thrill by continuing this chase between them, but Andreas wasn’t about to complain, she wasn’t the only one who was wounded, and she had the advantage of demonic regeneration. He’d have to tough out his bruises the old fashioned way.

-xXx-

Sharrya saw the human out of the office, trailing behind him as they worked their way through this strange complex. After quizzing him on its purpose, he explained it was a space where humans did paperwork and filed reports. It sounded too tame for her tastes, she’d have gone crazy if she’d had to sit in one of those cubicles all day.

Soon they arrived at the building’s far side, ducking through an arch leading out onto a veranda, this floor of the building linked to the streets below by a twisting staircase. The human, Andreas, flashed her skeptical glances the whole way, Sharrya taking the chances to appraise him. There was a kind of rugged charm to his visuals, it reminded her of this Baron she’d met many years ago, his skin a patchwork of scars from a life of battle. What might the human look beneath all that armour, she wondered?

His hair was cut to a buzz, the little stems the colour of sand as they waved gently in the night’s wind. She’d seen hair on some of the species she’d fought through interdimensional space, but none were quite as thin and sparse as his. It made him look soft, but his muscular hide spoke otherwise to the fact.

“Well, this is where I leave you,” Andreas began, placing a boot on the first step. He turned to give her a reserved look. “Right? You’re not about to say sike or something?”

“Your reservations are warranted, but misplaced,” she replied. “I am a demon of my word. We can pick up our conversation next time, when I finally best you in battle.”

“In your dreams, pinky,” Andreas replied. His gaze lingered on her for a moment, and then he vanished below the steps. She approached the railing, and saw his figure crossing the street, slipping into an alleyway beyond, his footsteps fading soon after.

Chuckling, she turned her attention to her wounds, her laughter tapering into a groan as a cold stab bloomed from her stomach. The cuts on her arms and legs should have long stitched together by now, her regeneration must be conversing all its energy into keeping her heart beating.

How long had it been since she’d felt this close to death? Not since her early years in the Peaks, and the sensation filled her with a palpable rush of excitement that overruled her pain.

Not only was he a worthwhile opponent, but they’d even had a brief exchange that was a far cry from the usual ministrations she was subjected to. He’d talked, he’d listened to her, and the more she let that sink in, the more her attitude towards the human shifted from enemy to… something quite different.

She needed to ponder on this. She also desperately needed to heal, but one thing at a time.

“In my dreams, hmm?” she muttered to nobody. “We’ll see about that…”

-xXx-

Otherworldly energies rippled around her body, blurring the lines between the real and the unreal. Stepping through portals was a jarring experience for the uninitiated, but Sharrya had gone through hundreds of teleports before, the sensation irking her no more than a random itch in one’s skin. The unpleasant memory of her first portals was something she’d rather leave dead and buried, but foul memories always found a way to worm themselves to the forefront.

She had cried, she remembered. It had been her first instance of weeping, and not her last either. She was weak back then, a fact that had been berated into her mind by her less dispositioned kin. As a prank, one of the other whelps had tossed her through a breach leading into the Burning Abyss. Her sobs had been drowned out by the laughter of those witnessing her plight.

Her fists clenched hard enough she sliced her palms with her claws, but the sting of pain helped to drive the recollections back. She stepped away from the energies forming an aura before her, and the crimson darkness gave way to the atrium basing her cathedral.

She was pleased to see there had been changes in her absence. The acolytes were in their proper places, summoning circles brimming with sinful energies, the chants of her followers forming a comfortable tumult.

The steep, gothic walls of the atrium penned in the yard from three sides, some of the sentries posted along the watchtowers turning to give her looks of astonishment. The steps of her cathedreal took up the fourth side, its surface brimming with spikes buttresses and twisting support spires. She forgot how far it pierced into the sky from the ground, like an eternal vertice of ebony steel.

Noting she had a gawking audience, she sneered at a group of passing acolytes, turning her fiery eyes on them.

“What are you looking at, festering filth bags?” The startled group pushed each other out of the way as they fled the scene, Sharrya’s mood souring as she watched them go. Andreas wouldn’t have batted an eye at that, he would never have been so apprehensive.

“My Baroness!”

Speaking of which, she spotted her faithful priest making his way down the cathedral steps, pausing before her hooves to offer a breathless welcome.

“You’ve returned,” he said, bowing cordially. “As I always knew you would.”

“Indeed,” she replied. “I see you have not been lacking in my time away.”

“My mistress blesses me with her kindness,” the priest replied. “May she also bless me with news from the front? News has been slow to travel since the link to the nest was severed.”

“It has been more than severed. The nest is lost,” she said, her posture deflating a little. “As is most of the standing forces in the area. A lone human has intruded upon the territory and sowed utter chaos.”

“A… A single soul?” the priest asked, turning away when she scowled at him. “I do not mean to question your findings, my Baroness, but a single, meddlesome human cannot be responsible for such impudence! There must be others.”

“Perhaps, but he is the only one I laid eyes on,” she explained. “His abilities confound me just as much. I’ve not seen a mortal rip and tear into my ranks like he did.”

“I assume my esteemed mistress tortured his soul for his meddling?” the priest asked. “If you wish, I can have his remains serve as a base for a new summoning ritual. An eternity of suffrage would lay in store for him…

The idea of Andreas’ body rotting in a pentagram stirred something inside her, no longer holding the same glee as before.

“He… escaped my clutches,” Sharrya explained. She quickly added: “As in, I let him go of my own accord. In hopes he would lead me to his accomplices in time.”

“A wise course of action!” he replied, switching his demeanour as Sharrya tried not to strangle him. “Offing a mortal so quickly would have sullied our chances of seizing additional souls.”

“Indeed, yes…”

“By the scars on your flawless form I see this mortal has wounded you,” the priest continued. “Do you require my aid? My most accomplished chanters are ready to invigorate you.”

“Keep your insidious enchantments as far from me as possible,” she snapped, making for the cathedral. “I will heal on my own, I simply wish to rest.”

“Of course, my Baroness. I’ve taken the liberty to purge a few dozen of the weak who’d failed to stop the gore nest’s… demise. Their souls are burning on the pyres, you shall find you will regenerate rather quickly during the night’s course.”

The air was thick with lost souls, their energies drawn to her need like moths to flame. While she regretted the losses on her legions, who could blame them for fleeing such a costly battle, they served her better by repairing her corporeal form.

The priest waddled behind her as she mounted the steps, the giant doors parting like toothed lips as she entered the vaulted foyer. Two arch-viles stood guard just inside, the demons bowing their heads as she walked between them.

“My Baroness,” the priest started. “If I may be so bold as to enquire, what do you know of this lonesome mortal? “

“He’s a Seargent,” she explained as she walked. “Male, twenty to thirty years old. Originally from the Romania.”

“That’s… very perceptive of you,” the priest murmured. He was clearly confused by how she knew such things, but of course he didn’t question them. “He seems very capable to have caused you great bodily harm…”

She granted the priest a modicum of her respect. She didn’t think he had the balls to say she was hurt out loud. Today was full of surprises.

“He possesses several heavy armaments,” she said. “And if quite proficient of them. Why do you ask, priest?”

“I have a theory on this mortal’s identity. I have not been part of your retinue for long, but I have studied the history of Hell extensively. I know of very few humans who could be so capable of destroying a nest singlehandedly.”

She paused in her march, making a go on gesture.

“Do you think this mortal is… him?”

“Speak plainly, priest, who is ‘him’?”

“Could you have encountered the…” He glanced about the lobby, as though worried of being overheard. “The Slayer, my Baroness?”

Sharrya opened her mouth to retort, then closed it. The one they feared, here, in her domain? She recalled what she knew of him: the Slayer was a human who’d almost brought down the entirety of Hell eons ago, her dimension only spared thanks to a trap that had seen the human sealed within a crypt. A crypt that had gone missing not long ago.

Could the Slayer and Andreas be one and the same? No. If the stories were true, she would have never returned once she’d gone through the portal. One Baron was child’s play to a monster like the Slayer…

“Nonsense,” she eventually said. “This mortal may be just as dangerous, but he is more like… the discount Slayer. He is vicious, but he bleeds and tires like the rest of us.”