I smell death and candy

October 29th, 2058

I was nineteen years old.

I was an elf, but I couldn't see in the dark and that was posing something of a problem for me.  I didn't want to be known as an "elf-poser".  I wanted to be regarded as a reliable professional, but with a new identity and no rep I had to earn that respect.  Part of that was making my new identity as solid as possible.

I couldn't do anything about the electronic record. I just didn't have the money to have a carefully constructed, drum-tight identity crafted so I had to do with the record I could afford.  Living under the social identification number of a person who had gone missing as a teen.  Swallowed up by the sprawl, most likely.  But being an elf isn't just pointy ears and the right build, you have to have the traits or people will notice.  I should have thought things out more carefully and just been another human, but I wanted to be very different and so "elf" it was.

Of course, I wasn't really an elf.  I was wearing a mask of sorts.  The shape change spell was held in place by a particularly stout, self-sustaining, mana loop. It was permanent as far as spells go.  But it didn't grant me more than the physical shape and traits.  I had spent a week with a spell formula, going over it in every detail. I wove the spell carefully, the mana working in my eyes and the forefront of my brain.  It makes me a bit nervous to think that magic is literally flowing through my brain, but there you are.  I am, after all, a wizard. Once the spell was in place I snuffed out the candles in my little apartment (the power was out again) and looked in the mirror. I saw the amerindian elf I had become looking back at me.  With a lot of effort, and more time that I care to admit, I wove the mana loop that would hold the spell firmly in place.  After that, and ever since, I can see in the dark like any elf.

*****

October 30th, 2058

I was down at the tailor's shop when it opened.  I wanted a suit of form-fitting armor for my new form, and I wanted it done right.  Back then there was a place in Bellevue I liked to use where an ork named Russell would put his incredible talents to work to make you the best dressed version of you possible.  I liked Russell even though I sometimes had no idea what he was talking about (I don't understand fashion).

Russell finished up the measurements, and was taking the notes on the options I wanted included.  Some of them were of a "questionable" nature, but Russell didn't ask questions.  Which is why I liked to use his services. {Tommy, he also did that blue gown for me when the Geo-Dynamics job went up in '59.  Miss him. ~ Angel}  So Russell was putting together the armored undergarment complete with the concealed Faraday pocket (thanks Angel!) and the thermal dampening.  Russell was good and fast, so I was able to pick up my new armor later that day (at a good mark up).  I felt a bit of relief having a layer of ballistic fiber between me and any stray bullets. I left Russell's place feeling a little more comfortable in my own skin (see what I did there?)

I was in Bellevue so I decided to treat myself at an all natural ice cream shop I knew.  The place wasn't busy in October, and the ice cream was simply amazing.  So for twenty nuyen I sat down with a sundae and was watching the chic people stroll by.  It was raining (which should go without saying) so being indoors with a cold sweet treat suited me just fine.  I was nearing the bottom of the dessert when my pocket secretary vibrated.   I had a message from my favorite fixer.

         Text:  "Halloween party tomorrow night? Come see me, we'll talk"


She had my attention and you can't buy good ice cream with looks alone.

*****

I landed in a rubble choked lot about a block north of the Brick Yard.    I let my invisibility spell slip away as I walked down in plain view of Little Rickie.  He saw me coming immediately, hand on that cannon he called a pistol.  As I approached, I felt his gaze fall heavily upon me and thought, not for the first time, that I just might piss myself.  He waved his off hand toward the door, "Check the gun inside chummer.  Don't pull any drek."

"Null sheen Rick", I said it out of reflex and immediately regretted it. Little Rickie's trigger finger poked me in the forehead hard enough to knock me back a step.  Even with the spells I had running to enhance my reflexes, he was just far to fast for me to avoid.  I gulped and was thankful he hadn't pulled his gun.

"Chummer, you don't know me", was all he said.  He pointed toward the door.

I checked my pistol inside and made my way to the bar.  Sandy was taking a trio of heavily laden plates over to a table occupied by three orks I saw down there pretty often.  I sat down on a stool and was greeted by Aria's lovely voice.

"Hi ennas ow turim bucin?", Aria's voice came out with a lilting sing-song quality to it.

Unfortunately, I didn't speak of word of Sperethiel at the time. "Uh, what?" I said. "I don't speak it."

"vanima asinus", she said with a smile.  "How can I help you?"

"Yeah, uh, can I get a bowl of Solomon's chili and some of those cornbread muffins?  A big glass of ice water too, please."  Aria looked at me for a moment like I was forgetting something, then she turned around and walked into the back.

Ten minutes later I had a bowl of potato soup and a pair of rolls.  I had my ice water, and a tall glass of cold, dark beer.  The food was great but I skipped the beer.  I flagged down Sandy when Aria wasn't looking and ordered a triple rum for the cook with my compliments for the soup.  I left Aria a modest tip, and decided I would need to learn a little Sperethiel in coming months.

When Aria came back around she smiled and said, "The lady in the back is asking about you." She gave a conspiratorial wink at me.  I slid out off the bar stool and walked back to Sheila's usual booth.

Sheila was sitting with a pair of tall, beautiful women.  One woman was a tall amerind-elf with stunning features, with emerald eyes. The second woman was a bald elf with skin of the deepest black I have ever seen and eyes like silver star light.  I don't mean to romanticize it but they were both simply beautiful.  I was nineteen and I stopped and stared for a moment.  Sheila X came to my rescue with, "Ladies, the asset I spoke of.  This is Mr. Gun"

{Tommy, weren't you going by the name "Joseph Silver" at this time ~ Angel}

{Angel, I'm not going to try to keep up with all the aliases.  I'm just going to use "Tommy Gun" for all of these entries. Can you imagine if you had to recall all the user names you've ever used?~ T.}

I sat down next to Sheila X, "Ms. Johnson I presume" I was calmly professional, mimicking Sheila's mannerism after years of encounters.

"You presume to much Mr. Gun," the amerind-elf lady spoke with a soft voice that felt like it caressed my ears.  There was an almost magical quality to her voice that alarmed and intrigued me at once.  "I'm Samantha Goode, this is my business partner Desiree Blockley. We've got a problem and we want you to fix it."

"Tell me more.  If I can help and we can agree on reasonable compensation then I'll work on your problem. What is it?"

*****

Blockley and Goode presented me with the easiest job of 2058.  The local Humanis chapter-house had been discovered.  Blockley and Goode wanted it burned down.

In the wee hours of October 31st, 2058, shortly after dawn rose on the Metroplex, an errant fire elemental, or two, manifested in the chapter-house.  The resulting conflagration reduced the building to a pile of smoldering ashes and charred beams in a scant two hours.  Four men ran out of the building as the fire started, one was actually wearing white robes. I watched for a few minutes as they milled about trying to call in help.  But when I heard motorcycles approaching and recognized the motiff of the Halloweeners on several gangers closing in on the early morning inferno, I held my invisibility spell very firmly around me as I fled the scene.

I'm not ashamed.  I ran away.  The job was done and those pyromaniacal psychos were closing in.  Let this be a lesson, don't fight crazy people if you don't have to.  You'll live longer.

I met up with Ms. Goode in the Brick Yard shortly after noon.  She paid the agreed upon amount for my little bit of thaumaturgic arson, then left.  The scent of her perfume lingered in the air, leaving the aroma of lilacs and vanilla.

*****

I left the Brick Yard, paid a few bills, and headed into Renton for a Halloween festival I had heard about.

I paid ten nuyen for a little neon wrist band that told the booth vendors I was over twenty-one, picked up an organic caramel apple, and slipped into the crowd.  There were vendors for dozens of different aspects for the holiday.  There were Wican themed products to "celebrate Samhain" next to stands selling straw brooms.  I watched a horror movie themed cosplay contest, caught most of a presentation from the Sisters of Ariadne, and ate a variety of festival foods.  I laughed at a comedian telling jokes to passersby, "What's the difference between executives and shoes?  Shoes have soles." I love that joke.  I found a stage where there was a costume contest going for little children.  Scores of parents were clapping and cheering on the little tykes as they walked out on stage. I saw little Red Samurai and Lone Star police contractor costumes, cartoon characters, and some things I couldn't identify.  There was joy in the area, a pleasant ambiance to the whole event, and people were in good spirits.

I was watching an apple bobbing contest when a trio of orc paramedics rushed by carrying a stretcher.  There was an older man secured to the stretcher, with one ork leading the way calling out, "excuse us, medical emergency" while the other two did the heavy lifting.  I moved out of the way to let them by, and recognized the "paramedics" as they passed.  I was impressed by the their work.  They looked, for all the world, like real paramedics saving a life.  They were calm, cool, and they got the guy out and loaded into an ambulance waiting at an emergency exit. I made a mental note about the incident, then found a booth with an artist sketching customers.

I spent two hours at the festival, spent a little money, and had a fantastic time.  I was being a person, and it was nice.

*****

2200 hours

I was on my way home.  My neighborhood wasn't exactly friendly, so I was traveling under my trusty invisibility spell.  I wanted to be home before midnight as I had some things I wanted to do during the witching hour.  I was a block away from my doss when I saw two boys, pre-teens from the look of them, running out of a burned out strip mall.  They looked scared and my hand found my viper slivergun by reflex.  They were already half a block away when I heard a scream for help from the ruin. The kids drew up and looked back but paused.

The screaming continued.  It sounded like genuine terror and the voice sounded young.  I ran across the street and opened by astral sight.  For the record, walking around on the night of Halloween with your astral sight open as you run over to look into random screams of terror was stupid.

A girl came running out, screaming as she ran.  Hers was the voice that brought me to investigate.  Her aura was bright with fear, and vibrant with the glow of someone who had a budding magical talent. She was looking into the astral, saw me standing their wrapped in myriad spell energies, and yelled "Help!" Behind her a rotting corpse was coming out of the building after her.

The body had once been a man.  A chip jack was scorched at it's temple, the body was bloated and stunk of rot.  He'd been dead for only a few days.  The girl sprinted after the other two kids, and I watched in amazement as the dead man came striding out.  The body was possessed by a strange, dark spirit.  I had never seen anything like this before, but I had heard rumors.  The spirit saw me, and turned hungrily toward me.

I backpedaled, holstering my gun and raising my hands in a gesture of denial.  "Avante! Avante spirit! You have no power here." I forced my will and power into a banishment and locked myself into a mystic battle against a spirit of unknown power. The spirit contemplated me for a moment, then pushed on through my efforts, gaining two strides toward me.  I felt sweat break out on my brow as I felt my power struggle against the spirit.  It was like swimming upstream.  There was a solid power to the thing which brought a steady pressure against me and showed no sign of letting up.  "Avante! Avante spirit!  I rebuke you.  Go from this place and never return!" The walking corpse faltered in place.  I held it back but tasted blood on my lips as my nose started to bleed from the strain.  I could see the spirit struggling against my power.  It held onto the corpse, keeping it in the world, and I seemed to be tiring faster that it was.

Then the damn thing cheated. It opened the corpse's mouth and spoke, "Die mortal vessel!  Die and be reborn!  You will harbor the host of darkness.  Your bones will be our home!  Die mortal vessel, die!"  I felt a surge of force from the spirit which pushed me back two full meters, and forced me against a charred wall.  I had never heard of a spirit using any sort of evocation in a banishment contest but I was certainly on the receiving end of it. My vision blurred a bit and with a moment of real fear, I realized I was going to lose. I was going to die.

When you know, really know, that you're going to die, you have a whole list of ways you can react. Panic, anger, defiance, witless crying, a number of options are presented to you.  I thought of Pepper and his family, buried in the church boneyard.  I decided to go down fighting.  "Avante Spirit!" I put every bit of my remaining strength into my banishment, took a deep breathe and bellowed out, "Avante unclean thing! Yea thou I walk in the valley of the shadow of death I shall fear no evil!"  I swallowed as I tasted my own blood and took a step toward the corpse-spirit. "Avante shadow of the pit! You have no power here!  I banish you from this place never to return!"  My vision swam as I saw the dark form of the spirit slip away from the corpse, it clawed at the air for a moment screaming something I didn't understand.  It hung there a moment, fading into the astral as it was forced into whatever meta-planar hellhole it came from, screaming the entire time.  The corpse fell to the debris littered floor, and I collapsed a tick later.

I landed on my ass. Hard.  I turned, rolled onto my side, and puked my guts up.  Seems candy apples and popcorn don't go well with a banishment.  Who knew?

I lay there for a few minutes.  When I got up I found a satchel laying in a crudely drawn pentagram on the floor. Footsteps from the corpse began about a meter away.  The satchel had a cellphone, a bag of chocolate candies, and a hard copy book titled "Eldritch secrets of the Babylonians" the copyright date read 1985.  I took the book, and the chocolates, and stepped over the dead chiphead.

The place stunk.  I sterilized every bit of my blood and vomit, and walked out of the charred ruin.  The kids were still watching the building from half a block up.  All three of them looking at me as I made the sidewalk.  I looked over at them, the girl's aura bright with magical potential and all three of them radiating terror.  I wove a spell of invisibility around myself, and watched as they ran off.   I unwrapped one of the chocolate candies and popped into my mouth.

The chocolate helped cut the taste of blood, and dampen the stench of death.

*****

That was my first time tangling with a shedim.  It certainly wasn't the last.  I still have that book somewhere.  It has a lot of bogus incantations, is full of flawed theory, was written before the awakening (which makes me wonder sometimes), but also contains a working ritual for binding "a spirit of the ebon depths".  The ritual seems to work, but the book doesn't make any mention of creating a protective or containment circle.  I'll never know how the ritual made it into that book, but it almost killed those children.  You can buy digital copies of it online for ten nuyen.

Want a beer?  Lets go.