Depths: Southern Watch #2 (4 page)

It wasn’t a sound he loved.

Duncan came around the corner into the family room first. Lerner followed a step behind. It was a wide area, classic decor with cloth couches and a TV that took up half the wall. Lerner had given a lot of thought to the increase in television size, thinking they were getting bigger as people in society lost touch with themselves. It was almost like they had to expand the screen to fill the shrinking hole of self—

“There,” Duncan grunted. There was an open door ahead, and the sound of the eating was coming from within. Red wallpaper gave the room a dim aura, the only light spilling in from where they’d left the front door open, the porch light sending shafts of illumination across the floor.

There was a dim light in the room ahead, too. Lerner looked at Duncan’s shadow and gave him a quick nod. They both crept up to the door and Duncan stood behind the frame while Lerner looked in.

It was worse than he thought. Four Tul’rore were fully engaged, a body shredded on the kitchen table. Blood was dripping onto the oak floor. Three bulbs overhead cast the scene in a murky orange light. It made the blood look black.

There was an open chest cavity on the table, a naked figure that had been split right down the middle of the sternum like a surgery was being performed. No, not a surgery. Lerner had watched those on the TV when he and Duncan were staying in hotels. It was an interesting way to pass the time.

No, this was more like something from a slaughterhouse.

Lerner couldn’t even tell if the corpse was male or female, such was the extent of the damage. The chest cavity was pretty damned empty, and the flesh was stripped off the legs, already sacrificed to the massive appetite of the Tul’rore. One of them could eat a whole human every twenty-four hours, and here there had been five.

“Fucknuggets,” Lerner breathed.

The two Tul’rore on the opposite side of the table finally took notice of him. One of them got to its feet, overturning a chair in the process. Its real face was exposed and red eyes gleamed over the slick of blood that ran down its face and stained its cotton dress. It was ostensibly female, though Lerner knew that mattered as little with a Tul’rore as nipples on a man. It ate humans; it didn’t fuck them.

“You need to sit your ass back down,” Lerner said, holding up a hand. He knew even as he said it that it was utterly fucking pointless. Trying to get a Tul’rore to calm down was like politely asking a hungry lion to stop devouring you mid-meal.

The Tul’rore listened just about as well, too. The two closest to him turned to look at him now, too, and he imagined they didn’t see anything but a giant flashing sign indicating he was another fine dinner waiting to be opened up. Like a fucking Happy Meal box for these bottom feeders.

Lerner wasn’t stupid, and he didn’t want to get tripped up, so he backed up into the family room. He passed Duncan flattened against the wall without so much as a nod of acknowledgment. Duncan was a big boy. He knew what to do.

Lerner made it about six steps back from the open door before the first one came charging at him. He let it come. Stuck out his truncheon when it got close, pushed the button. The bloodthirsty open mouth flared with black fire and the Tul’rore dissolved, sucked back into hell.

Lerner watched Duncan get the next one, jabbing out his truncheon as it came into the room. This one screamed before it burned, flesh cracking open in a fast-moving pyre. Lerner never got used to seeing them burn like this. It happened so quick it left an afterimage in his eyes, like looking at a bright light before walking into a dark room.

One of the last two Tul’rore burst through the wall behind Duncan as the other came through the door at Lerner. He wanted to shout “
shit!
” or “
fuck!
” but neither really fit the situation. It was all just local flavor anyway, stuff he’d picked up from the television. Those pay channels taught him all the nuances.

The Tul’rore were just too dumb to know that this time they’d bitten off more than they could chew.

Duncan flung the Tul’rore that was on his back through the air. It hit the ceiling and cracked the plaster. Lerner could see the dust fall in the faint light streaming into the room, like it was a little shower of powder dropping on him.

Lerner didn’t even bother to hold up the truncheon as the Tul’rore charged him. He threw up a fist and caught it on the chin. It staggered, momentum completely arrested. Lerner followed with another punch and he heard the shell crack under his onslaught. “Do you have any fucking idea what you’ve done here?” he asked the Tul’rore.

The Tul’rore he spoke to was the one in the dress stained by blood. He brought the truncheon down across its face, whipping more than striking. It cut a dull gash in its forehead, exposing a little light of fire.

The light of the soul. The essence.

But it wasn’t enough to kill it.

Not yet.

Lerner whipped the truncheon aside and leapt forward, grasping the Tul’rore around the throat and throttling its neck back. He could feel the fury creasing his face as he landed on his knees. He dragged the Tul’rore down with him and slammed its head on the oak floorboards. For good measure he slammed it down again.

That was pointless, too. It wasn’t like there was a brain to damage on these things.

The Tul’rore looked at him with those hungry eyes, and he shoved it down to the floor and held it with one hand. He landed a knee in its gut and it reacted with a gasp. He knew it was like a squeeze, more shock than pain. They didn’t have organs or guts, really. Just essence and energy swirling around in there. They could digest a human and add its essence to its own, could burn up all the flesh and blood. Other stuff would come out the other end eventually, waste processed by the essence. Compared to human digestive processes, it was fucking magic.

And fucking was another thing Lerner contemplated, because he’d seen demons have babies with humans. It was really a subject worthy of study—

“Are you gonna kill it or not?” Duncan asked from just above him. He was standing there waiting. His arms were folded. His truncheon was already collapsed, ready to stow. He wouldn’t put it away until Lerner finished this one, though. Lerner knew that much. Duncan was a cautious bastard.

“Give me a minute,” Lerner said.

“You start contemplating the wonders of human life, and I’ll spike you and it both,” Duncan said.

“You’re such an anti-intellectuallist fucker,” Lerner said, baring his teeth at Duncan. His real teeth, not the fake veneers he ate human food with. Lerner snorted and looked back at the Tul’rore. “You opened a can of fucking worms for us here. You left your damned essence trail all over the house next door, and the house before that, which tells me you’ve been feeding here for days, maybe a week. This shit where you eat a whole family then move to the next house in a line may fly in Detroit or New Orleans, but this is a small town, you numbskull dumbfuck.”

The Tul’rore didn’t answer in words. It made a snarling sound, the ravening still heavy on it. Lerner punched it in the nose and heard its head hit the floor. The boards cracked and the eyes flared wide. “Get that damned hunger out of your eyes when you look at me,” Lerner said. “Aw, fuck it.”

Lerner grasped the wound on the Tul’rore’s face and pulled, ripping the faux flesh wide. He could see the black flames starting to escape, burning within.

“The sentence,” Duncan said from above him.

“Oh, right.” Lerner had almost forgotten. He looked back at the Tul’rore. “By chapter 8.14 of the Uniform Code of Daemonic Conduct, I hereby charge you with the crime of exposure for killing and eating multiple humans in a space of confined population. The sentence is carried out under the laws of the Pact, Occultic Concordance Officers Lerner and Duncan presiding over said sentence.”

The Tul’rore seemed to be coming back to itself now, the ravening leaving it.

Too late.

Lerner ripped the flesh back from the wound and the flames escaped, rushing over the Tul’rore in one good burst. Lerner stood and watched it burn. It went quickly and slowly all at once. A moment and an eternity later it was done.

“Truncheon?” Duncan asked, and Lerner turned to see him holding it out. He had picked it up, the quiet bastard. What a time saver.

“Thanks,” Lerner said, putting it back onto his belt. He looked down at the shadowed spot where the Tul’rore had been dragged back to hell and took a sniff. He kind of liked the sulfur smell they left behind. Most officers of the Occultic Concordance hated it. It was like a corpse stink to a human, he supposed.

Which was another interesting question, really. Why was the smell of rot unpleasant to a human while it was appealing to a maggot? Was it just an instinctual interpretation offered by their brains to keep them from eating something that would sicken them? Or was it something deeper, an intelligent reaction to their own mortality—

“You’ve got that look again,” Duncan said, expressionless as ever.

“I was just thinking—”

“That’s what I was afraid of,” Duncan said, turning to leave. His cream-colored suit flapped from his turn.

Lerner ran to catch up, heard the squeaking of the floor as he did. “You ever eat a human?”

Duncan frowned as they reached the door. “Tried some one time. Didn’t like it.”

Lerner nodded. “I never have. Never saw the appeal. Steak, on the other hand, I love. Can’t get enough of a good rib eye. What do you suppose is the difference—”

Duncan froze him with a good look that said, “Shut the fuck up.” Lerner knew that look from Duncan, and he nodded. It was something he did out of courtesy. It had kept them as partners for over a hundred years, allowed them to tolerate each other.

Lerner took one last look up the walk when they reached the fence. He’d left the door open. He thought about going back and shutting it, but it was pointless. It’d only buy some time, and they might as well just get this out in the open now. It was already going to blow big in a town like this.

Duncan slipped behind the wheel this time, putting on sunglasses with exaggerated lenses that were too big for his face. Lerner didn’t bother to say anything, but they were women’s sunglasses. This was normal for Duncan.

Lerner looked back at the open door, thought about what was inside, what was probably waiting in the next two houses as well. “This is a fucking disaster,” he said under his breath. He saw Duncan nod, those big-ass sunglasses bobbing along. “It’s gonna blow this town wide open.”

“Yep,” Duncan said.

“Why couldn’t they have stayed in a city?” Lerner said under his breath. He knew why not, of course. Because this was the place. The lights were on, the welcoming committee had rolled out the red carpet. There’d be more like this, more crazy shit unfurling in this small town than it could possibly handle.

“Nature of the business,” Duncan said as he put the car in gear and pulled away from the curb. The nearest streetlight winked on, then off, cutting through the black night with intermittent illumination.

“Yeah.” Lerner nodded then tapped his finger along the leather just below his window. He liked the feel of the town car interior. “You remember that town in Alaska we were at in … what, 1965?” He sniffed at the air-conditioned air blowing out at him. He saw Duncan nod out of the corner of his eye. “I get that same vibe here. Like it’s gonna get out of control.” Lerner put his hand over his head, pushing his comb over back in place. “How long did it take for them to tear that place apart?”

“Six weeks,” Duncan said.

“I bet you it takes less time than that here,” Lerner said as they turned back onto a major thoroughfare. There was a traffic light ahead, blinking a yellow warning, like it had been shut off for the night. “I give it a month.”

Duncan grunted. “Maybe less.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Lerner said. “If someone gets fucking ambitious. Imagine the hell we’ll catch if that happens again.” He let out a ripping sigh. “Maybe it’ll just dissipate. Back to business as usual.” Duncan’s grunt was less committal this time. “Yeah, fucking unlikely, I know. But I can hope.”

They were passing through the town square now, full of boarded up windows and old shop fronts that probably hadn’t changed since the fifties. It was kind of homey, Lerner had to admit. Too bad it’d be gone soon, in all probability. Even a couple officers couldn’t hold back the tide rushing into this place and he knew it. Duncan too. He’d been around long enough to be pragmatic.

“Yeah,” Lerner said, shaking his head as they rolled onto an old highway and Duncan gunned the car up to fifty-five. “I give this place—Midian, isn’t it?” Yeah, that was it. “I give Midian, Tennessee, about four weeks before it’s a fucking crater. Tops. There’ll be nothing left but a bunch of body parts and wreckage.”

Arch waited to unload on Hendricks until they were back in the deputy’s squad car, for which Hendricks was grateful. His nose hurt like hell, his head was still spinning, and he felt like his rib cage had been used as a piñata for a demon birthday party.

Other than that, though, he felt fine.

“You were supposed to identify them and then come get me,” Arch was saying, his rich baritone still operating at a pitch that bothered Hendricks's aching head. “Not start World War D in a bar!”

“World War D?” Hendricks asked, leaning his head against the window. It felt oddly cool given how hot it was outside.

“Like the movie … never mind,” Arch said. The deputy was steering with his right hand at the top of the wheel, turning his body away from Hendricks. Hendricks wondered if there was some passive-aggressive shit going on with the man, but his head hurt too much to muster any give-a-fuck about it.

“I would have gotten you,” Hendricks said, “but by the time I had them out in the open, shit was already going down. I couldn’t just leave those guys in there to face down three demons while I ran for help.”

“So instead you got two of the civilians beat up and got yourself whacked around like a heavy bag because you didn’t get help,” Arch said. There was a serious crackle of anger in the man’s voice, and Hendricks did not care for the sound of it.