The Succubus' Vows free porn video

The Succubus' Vows Part Three of The Succubus Bride Trilogy A fictional story, written by REIF DISCLAIMER: This is adult fiction with heavy transgender elements, if you find that in any way offensive then stop reading NOW. No character in this story is meant to resemble any actual person living or dead. This story is presented as part of a trilogy, the author highly recommends the sections be read in the correct order. (The Succubus' Wedding Night, The Succubus' For Better or For Worse, The Succubus' Vows). The use of parentheses () typically denote sounds. All rights are reserved by the author, excepting copyrights as noted, all references are property of their creators. This is a non-commercial work of fiction. Don't Steal. Comments or feedback may be directed to [email protected]. Note Edit History: Version 1.1 (7/31/2010) - Mostly typo fixes, clarifications, content added Ch. 14 & 15. Unity of the heart is all that is necessary. If this cannot be had, all else is futile; if this is accomplished, nothing else is necessary. - Mahatma Gandhi CHAPTER 1 The heavy gloom and pervasive stench of the place was a horrid, animate thing that seeped into body and mind, the brew forged of damp shadow and reek pressing in with a malicious will like a heavy suffocating, wet blanket, sapping the spirit of any who dared brave it. The slow pattering drips of dark, polluted water echoed in the long tunnel providing the rhythm of a torturous cadence as gravity pulled slow trickles of oily fluid through cracks in the surrounding stone down into the bowels of the earth. The few shafts of dusty sunlight allowed into the gloom at regular intervals did little to dislodge the deep dark that owned this sprawling cavern and served mostly to define the edges of various lumps and piles along the tunnel floor that the feeble light could not fully illuminate. Whether that was a blessing or a curse to the sole occupant of the tunnel was debatable, in some cases it was better not to know, but not knowing invited imagination to supply the answers that sight could not and imagination in a place such as this was not an ally. (SQUUEEEEEEEeee) The figure spun, the glint of light reflected back from the wet stone played over the square angles of a worn hammer held high as a column of light anchored at the figure searched for the sound's source. A tensing breath as two red eyes loomed out of the dark twilight...a second before an illuminated circle captured its target, stripping its mystique as the form of a mangy, flea bitten rat scurried from the top of a forlorn pile of trash that served as the rodent's home. A sigh of relief mixed with worry echoed like a whisper in the long hollow space before it ended with a cough as a momentarily forgotten sense of smell returned. The slow splattering footfalls resumed as the figure carefully picked its way over the trash strewn floor trying not to think about the muck under his feet, the cast off detritus of countless masses. Occasionally he would stop and look up, perhaps listening to the unceasing rumblings of the oblivious hive above him. So it continued down a long straight tunnel until finally the passage reached a junction, the lesser tunnel the man traveled dropped down into a larger tributary of a sprawling subterranean labyrinth. The man paused, and drew what appeared to be a phone from the pocket of a small pack, setting down his weapon briefly to do so. The figure looked strange as he waved the device around near the edges of the drop off. After a few brief beeps announced the passage of an unseen trail, an arrow shone on the small screen, flashing weakly in the gloom as it pointed directly onward at the far wall of the lower tunnel, halfway between the dark passages that led left and right, halfway to nowhere. A weary sigh flowed out among the plinking off-tone notes of dripping oily water. Left or right, with no way of knowing if the path was true. If he was wrong...well what if he was wrong? What if he had always been wrong? No...he wouldn't think those thoughts, if only this had been a dungeon in a world that had no true capacity to hurt him, no real cost for failure. It would have been so simple, fight to the bottom, kill the boss, loot, profit, repeat. This was not simple and fate kept conspiring to make it even less so. "Do you feel lucky punk?....Viva Las Vegas," Scott Carver sardonically quipped as he punched the buttons on the side of his watch adding an infinitesimal amount of light to the shadows that enveloped him as the face of his watch lit up with a faint glow. 2:01 pm - Saturday Had it really been less than a day? Not even a single turn of the Earth to mark the time it took for his life to come apart. "Do you have any idea what you're doing?" Scott rubbed his weary eyes and coughed as his lungs protested the brew of noxious vapors they were being forced to endure down here in the Las Vegas storm sewers. His last thought ominously echoed the prophetic words of another, the concept seeming to flow around him in the same manner as the tapestries of dark slimy stains that covered the concrete walls of the sewer tunnel. Left or right, to go forward in the hope of saving Zoe. Left or right to go down into the next branch of a maze of drainage tunnels ever deeper into the belly of the beast forged in a billion tons of concrete and steel down where the light of day and the thoughts of men rarely moved. Left or right to descend deeper into another darker layer of hell chasing Zoe. Scott craned his head down over the ledge. Scott looked left, Scott looked right, and only the crushing dark emptiness looked back. Only quiet stillness broken by the sound of the cities' slowly leaking wastewater answered. Scott pulled back, his breathing shaky, the beam of his flashlight hardly capable of piercing that dark veil. A shiver borne of nameless fear rocked him. "Why the hell did you come this way? What the hell is down here for you?" Scott asked the demanding question of a woman that was not there to answer. He looked into that living gloom and knew the answer, he was one of the few who knew, incontrovertibly that there were things that lived in the dark shadows far from the light, outside of the mundane lives of those above, things to whom this dank reeking sewer would seem a pleasant home. The question now was whether Zoe was now counted among them. That she had come this way was not a good omen...the half seen impression that had flown through his mind yesterday haunted him like a specter. "Please....," Scott implored into the darkness as he waved his detector around again hoping for an easier path to be revealed. (Beep, Beep, Beep) The arrow fatalistically pointed onwards, as it had before, into an impossibility. "What are you doing?" Scott asked himself again trying to find an argument to force himself to action, but instead doubt gnawed at his thoughts. How many times was it going to be his life on the line, how many times was he going to have to jump in feet first and simply hope that the water would be deep enough? That first night, he had trusted Zachary, the concept that his wedding night might have killed him in a truly gruesome manner hadn't fully, truly, registered until later when he had finally seen the last moments of Crandall Smith. Still there had been losses and questions. Had he willingly damned his own friend? He had lied to so many people that day including himself for what seemed like the greater good. Even then the questions still came, what if Zoe had made him into someone unrecognizable, destined to suit her needs? It had worked out alright... but then... Then later he had turned a blind eye to what Zachary had become even though he saw the beast, the ravenous predator that needed frequent sating, that lived within Zoe clearly. He had ignored his inner feelings of caution. Was he a hypocrite, willing to accept the disquieting situation simply because it entailed a gorgeous woman-thing sharing his bed? The losses had continued. What if it was simply luck that in her forcible conscription to the fairer sex Wendy had turned out all right? Zoe had corrupted another man and he had tried to spin that fact both to himself and the world positively. He had told himself and Zoe, even believed it, that it wasn't her fault that she had upended several lives and spawned another member of a sect that may be both blessing and curse to the world. What if he hadn't been immune to her waste essence. He too would have become a woman, or Witch...or worse. He had been insanely lucky so far that this whole fiasco dating all the way back to that pivotal night at Riley's hadn't blow up taking him with it. And now here he was in a place he had never wanted to be, attempting to get lucky yet again, with no real guarantee that anything he was doing might make this bad situation reverse into something tolerable. What on earth was he doing? There were easily a dozen ways that this little expedition of his could end poorly and no real solutions. Math was his specialty but how can you figure odds when you don't even know the path needed to succeed? The cloud of unknown variables was damning. Was it worth it? That insidious but appealing little thought reared its head, again. How deep into the morass Zoe had made of his life was he willing to trek for her? Did he have to keep doubling down at this table? At what point could he allow himself to admit defeat...and walk away? She would never be normal. Even if by some miracle he succeeded he would only return a status quo that as much as he hated to acknowledge it had utterly derailed his life. Was it worth it? Was she worth it? Slowly, Scott looked back down the way he had come, the small point of light that defined the entrance to this hole burning away off in the distance. Slowly he turned back to face the unfathomable darkness that laid before him, potential miles of suffocating gloom between him and any faint hope of victory. Surely, he had done enough...surely, no one could fault him for not trying. Surely honor had been sated, hadn't it? "Do you know what you're doing?" Scott flatly asked himself and the shadows that swirled around him in a voice drained of emotion. The only answer was the drip of water and the faint scurrying of vermin. .... 2:17 pm - Saturday Scott Carver blinked furiously and squinted as he stepped into the blazing desert sunlight, the yawning opening to the storm sewer behind him. He hated himself in that moment, hated himself for the lies he had always told himself of how when it mattered he would rise to the occasion. Hated how he was only a hero, a somebody, in his dreams and games. Hated how he had started doubting the woman he loved. Most of all he hated himself for feeling happy and relieved to be out in the warm sunlight and out of that forsaken hole. Not a particularly good day he mused, ending with a joyless sigh, it hadn't started well, why should the ending be any different? Less than one day, but yesterday might as well have been an eternity ago. Oh how things had changed. CHAPTER 2 4:11 pm - Friday / Yesterday, a little over 22 hours before Scott exits the tunnel. A few saw Scott Carver leave the file archives at Inventech, none knew why though his face was ashen. None knew why his left hand trembled uncontrollably. None knew the torment that had given rise to the grim stone his expression was set in. It was good none chose to inquire, for the shattered tempest that comprised his thoughts could not have provided even the basest lie to cover his single overriding concern. He strode with an unrelenting purpose down the tiled hall, and turned left heading towards Zoe's usual sanctum, he needed a place where none could overhear the questions he needed to ask. Zoe's secluded office was by far the best place he could go without leaving the building. The door opened onto the vacant space with a creak, the humming servers with their flashing lights uncaring in their robotic way that their mistress might be in danger. The whole setup seemed so wanton and empty without Zoe in her usual seat. Scott gulped with a rising dread as he pulled out his phone and dialed the phone that to Zoe was a near permanent fixture of her wardrobe. (BRING, BRING, BRING, BRING)...."please pickup, please, please, Please, PLEASE, PLEASE BE ALL RIGHT... Scott whispered with rising force hoping, praying that whatever had transpired was some crazy fluke. He would given anything to hear a weary, angry Zoe answer that call. "Hello, this is Zoe, I'm sorry I missed you but please leave a message." "No, DAMNIT...Zoe please call me, please be okay...." Another number... "Hello, front desk how can I help you?" A cheerful feminine facade chipped in places with fatigue answered. "Hello, this is Scott Carver, my wife, Zoe, is staying in room # 437, she hasn't called and I'm a bit worried about her, could you have someone check and see if she's there?" Scott's anxiety swirled in the background in his voice and thoughts as fragments of conversation leaked over the phone, all between the hotel's front desk staff. A moment leaden with woe passed. "I'm sorry sir, but no one is answering," an answer bereft of concern came from the front desk. "Thank you," Scott returned a reply stripped of genuine appreciation. Another number...followed by a circuitous number of transfers... "Ballroom, Security," a gruff masculine presence announced. "Hello, this is Scott Carver, my wife Zoe is attending the show today, about 5'8", blonde hair, blue-green eyes...she called earlier and was concerned that someone she knew might be there, another woman, there's bad blood between them and my wife hasn't been returning my calls. I was hoping..." "Mr. Carver, I appreciate your concern, and I can pass along word to the few people I have, but no one's mentioned anything out of the ordinary and I have thousands of guests down there on the show floor coming and going. Unless you can give me some specifics as to what I'm looking for or where they might be...," the gruff voice cut Scott off with a voice laden with incredulity for the implicit task and the difficulty of locating one singular woman in a sea of people. Scott paused unsure of how he could make his case as someone else's voice filtered in faintly from the background asking the man who had denied Scott, a question. "Jim, CompuFabTech is asking if we've located their presenter Mr. Brett Anderson again, what do I tell them?" "Damnit, Sheryl every time we do a show at least a few men skip out and head to the casino's. I got three people. THREE! I cannot turn over every rock looking for people who are AWOL, tell them we'll keep an eye out but we haven't seen him." The security man's rising ire had allowed his words to seep through the hastily covered receiver and down the phone line to Scott for whom they had not been meant. The plastic receiver in Scott's hand creaked under the force of his grip as his knuckles went white as he politely thanked the man, part of Scott's mind silently screaming at the ignorant fool but refused voice as the other man hung up. How do you convince someone that there was likely a murderous wolf among his flock when the wolf wears a sheep's skin...flawlessly? A last try, he redialed Zoe's phone. Three rings and then it picked up. "ZOE!!" Scott's heart soared ... (silence)...(silence)...(silence)...then a faint snickering giggle which was not Zoe, hinted with malice, slithered out of the connection just before Zoe's phone abruptly hung up. "DAMN IT!!!!! Scott screamed with a frustrated fury, his voice reverberating in the small room, uncaring who might come. "Damn it," he cried, his face in his palm the obvious too horrible to accept, but increasingly impossible to deny. What could he do? The question haunted him as he searched for answers, his idle hands picking up Zoe's little figurines as if they might hold some helpful revelation. He felt like a prophet among the blind and deaf. Bleating out that he knew the wolf, had seen its hungry red eyes, had felt its shadowy claws touch him, and yet there was no way to make the world believe him. Who could he call? The police? He could imagine how that call would go. Hello, my wife has been kidnapped by a succubus...yes he would be lucky if he only got treated like a nuisance. No, he needed someone who knew, someone who had to know what it was like to know the truth and be surrounded by those blind to it. He could only hope she would help. CHAPTER 3 4:42 pm Friday/Yesterday A few of last fall's leaves lingered on the ground, a crackle here and there sounded where the melting snow had not completely soaked through as Scott's shoes fell uncaring upon them as he trod the uneven concrete path in the all but deserted park. "Mirabel...," he summoned in soundless thought. What was he going to do? "MIRABEL...," his mind thundered as its only recourse. Was he already too late? "Mirabel...," the plea dropped from his lips as he sought something, some shelter or refuge from this waking nightmare. Why had he let her go? "MIRABEL...please," his shout partially caught in his throat as he frantically spun under an old lamp near the middle of the park seeking, seeking, and yet not finding. "I heard you the first time," Mirabel spoke flatly from somewhere behind him. Scott spun and found the raven haired Mirabel leaning up against a tree that he recently passed. "Mirabel, I need your...," Scott began, ignoring the implicit question as to how she had simply appeared like that. Mirabel held up a hand as she interrupted, her sad green eyes already telling Scott her news was dire. "Scott, I know you don't want to hear this, but it will make things a lot simpler. There's a Witch that lives in Boulder City, Nevada, closest any of us is willing to get to Las Vegas given how many demons it attracts. She doesn't know what happened precisely but there was a massive disturbance of tainted essence in Las Vegas right about four p.m. that lasted several minutes. It is safe to say that a succubus in all likelihood caught Zoe and forced her to become a full succubus...I'm so sorry, really I am." Scott slowly knelt down, fingers tracing the cracked, worn concrete, his shoulders sagging as he tried to comprehend those words. After a moment he looked up to Mirabel who still maintained her expression of concern for the well being of the man who had given so much and now had lost it. "What do we do now," Scott questioned in all but a broken voice. "We make ourselves scarce for awhile and hope whatever Zoe's become decides to settle down someplace faraway. You in particular might find it beneficial to find a new job and a new home, ideally before she thinks about returning here. If there's anything in particular you could do like canceling plane tickets I'd do it, anything to discourage her." "What do you mean...we're supposed to run? We're not going to try and help her?" Scott was surprised at the matter of fact tone Mirabel was using to describe him picking up his life and running for the hills for the purpose of hiding from his wife. "You're serious," Mirabel questioned after a twitch of surprise, wondering what plan Scott had envisioned, "what were you expecting?" "There's got to be something we can do, some...sort of treatment, you're the expert, there's got to be a few Witches that might help us, between you, me and Wendy, and...whoever else, there's got to be something." Scott rambled through a serious of disjointed thoughts not really sure of anything other than the need to do something, anything. "Scott, dear, that is a very noble sentiment, but you have no idea in the slightest what you're asking. I'm not going to Las Vegas, no sane Witch or Warlock is either. Surely Zoe told you, surely she showed you? Do you have any idea what a full blown succubus can do when she's not attempting to hide what she is? Scott gulped and nodded, remembering what Zoe had showed him, her memories of that night, he knew why Zoe feared that final door, "she showed me the night she ran into her succubus." "... And you think you know how bad it can get? I doubt you truly saw, I doubt you even begin to comprehend just how easy, how trivial that was for her. That night to you and Zoe was a life changing moment, to her it was the equivalent of picking up a burger from a drive-thru," a touch of personal fear crept into Mirabel's voice as she paused finishing her low, laden words. "I'm not saying I'm not afraid, but I CAN'T DO NOTHING. I can't let her win," Scott emphatically exclaimed some life returning to his voice. "You do not understand in the slightest what you are doing, what you are asking. You are not prepared. Look at me Scott...LOOK AT ME," Mirabel's request came across as both word and an unspoken imperative that demanded his body obey. Even knowing the warning signs of his will being hijacked Scott still struggled to even begin to disobey Mirabel's command. His gaze wavered as his body trembled, but despite the contrary commands to his limbs, slowly he turned, slowly he lost control of his body, slowly he looked into the smoldering jade-green eyes of an ancient Witch deceptively clothed in the body of a maiden and saw a fragment of her true power. "UGHHHH" Scott shook as Mirabel finally released her hold on his mind. Her next words were full of trepidation and came as little more than a whisper on the stirring breeze. "Scott, I'm sorry I should not have done that, but you needed to feel it, feel a fraction of what Zachary experienced. There are only a handful of men in this world who can resist the power of a trained Witch or Warlock and you do not have even a shred of the mental training needed to be one of them. Yet, to a Succubus I...am...as...a...child. Once before, long ago when I was younger I fought one of them with a group of some of the greatest Witches and Warlocks of that age. Ten of us against a single succubus that was too ambitious, too dangerous, too murderous to leave alone. We spent a month planning our ambush. We executed it perfectly and yet she escaped. Even with her badly wounded the fight that followed still lasted nearly an entire day as we fought across a swath of countryside, had we shown even the slightest hesitation in concern for the peasants she kept hiding among and using as shields we could not have prevailed. When at the end we finally succeeded in destroying her the three of us who still lived limped away more dead than alive to lick our wounds. If it comes down to you versus a succubus the fight will be over in a matter of seconds, and you will be very lucky indeed if she simply gives you a clean death." Scott's reply came as a defiant brooding rumble, "what gives you, them, the right to exist, what gives them the right to be here?" "I'm sorry I couldn't tell you. We are what we are." "I promised...I'm...I'm sorry Mira." Mirabel shook her head and thought for a moment, she looked off into the larger park as she pondered. Eventually she seemed to reach a decision. "You do not serve her memory by going to your death dear...but if this is your way of protesting the injustice of it all to the universe then so be it. Let me see your ring..." "Mira?" "Time is short Scott, it won't hurt her now to have it off for a moment." Scott slowly, hesitantly took off the black iron thing his ring, his precious gift from Zoe, had become and handed it to Mirabel. The Witch examined it, her quick keen eyes noting details that were beyond Scott's ability to see. As she turned it a few weak rays of amber light from the setting sun danced on the inside of the band, a few fleeting threads of gold answered from a few remaining etched marks though they were all but consumed by the dark metal that surrounded them. A hint of a smile crawled into the corners of Mirabel's lips before her face reset to a mask of worry. "A trace, a hope, a fool's hope, but it makes me feel better about this," Mirabel sighed. "About what," Scott probed unsure. "About being an idiot of an enabler, instead of carting you off for your own good. Right now there's still a bit of her left, some part of her that may be holding out deep inside her. It will fade soon so your time is limited. I don't think you can save her but maybe whatever's left inside might give you chance to end her suffering, might give you a chance to grant her a clean end before the demon she's become finishes wiping it out. You'll need these." Mirabel handed over a small bag to Scott who tentatively took it, unsure of what form a Witch's aid might take. He peered inside to see an ordinary looking phone surrounded by a cluster of five vials that glowed with a soft pale golden light. A small irregular bundle sat by itself. He instantly recognized the vials as some of the same type that Zoe had collected, but the color was different. He looked back up to Mirabel as he pulled out the phone, anticipating his questions, she started speaking again. "Its not obvious, that's the point. I'm not going to give you anything that if it falls into a succubus' hands that can be easily traced back to me. It's keyed off Zoe's essence signature. Hit the keys in the sequence 4337 and it will survey the area looking for any of her waste essence and then point along the essence trail she leaves as she moves. Follow her trail and you'll find her...for whatever good it will do when you catch up to her. The vials, those are up to you...I know she's taken you into the dream world so you should have a pretty good instinctive idea by now of how to manipulate raw essence in that concentration. All of the waste essence that Zoe left across this city originated with you. I reversed the bias back to male, hence the color change. With the compatible bias you should be able to control it if not precisely, after all it is your essence dear, it originated with you. It will dissipate quickly once you release it from a vial so don't use one of them unless you're sure Zoe is close, but if you use it like a bubble to shield yourself it should absorb either her domination power or several swipes from her claws, though it won't take long for her to overwhelm even that amount of energy. Be creative, but its best use is probably to give you a few seconds where she can't hurt you. That's my best gift to you, a chance to get in close, surprise, and kill her. Make your first attempt count because I assure you she won't give you a second chance. The last item doesn't really DO anything, I added it for luck...you'll need it." Mirabel finished her rambling explanation as she looked past Scott, her gaze seeming to look past him as if she didn't want to look him directly in the eye. Scott solemnly nodded as he gave the detector- phone an experimental try, the few beeps it gave off feeling very loud in the empty, cold park. "Mirabel, thank you...really thank you." "DON'T THANK ME, I'm giving you a fool's hope and you're going to get yourself killed because of it. Do you have any idea what you're doing?" Scott studied Mirabel's face and noted the unspoken plea written there. Was he being foolish in insisting on launching this rescue mission? Was he tilting at windmills to protest the larger injustices that had pulled apart his life? Logic and emotion stewed within him for a few pondering seconds as he counted the reasons for and against his mission and found them remarkably balanced. A singular condemning, defiant answer crawled out of his mental gridlock. "No...I don't...but we never did. Thank you Mirabel." With that, Scott turned and walked towards home, his shoulders sagging a little with the knowledge he now carried. The soft scrapes of his shoes on the concrete path scratched a raspy chorus of condemnation to the woman who stood under an old lamp and watched him go, remembering this moment, for it was slated to be another regret added among many in her long years. "It is ALWAYS the same, the knights get themselves killed in battles already lost, and the knaves inherit the kingdom," Mirabel whispered with a quiet anger to the bare trees, the new grass, the last biting winds of winter, and another of her kind. "He doesn't have a chance in hell does he? Why did you help him?" A second red haired Witch too young to know to know the answer with only seven decades of life to her name, and still surprised by the simple effective magic of hiding herself in plain sight, asked from under the leafless canopy of a tree that had just started to put out it's first green buds. "Because Wendy, there are three paths that lead from this place. He cannot take the first path that seeks safety without surrendering everything he believes himself to be even if he tells himself this battle is for other reasons. The second holds him here in limbo if I deny him the tools needed to find her, if I do that he lives but with the enduring pain of losing everything he fought for. The third risks his death but holds out the chance for absolution. Tell me how you would grant him peace Wendy without betraying his cause? I could force him to be happy, I could make him forget, I could save him, but that act would be anathema to everything that I hold dear. Tell me Wendy, how do you make someone happy when his sorrow is part and parcel with his joy? That is why I wanted you to see this, because this is the price that being a Witch sometimes exacts." "Hell of a price...," Wendy nodded, her hand subconsciously reaching down to pat a large gold watch hanging from her belt, that conundrum was quite familiar to her. "Yes, it is...," Mirabel replied wistfully, "...it always is." CHAPTER 4 5:19 pm Friday The scratch of metal on metal preceded a shaft of orange light that speared into the home of Scott Carver and Zoe Carver. Whether the former could call a place home that he might never return to after his coming trip given the odds was debatable, whether the latter still considered herself as belonging to this place, this mundane human abode, was even more uncertain a question. Scott turned on few lights and packed a few bare essentials, some food and water, a change of clothes, there was surprisingly little that he could use as a decent weapon. Ultimately an old battered sledgehammer from the tool closet that had been handed down was his best candidate. He considered trying to go buy a gun but despite his virtual prowess with all manner of firearms he hadn't ever fired a true one in anger and he didn't have the time to learn how. Given how fast he knew Zoe could move that seemed like a recipe for getting disarmed and shot with his own weapon. The little pack he had put together seemed so small but what else was worth taking? Scott stood in their shared room and surveyed the shelves loaded with the physical incarnations of ideas, desires, and hopes and considered just how meaningless it all was in a fight against the onrushing night. Did any of it matter? What were words and imagination against THIS. The unsaid question lingered. Scott trembled, this house felt like Zoe, he could smell her in its air, feel her lingering in its nooks and crannies. That she might be truly lost to him...no, Mirabel had said there was hope, however small. Scott nodded and picked up his pack. "I'm coming back, and I'm bringing Zoe back home too, its not over, I won't let it be." Scott's words rang softly in the shadowed house and he felt just a bit better for his pronouncement. He looked in each room searching for any last possible tools of aid before turning again for the front door, the same door that he had let Zoe walk out that morning to his overwhelming misfortune. The sullenly blinking red light on the phone by the kitchen caught him as he passed. He paused and the momentary relief borne of his statement fell out of him as he read the number that had called. He wanted to sink into the carpet rather than acknowledge that particular loose end but they deserved better. He grimaced as he dialed the number and listened to a faraway phone summon more people to share in the day's misery. "Hello," Anne's harried voice answered. "Its Scott," came the qualifying statement. "Oh SCOTT, please I wanted to talk to you. I...its hard to explain but a little over an hour ago, I felt...I just felt so WRONG. Please is everything all right?!" Scott Carver wanted to lie, wanted to do anything but tell this woman that one of her children had been carried off on his watch but there was no use now. "Anne, I'm sorry but it looks like another one of Zoe's kind found her and took her. That was the horrible feeling, Zoe may be one of them now. I'm going to Las Vegas, I'll do what I can." "TOOK HER, Oh no...oh no...," Anne's screech filled the phone. "WHAT DO YOU MEAN TOOK HER? What was she doing in Las Vegas?" A booming voice heralded James joining the conversation. "She went there for work, for a tradeshow. Damn it, how could I have been so stupid, like the city of sin isn't going to have a few of those THINGS camped out there. I don't have the exact details, this is all coming second hand, but I trust the source. That same source warned us that they would view Zoe as an aberration, something to be corrected through, I guess, their equivalent of a demonic booster treatment. I'm leaving right now for Las Vegas, with a lot of luck I might be able to...might be able to finish her before she hurts anyone." "...you're talking about killing Zoe," the tone in James voice instantly switched over, a threatening growl starting to creep in. Scott winced knowing how his words must sound, "James, Anne, I'll do what I can, but if they did get Zoe then she's not Zoe anymore, and she's almost certainly not going to get better. For all extents and purposes the Zoe that we know probably died at four pm today, a monster may still be walking around wearing her face but its not her." Scott heard deep breaths over the line, in the soul crushing pause that followed he could imagine the shared look of decision, the subtle nod, the slow sorrowful realization creeping in. "If...If it comes to that...I suppose it may have to be done," James slow pronouncement was partially obscured by a sob from Anne. "We'll head that way, we should be there..." "James, Anne, you have another daughter, this is not going to be easy and you really have no idea what they're capable of." "I know, I felt it when she showed us, but we NEED to be there, and between the three of us Anne is probably the least susceptible to whatever you call that mental thing that they do." "There is that, but what about their claws James? Zoe didn't show them to you earlier. One second normal woman, next second demon with claws that go through 2 by 4's like they were matchsticks. We actually tested Zoe's a few days after that night. She punched through a piece of roofing metal like it was tinfoil. She can see perfectly fine in pitch darkness, AND if she's gone full demon then her shape shifting power is probably unlocked. Oh and by the way IF they're still together there's there will be TWO of them. James...Anne...you have another daughter that needs you. Please, stay away from this," Scott's exasperated ramble slowly morphed into a quiet plea. His gut churned and a wry smirk crossed his face as he finished savoring the tragic irony, wondering if this is what Mirabel had felt for him. There was a long pause on the other end of the line before James gave to words what all were thinking, "Scott, are you going on a suicide mission?" "...the, the odds are not good, but I can't let those damn demons win. What Zoe wanted more than anything was to not be like them. If she can't fight for that anymore then I have to fight for her...James, Anne...Goodbye." Scott started to hang up. "Scott, she's smart and crafty, she got that from her mother. From me she got the determination. Don't underestimate her, she always had a trick up her sleeve. Lastly for what its worth I did you a great insult before, I know you meant it when you promised to take care of her. If...if there's no way to help her then...then I know you'll do the right thing, and if there's no way for you too without...without getting hurt real bad, then come back and we'll find some other way to make them pay for taking our daughter." Scott swallowed, "Thanks..." Scott felt just a little more alone when he hung up. In a green house with white trim, far away from where a man was walking out his front door into the sunset, two parents who only a little over a week ago had learned they had lost a son now faced the additional loss of a daughter. Anne Miller fell into the arms of her husband James Miller and sobbed quietly. "Do we go?" "I don't know..." ---- Early Saturday Morning Scott rubbed his eyes and reached down for the Mega-Gulp cup of atrocious tasting coffee he had bought a hour ago at a pitiful excuse for a all night truck stop. A shake of his hand informed that the cup was all but empty. Drat, he thought and sighed, blinking to keep away sleep as his car barreled alone through the high desert its twin headlights alone in moving through the night on a straight empty stretch of highway miles between nowhere. The far horizon was still black and waiting for the first rays of sunlight. The stars out here away from the cities were beautiful but Scott found it hard to give them heed, he had been alone with his thoughts for a long time on this trip and that was not a happy place to be. Mirabel's warnings and his constant review of how ludicrously remote success seemed had been eating away at the surety of his action like a slow consuming acid. Doubt was slowly undercutting the foundations of his personal crusade. So much like his trip to see Zoe's family, it was easy to be brave and certain far away in the light, but each dark mile through the slow hours of the night brought closer that moment of reckoning, and narrowed the calculus between the vengeful rage of a grieving husband and instinctual self-preservation. Needing something both to distract him from his thoughts and keep him awake he cycled to another CD without even looking at the label and tried to relax as the happy tunes began to play. Soon though a song began to play that he had always enjoyed for its raw emotion from an artistic standpoint, a song that he had not listened to in the last three months. No, stay I don't care what you've said or done Don't go away Not now, when life had just begun Come back, and be the woman who I knew Help me to believe in you What on earth am I to do? She's gone, this vision who was not quite real I must move on despite the pain The pain will heal Oh, Lord, how could you let me love like this? No one dies upon a kiss And only fools believe in bliss And yes, God knows I am a fool A man deluded by his wife A figure ripe for ridicule Who's lived a vain and useless life So be it then, I'll play that game I do not give a tinker's damn I'll be a fool, it's all the same It truly doesn't matter what I am God, no! I'm broken, but I'm still alive And slowly I will feel my soul revive With time, I'll find a way to right this wrong If it takes my whole life long Lord, I'll fight my battles all alone But make me strong (c) "Prayer", Soundtrack to The Scarlet Pimpernel Scott Carver knew of succubi, witches, and suspected that probably a whole other menagerie of things skittered and crawled through the warren-like underbelly of the human zeitgeist. What gave them a right to be here? Had he been wrong all along? A fool? Zoe had practically been one of them and he had helped it happen. A traitorous fool...A man deluded...Such were the thoughts invited by the empty void through which he traveled, the pale light of his car on the road barely enough to illuminate the path ahead. So much unseen around him. So much unseen, unknown... "Do you know what you're doing?" Scott dared asked himself, only the creak of vinyl from his steering wheel as his hands tightened answered. CHAPTER 5 2:32 pm Saturday, 15 minutes after Scott exited the tunnel, 15 minutes of doubt and memories later. Scott looked over at the broken security gate set in the sluice for the sewer that poorly guarded the entrance to an underworld. No Cerberus, no Black Knight, no ominous portal, hardly remarkable at all. That door that hung off a rusty twisted hinge, oh how he hated and feared it. He was tired, a night without sleep, and several miles of tracking through the dark corners of a city had led him here and nourished the temptation to simply go home. Each time though, that tempting hydra of a thought reared its heads, he calculated it against what it would cost him. To abandon Zoe, to deny that he loved her, to run and surrender to these things that had tainted his dream, his life, his world, he would never be able to look in the mirror again and not feel the shame it would brand him with. "Can't go forward, can't go back...wonderful...," Scott sarcastically quipped as he sat up against the concrete embankment of an enslaved waterway. "A little help down here would be nice, you know with all the demons that seem to be running around loose," Scott fumed as he lifted his gaze up into the desert sky for a brief angry outburst before he settled back down. His stomach growled. "Yeah, yeah...," Scott muttered as he reached into his bag for a granola bar, his hand fumbling over the various things he had brought...there... Scott pulled out his snack, but another thing came too, the small cloth wrapped bundle Mirabel had given him. He reached down with his hand and picked it up from the side of the bag and gave it a quizzical look. "Some luck charm, I'd hate to think how this day might have been any worse without you," Scott acidly remarked as he looked at the oddly shaped lump. Oh well he thought, might as well see what it was. After a few crunching bites of processed food he unwrapped the little lump, something hard and smooth finally falling into his open palm from its shrouding cloth. Scott held up his hand to see a small glass figure, of two people holding hands. A slow searching look and the tiny aquamarine beads set into the clear glass at the head of one quickly told him who this little couple was supposed to be. Mirabel had given him tiny versions of him and Zoe. This was a Witches' luck charm? A small roll of paper sat snugly in figurine-Scott's other arm. Scott carefully worked to remove it and unroll it only to reveal it was blank. Scott started to sigh in annoyance but slowly text began to reveal itself the letters fading in from nothingness. "Right, Witch...," Scott bitterly muttered, expecting her to use a simple pen would have been asking too much, oh well. Scott, Sorry about the ink, just being cautious. I made this for you. I know it must seem an insult to you now, but I saw the meaning that you brought each other. If you remember, I told you, Zoe, and Wendy before that at one point I was tired of this world. Then I met someone who changed that. I made myself a little figure of myself and that person to remember. I hope that this one helps you remember too, don't forget who she was. Don't forget that she chose to be your wife. Good luck, Mira Scott looked back at the little figures, watching the afternoon light glint on the curves of the glass. What was it? Insult forged and made real of all the lies that he had woven, of all the concepts he had betrayed? Or gift representing everything she had tried to be, the love they had shared. Scott looked into the little face of the aquamarine eyed girl and wondered if this is what Wendy felt when she looked at her watch. Wendy's watch. Zoe's own figurines. James' picture. Mirabel's unseen token. All totems into which they had poured themselves, defining a singular moment of clarity for each. The thought begged the question, what talisman defined him? What clarity had he gained in this fiasco? He had nothing but a crumbling desolate ruin forged by getting exactly what he had wanted only to find it twisted beyond recognition and hollow on the inside. He had nothi--........ Scott's thought stopped halfway through as he rolled the little figurine in his hand. There behind the little version of him, the black ominous ring still decorated his finger. Zoe had given him that ring, had made it beautiful and now it was tainted...but...Zoe had given him that ring. That ring had been attached to a promise made on their wedding night. What were a succubus' vows worth? No...what were a woman's vows worth? Zach had chosen him, chosen him at the moment of fateful decision as the foundation to rebuild his shattered life on. James and Anne had challenged that arrangement but ultimately accepted him. Mirabel had aided him in his cause to save Zoe even knowing his chances were slim, knowing that she was risking a demon's retribution. They trusted him. Silently, slowly, he had become the foundation. In the crucible of this nightmare, without declaration or statement, they were all looking to him. "Isn't that what you wanted?" Scott whispered to himself as the afternoon sky and sun glinted on the glass. The age old fantasy. The great deed of meaning and courage that gained the princess' love. A happily ever after. His princess had been cursed, and her love bought by the sacrifice of the jester. But that fantasy was an artifice, it did not change the meaning of the struggle. It did not change the value of a succubus' vows one iota. The vows made to her hero, however strange. Scott breathed out. "Isn't that who you wanted to be?" Scott asked himself in a whisper more breathed than spoken as he counted all the books, movies and games through which he had explored trying to leverage himself into that role. Trying to find a purpose in his life beyond the simple mundane. Had she not given him that? Had they not all given that to him? Scott choked back a sob born of exhaustion, trial, and...clarity as his eyes misted and a tear ran down his tired, dirty face. Classic, unable to see the forest for the trees, he berated himself silently. He had even seen the exact same problem in Zoe but not himself. The taint and doubt that had gotten under her skin and prevented her from being happy in the life she had chosen had also gotten under his, and he had been blind to it as it ate at him. Scott held the little glass figure tighter. How did he get so complacent? So wrapped up in combating the everyday symptoms of this malice that he missed it slowly gnawing away at the roots of the creed that he aspired to. True evil was not a prancing villain plotting in its lair, it was an insidious power that made men and women forget who they are and who they want to be. Scott grimaced as he counted all the ways he had ignored that wisdom in the last three months, and counted just how close that doubt had come this day to taking the fortress of his mind by stealth. Scott's mind flashed to the succubus who had destroyed his friend, and maybe the same who sought the destruction of his wife. Doubt slowly melted in his heart flashing to a boiling lake of anger for these succubi who wanted to remake his princess as a monster, who sought to recast him as liar and a coward. He would not abide it. Quickly, with a new zeal, he reached down and took off his ring, holding it up to his eye in the hot desert light. A few lone golden strands still existed within the hoop of dark iron. Hope, a fool's hope. Scott's face set in grim stone as he replaced the ring on his left hand and clenched it into a fist, his right gingerly holding a Witch's gift. He turned to the mouth of the sewer tunnel. "You won't have her," Scott pronounced with a low brooding fury, "not while she or I remember who we are." Scott collected his bag and strode back to the entrance of the stygian passage. A noxious smell and the edge of the brooding shadow challenged him as he paused briefly at the doorway. "...down whatever paths eternity lead us...," Scott rumbled as he peered into the long passage. For a second he rolled his head working the tension from his neck and then he began a slow charge down that forsaken path, heeding not the protests of rats and vermin as he barreled onward through the slow dripping tunnel under a city block. The junction with the larger tunnel loomed ahead, his light fixed on it. Scott winced as he coughed, his lungs again reflexively protesting the vile fumes and smell down here. The crushing dark of the deeper passage rose up like a living thing as he reached the junction, again denying his small light but Scott paused only for a few thudding heartbeats before he looked left and then right and then climbed down the sluice and took the left hand passage noting that Zach and later Zoe always had a knack for turning left when lost. Slowly the sewer curved back around. After a few anxious samples a Witch's second gift announced that his course was true as it found the invisible evidence of Zoe's passage. Scott looked up, seeking a sun he could not see, hidden in the shadow of a deep sewer and thought to his direction. Southwest. Why was Zoe headed southwest? The abyss gave no answer. CHAPTER 6 3:37 pm Saturday The soul crushing dark had kept up its long relentless assault as Scott hiked the longest mile and the longest hour of his life. He moved slowly, but implacably, lead by the thin cone of pale light through the slimy mildew covered concrete tunnel, checking each branch of each new tunnel that joined the main. Zoe's path had not wavered, she was moving inexorably under the city towards the southwest, towards the Strip. His will reinforced and his purpose girded for the long trial of his sanity Scott was able to make due. His thoughts increasingly turned to why Zoe had taken this road and what laid at the end of it for her. Consumed with reflection earlier he hadn't spared much thought for the implications of Zoe's direction. He had picked up her trail on a street near the tradeshow. At first her path had been tortuously complex as it weaved in an among the buildings near the tradeshow from which she had disappeared but then, it had left that area snaking through back alleys and the crevices between buildings and eventually down into this warren of storm sewers but always heading toward an unknown goal. There were so many endless reasons she might be headed that way that Scott couldn't begin to mentally filter the list. For a succubus it was the ultimate "target-rich" environment. Dozens of hotels, casinos, bars and restaurants. Scott prayed that this wasn't Zoe being drawn towards prey. He could only hope. Scott paused and searched with his detector to verify that he was still on the right path. It didn't take long. The modified phone beeped strongly. The trail had gone from cold to warm surprisingly fast. Zoe had not moved quickly down here. She could not be far. That was an anxious realization. As Scott turned to move on his light played over a section of tunnel wall near where he had taken his reading. Scott paused in mid turn, his mind registering an oddity. Scott swung his light back searching for what had flashed by in a second only vaguely seen out of the corner of his vision with errant light. The spotlight found it. A thin discolored line disturbed the dark moist mildew that coated the tunnel walls. Scott slowly traced the line with his light. Another line began above it. Then another below. Another. Another. Five arcing lines in irregular parallel. Scott stepped back, a panic borne of knowledge making his hand tremble. The light wobbling on those lines. He gulped, his eyes searched the circling darkness but found nothing. Scott forced himself to step forward against his fear. His fingers felt those lines on the tunnel wall hoping they were other than what he knew them to be and yet finding as expected that the discoloration was the result of freshly exposed concrete peeking in thin grooves through the disturbed moist mildew. Scott shook but worked to quiet his fear. Yes he was on the right path. He did not need the detector to tell him. The four foot long arcing gashes in the wall were unmistakable. A succubus' claws had marked her passing. Scott's hike resumed as an exercise in fear control. Each echoing step heard by ears that now sought any sign of Zoe in the darkness. His advance was slow, his flashlight looking for Zoe, for she was definitely not far. Slowly he moved on, a hand resting on a Witch's third gift, his only real defense against claws easily capable of etching concrete. His flashlight could only clear away a small column of the shadow. He advanced methodically sweeping, exploring with his light until he was sure that nothing lurked in the darkness in front of him. He moved up and repeated the cycle. Again and again and again. A quarter mile crawled by as he advanced through the tunnel, each step an exercise in control as his thoughts returned to the subject of what he was going to do when he actually found Zoe. His unformed plan of hoping there was enough of her left to recognize him and hoping for the best seemed amateurish against the creature that had made those claw marks. He was deep, in a dark tunnel alone, far from aid with few avenues of escape, and limited by the dimensions of the narrow tunnel. Ideal conditions for a demon that could see in the dark and was armed with talons that put razors to shame. The thought broke anew on his mind and tried to force him back down the tunnel in the interest of self preservation but Scott's will held. On he marched. Another side tunnel came up on the left. He lavished his precious light on it. The idea that his best shot at Zoe would be from surprise absurd under these conditions. The light that guarded him from whatever monsters that lurked unseen in the darkness also telegraphed his position. His safety was his weakness. Scott inched forward. The ratcheting tension as each tunnel section passed by empty wearing on his tired body and frayed nerves. Another long side tunnel stretched off into black oblivion. Scott began to scan, eyes darting here and there looking for anything that hinted at where a succubus might be hiding. Drip...drip...drip...the slow patter of water was interrupted with a series of beeps from the altered phone. Beep-beep-beep...(rustle). Scott's heart nearly exploded from his chest at the faint sound of movement to his right in the main tunnel. He swung his light and peered into the gloom, his light falling off into shadow in the distance. Something had moved. Scott silently gulped. A moment of truth. What to do now? No cheery greeting had come, that would have been asking for a miracle. Neither had a hostile one. Just the long echoing silence between drips of oily water. But something HAD moved. He looked at his ring and steadied himself. The tunnel was empty as far he could see. Go on or go back... Claw marks in the darkness in a world alien to the light of day. Go on or go back... Would he find his wife or a merciless demon? Go on or go back... Steps forward. A shallow bend in the tunnel. Scott's breathing was fast, shallow, and to his ears terrifically loud but still, but still he heard it as he cautiously took that bend. (Rustle) Movement, and the soft scratch of something hard touching stone. Scott's fingers twitched on the flashlight. On his hammer now held ready. He cautiously peered around the bend steeling himself for what he might see there. Emptiness. Another stretch of tunnel, up ahead some sort of junction. A bit far for the sound to carry but he might be pushing her. He thought to Mirabel's warning about the vials but he couldn't risk it, he might not get a chance to uncork one of those vials if he was struck by one of those claws. He had to stop to recover one, removing the stopper. The soft golden light streamed out and was caught around him in eddy swirls of pale gold light. For a moment he focused, pushing the energy into a kind of rough bubble around him. The additional light helped, a little, bringing a soft dim golden light on everything. He strode forward up towards the empty narrow tunnel thinking of how he was going to go about clearing that junction ahead. Then stopped. It was the obvious place for Zoe to be, and it was a touch far for the sound of her movements to be carrying from. Scott turned back towards the bend and the way he had come over the last dozen strides searching, his light flitting here and there tracing stains, mildew, the glisten of dark water but nothing else. Empty. (skitter...) Scott turned back around, his light searching wildly for the source of the sound in the space between him and the junction. Empty. He gripped his weapon tight. A frown crossed his face lit dimly by the light reflected back from his flashlight and the soft golden glow. That had almost sounded like...He started to turn back around, hammer held in a defensive stance. "HISSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS...." (THUD)..."ARGHHHH" The light flashed wildly as the flashlight knocked from his hand clattered and splashed across the tunnel floor spinning in a circle, granting brief flares of light as the spinning beam lit two figures in it's circling strobes. Scott was not thinking about the pain in his back from where he had been knocked into the tunnel wall in a vicious bruising impact. Whatever fragmentary thoughts he could muster in that second were focused solely on the glistening teeth shaped like obsidian daggers that were scant inches from his face, buried in the wooden handle of his sledgehammer, the hot breath that washed over him reeking of unspeakable foulness and blood, and the dried crimson splatters that decorated the black plated head of the faceless creature that had ambushed him and all but pinned him to the wall. "ZOE!!!!!" Scott screamed in a frantic struggle as he fought a futile battle to escape his defenseless state, his stomach heaving with the smell of her blooded breath and the confirmation of the evil that had befallen her, that this THING might be his wife, a horrifying thought. "HISSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS," came the reply straight into his face slightly muffled by the wooden handle caught in its mouth. The slow splintering of wood answered all as the inhuman thing bit down but the handle was too thick even for its monstrous teeth to sever. Only seconds after he had been blindsided the stalemate was illuminated with a shower of golden sparks as the thing attempted to disembowel its pinned prey with its raking claws. The essence shield held but Scott could feel the drop in its life-saving strength. The thing leapt back, but not in retreat. For a tensing second Scott got to see. He wished he hadn't. In the dim light provided by the flashlight, which come to rest pointing roughly in the right direction a figure whose general body shape hinted that it once might have been female tensed for another attack. Her body plated in some sort of hard chitin-like armor sections that played over each other as she coiled to spring again. Her overlong, over thin arms and legs ended in oversized hands and feet that were little more than a platform for the black claws that stretched from her fingers and toes like knives. A barbed, serrated tail stretched sinuously, dangerously, from the base of her spine. Her whole form seemed to radiate wisps of freezing dark shadow from the sinuous body plated in matte black. She was almost a void that radiated a consuming cold in the tunnel's darkness, a black hole that consumed all warmth and sanity. Worst of all, aside from the gaping tooth filled maw there were only hints that she had a face. Like a dark plaster had erased it. Slight hollows and a slight bulge might have once been eyes and a nose but only traces remained. For a terrible, torturous second Scott Carver beheld what had become of his wife...whatever had been before, now a demon from some dark layer of hell rose up to seek his end. "HISSSSSSS" Scott went flying as it pounced, caroming off the tunnel wall and impacting him hard. He landed badly sending up a spray of muck and dirty water. Instinctively he rolled, as he did he felt foul water and small bits of concrete spray him as the creature landed right where he had been and swiping both its claws through the space he had just occupied. Another hiss of rage and Scott got a second showering of bits of mildewed concrete and muck to the face as the barb of the creature's tail descended like a guillotine and speared the floor next to his head. Scott managed to frantically get to his feet while the creature took a second to pull the point of its tail from where it had impaled concrete. "ZOE, PLEASE, REMEMBER, FIGHT IT!!!" A hungry empty hiss replied, punctuated with another leaping pounce. It caught Scott good with one claw sending up another shower of golden sparks as the essence bubble stopped the beast from taking its former husband's leg clean off. Scott swung his hammer with all the might he could muster as his desperate pleas to Zoe's humanity had been brutally ineffective. The crude attack forced the creature back, but not by much. It dodged the slow weapon and came back around twisting like a snake. Scott managed to break the momentum of the attack with a crude strike from the haft of the sledge's handle but got swiped at again. The glancing contact still took its due from the essence shield. Once it ran out Scott had no illusions, he would be very dead very fast. A series of strikes and counter-strikes flowed back and forth as an impasse measured in heartbeats developed. Scott could not land a solid hit on the demon, its speed was breathtaking and Scott could not match it. The demon could not hurt Scott as long as his shield held. Only one part of that temporary balance, however, was tied to a finite resource. Scott had one thing that he hoped could help, but he needed space. An anxious tremble washed over him as the creature borne out of nightmare charged again, Scott mentally suppressed every primal instinct in his body that told him to flee in the face of an overwhelming predator. It was on top of him like a maelstrom of claws. Flashing pale gold sparks lit the enveloping gloom in quick strobes and heralded the violent damage vicious claws were unleashing on the bubble of power that was fueled by essence that had once been given to Zoe in an act of gentle intimacy, thence returned to its source in a gift, now spent deflecting her remnant's savage, relentless fury. Scott held, forcing himself to override his reflexes, leveraging its bulk with his hammer. He pushed, hard. The creature went flying for a short distance splashing down in the film of water at the tunnel floor giving up a thin spray of murky water, thrown by Scott's maneuver. Scott was reaching into his bag as it coiled again. The demon creature Zoe pounced. Claws outstretched like scythes. Teeth aiming for his neck. Scott held up his greatest weapon. In the darkness lit only by errant beam of light and the residual warm glow of the power protecting Scott a small figurine was held in Scott's dirty hand. A figurine of Ripley and a dead Alien. "ZOE, PLEASE, THIS IS WHAT YOU DIDNT WANT!...PLEASE...don't let it end like this..." The creature seemed to shudder in mid pounce at the revelation. It landed short of Scott and brandished its claws. "hhHISSssssssss," the rasping sound carried in its wake the barest hint of a mournful note. It slashed the water sending up a defensive spray and then turned, and fled. Loping off down the tunnel towards the junction. A hope, a fools hope. For a agonized instant Scott stood there drenched and dripping in foul water, his body reeling from the abuse it had sustained in that moment that seemed to have lasted forever. Without Mirabel's gift he wo