Columbine

None of my previous experiences with mages could ever have come close to preparing me for the horror of what came next.

The blonde’s warning came true roughly five minutes later. Her words hadn’t even had time to fully register to me when a band of agents in Demataxt coats raided the lab, tossing people about like confetti, breaking everything in sight. We hadn’t even had time to silence the music and warn anyone when all hell broke loose.

The lab was suddenly filled with the sound of people’s screams and the smashing of bodies against the hard surfaces. I could feel myself becoming paralyzed with fear. It was that moment I’d been so afraid of happening before my eyes, all around me like a disastrous hurricane.

I didn’t know what to do. Run? Hide? My legs had stopped working, so there was no way I could have even if I’d wanted to. And even then, it wasn’t like I could stay hidden very long. I’d be found long before the worst was over. And then I remembered that the blonde had told us not to resist arrest. She had to have known this, too. There was no escape and no possible refuge. Not now.

I saw Charlie grab my arm and pull me to him, as faithful a bodyguard as ever. His grip was like a vice, but I could barely feel it through the veil of fear that had blanketed me all over.

People were running around in all directions, screaming and terrified. I could hear scattered gunshots, as well, but the music somehow softened their sounds, making them mere background noise.

“Columbine!” Charlie yelled into my ear, shaking me to get my attention. I finally looked up at his face, and saw, to my relief, that he looked oddly confident.

“Don’t worry, honey, it’ll all be over in a minute.” He told me, and wrapped his arm around my waist, as if to keep me from leaving. As if I would ever leave a vampire’s side at a time like this. If there was anything I wouldn’t object to now, it was his protection.

I didn’t know where Valentin, Sarah, and Scarlett had gone. I wasn’t about to go looking for them either. I was entirely convinced that at least two of them could handle themselves now.

The music suddenly stopped. A moment later, the screams quieted down, as if in response.

The crowd in the room seemed to have reached a standstill. People were either huddled in corners, against walls, or crouching on the floor to avoid getting shot. Now that the commotion had calmed down, I could clearly see the agents. There had to be two dozen of them, all armed and threatening.

“Quiet!” One of them roared, and I instantly knew that there was no way that this was a mage, let alone even a person. This was a full-blown demon, plain and simple. It was a monster of the worst kind, and there were so many of them standing in the same room as me.

I’d grown used to the concept of Valentin being a half demon, and now that I saw what a demon truly looked like, I realized how stupid I’d been to be afraid of him. Compared to the agents, he was the sweetest person who’d ever lived.

The agent who seemed to be in charge of the rest had yellow, eyes. His mouth was almost abnormally wide, and when he opened it, I could see that instead of teeth, he had fangs. It was just the sort of mouth built for tearing things apart and eating them.

It shocked me when that horrible mouth opened and formed words.

“Columbine Wells and Sarah Crow -- come forward!” The demon roared with lion-like menace.

“Let’s go.” Charlie whispered, and slowly led me forward, his arm around me the whole time. I grabbed onto him for dear life, holding on as hard as I could.

I could see Sarah and Valentin coming up next to us. Scarlett had to have gotten lucky and realized that she didn’t have to give herself up.

As the four of us got closer to the demons, I could hear the crowd, even surrendered as they were, begin to whisper among themselves. Their eyes were turned attentively to the scene of us surrendering to the demon agents, faces alternating between horror and surprise.

I didn’t look at the crowd for much longer, as I got closer and closer to the demons, I couldn’t help but be transfixed. Not all of them had faces as terrible as the leader’s. Some of them looked like…well, just like people. It was almost more frightening when a demon looked so human than when it truly resembled a beast. I’d read somewhere that the more monstrous a demon was at heart, the more horrible it looked. Somehow I couldn’t bring myself to believe that merely looking human made a demon less of a horror.

And then I saw him -- amid the demon faces and black coats, I saw that familiar face. It was Damien.

He was shorter than the others, his face utterly expressionless, but his eyes were fixed on me with the outmost attention. I realized then that Damien had the uncanny ability to communicate with the sheer force of his sight. His gaze seemed to assure me that he’d make sure we’d come to no harm. I didn’t know to what extent he could make good on his promise, but it was all I could count on at this point.

“There’s four.” The demon leader noticed out loud. “We just want the girls.”

“We’re coming with them.” Charlie explained, his tone more serious than I’d ever heard it. He and the demon glared at each other, as if trying to decide if it would be worth it to fight. The demon must have decided against it, realizing that going up against a vampire would be unwise, even for him.

“Very well.” He snapped. “Cuff them.”

All four of us were shortly handcuffed to a demon each. I was fortunate enough to be cuffed to Damien. Charlie, Sarah, and Valentin were cuffed to agents I didn’t recognize. With that, we were led up to the surface. The starlit night was warm, and I felt nausea creep up on me, facilitated by the bath-like atmosphere.

I saw that there was a van parked next to the pyramid. I hadn’t seen a van in years, and the fact that we were going to be riding in one now was only further proof of how high up on the Wanted list we were.

Unlike vans from before the New Era, this one was controlled the same way that the ships were -- by sheer force of will. Ordinary people, or at least those who could afford cars, had an incredibly difficult time driving the new mage-powered cars themselves. That was the only reason I’d almost been runover so many years ago, and the only reason I’d met Valentin in the first place.

It was then that something very important occurred to me: Valentin was under the Demataxt’s jurisdiction! Which brought up the question of what would happen when the mages saw that he’d been in cahoots with wanted criminals. With Asmodeus as his father, it seemed doubtful that he’d be punished like the rest of us. Did that mean he might just be our safety net against execution? But even if he was, there was no way I’d be imprisoned -- or worse -- if I could avoid it.

Damien and I exchanged glances. He still had no expression, he merely looked at me. I swallowed as the van began to move. There had been none of the traditional purring as the key was turned and the engine was awoken. We were just moving, no classic vehicular rules involved.

“In thirty minutes, you’ll be in Demataxt headquarters.” The demon leader said, looking bored now. “I don’t know what’ll happen to you after that, although I do wish you’d try to escape. I’d love a good fight right about now.”

“You know your orders.” Damien spoke up. “We are not to play with these.”

“Trust you to ruin all the fun.” The demon leader snarled. “We wouldn’t hurt them…we’d just chase them around a bit.”

“We were told to bring them straight to headquarters.” Damien repeated.

The demon leader merely smirked in response, and continued to sulk.

I looked at Sarah, who seemed to have turned herself to stone. She was doing her best to ignore the demon she was cuffed to, who was staring intensely at the healthy amount of cleavage her dress had generously left uncovered.

Thirty minutes passed like thirty years, and every second of them was outlined sharply by a fresh spike in my adrenaline level. We were rushing through the villiage, heedless of anyone in our way. Soon I could see the familiar metropolis of Ciaro, the tall buildings not beacons of light, as they would have been before, but enormous, hulking shadows in the night. They were nothing short of sinister as the van cut through to the city’s entrance too quickly for my liking.

As the van flew through the city streets, I could see that there were lanterns aglow in store windows and on apartment balconies. The faint shine of glow sticks spilled just a little out of open doors into the streets, an enduring promise that there were people inside, all much luckier than us.

I’d been through Ciaro for just one day after getting off the boat, until I’d heard about the immigrant villiage that was a few miles off. Naturally, I opted for being around people who spoke English and who I could relate to, but Cairo, too, had seemed to have its perks. But I could not appreciate them at the given moment, what with the speed at which the van was approaching the Demataxt headquarters.

“Before we get out,” the demon leader said, “I’ll just notify you that you are most welcome to try to escape. It’d make for a most fun exercise.”

Before I knew it, the van had halted so abruptly that I all but flew into the seat in front of me, but Damien had grabbed the back of my dress just in time to stop me from getting a concussion. No one else had been given the same treatment, and Sarah was now nursing a pain in her head.

“Everybody out!” The demon leader commanded, and the van’s doors slid open. I felt myself go dizzy, and it was becoming difficult to breathe. Damien clasped my hand, and I forced myself to remember that as long as he was there, I’d be at least reasonably safe.

We piled out of the van, and found ourselves truly in front of Demataxt headquarters. It was, by far, the brightest building in the city. The amount of light shining from the windows was incomparable to any other building.

There was another group of agents waiting at the door, coats hanging authoritatively from their shoulders. I took a deep breath and involuntarily tightened my grip on Damien’s hand. I hoped that none of the other agents would notice it.

“Commendable!” One of the agents exclaimed. “This is excellent.”

“Can we go now?” The demon leader snapped.

“Yes, yes, whatever you want.” The agent said absentmindedly, staring at us like we were some sort of prize. Suddenly his gaze froze on me.

“Is this Columbine Wells?” He asked.

“Yeah.” The demon said.

The mage walked up to me. I could feel my spine turn to ice with every step he took toward me, his face alight with wonder. It almost screamed when he took my hand and held it to his chest.

His expression fell a little after a moment.

“I don’t sense anything.” He complained. “Are you sure this is her?”

“Positive.” The demon snapped.

“Then why does she feel just like a human?” The mage asked, letting go of my hand.

“Maybe because she is a human.” The demon tilted his head, as if mocking the mage for being so stupid.

“No human can do what Campbell has described.” The mage shook his head. “There’s nothing the least bit extraordinary about her. If there was, I’d have sensed it.”

For one pulsating moment, I almost believed that they’d let me go. Indeed, why waste time on an ordinary human? That entire avenue of possibility was founded solely on the slim, slim chance that they wouldn’t test me the old-fashioned way and just take a knife to me, like Doc had.

“It’s no matter.” The mage concluded after a moment of consideration. “Human or not, they are still criminals, and need to be dealt with.”

We were taken inside the building, which reached twelve stories high and seemed to span an entire square mile over the ground. At first, I could barely look around, but seeing the Demataxt nest was almost like looking at a car crash. After a while, I just couldn’t hold back.

There were agents hard at work in cubicles, filling out papers. There were teams of mages being sent out for duty, agents bringing in the catch of the day, a few out-of-place people doing janitorial duties. They certainly didn’t look evil, but I knew they were. The way mages acted in headquarters and the way they acted outside differed greatly in both civility and general morality.

We were led into into a meeting room, almost entirely filled by a circular table, at which sat several dozen people, some in suits and ties, some in uniform. They each had a file open before them, and when we came in, they looked up, eyes ablaze with interest.

I gasped when I saw that Doc was one of them, a smug smile on his face as he looked at me. How had he managed to escape the FFH? I’d been assured that every rogue FFH member had been dealt with! Had Doc somehow managed to worm his way out of something that had seemed so foolproof?

“That’s them, all right.” He announced.

“Valentin?” One of the agents exclaimed. Suddenly every pair of eyes was on Valentin, and it seemed that true shock had colored every one of them.

“What on earth are you doing here?” The mage asked.

“I am as guilty as any of them are.” He said somberly, no sign of fear or even worry in his voice. It was simply matter-of-fact statement.

“But how can this be?” The mage asked, looking horrified.

“If you’ll recall, I never promised to follow Demataxt code of conduct.” He said.

“So you’re part of a terrorist group now?” The mage shook his head. “I know you’ve always been a difficulty for us, but for god’s sake, you’re an adult now!”

“And that should be proof of how serious I am.” Valentin said.

“How could you disgrace us like this!” The mage stood up, sounding more and more horrified by the moment. “Have you forgotten who you are? Who your father is?”

“As if I could, you’re so consistent in reminding me of it.” Valentin said.

The mage shook his head and massaged his temples. He took off his glasses and wiped them with a hanky that he’d been keeping in the inside pocket of his suit.

“I don’t know why I keep trying.” He sighed. “And what do you propose I tell your father this time?”

“Tell him whatever you want.” Valentin said.

“And do you suppose he’ll be pleased? Do you suppose he’ll stand up for you this time?” The mage asked.

“I’d be perfectly happy if he stayed out of my affairs and did absolutely nothing.” Valentin said. “Why everyone here believes I need his assistance it something I don’t entirely comprehend.”

I’d never heard him talk like this. His tone was nothing short of despicable, and yet a room full of agents weren’t doing anything to reprimand him. From what I’d understood, it was due more to his father’s interference than to anything else.

“We’ll talk in depth later.” The mage sighed, finally sitting back down. “For the moment, we need to focus on the individual we have gathered here to assess.”

He looked down at the file before him, and then his gaze locked directly onto me.

“Is your name Columbine Wells, miss?” He asked.

I opened my mouth, but couldn’t bring myself to answer. Every pair of eyes in the room was on me, and I realized that getting up on a stage in front of the entire Blood Bank had been a cakewalk compared to this.

“I am Maximillion Greenley.” The mage said, as if to facilitate the introduction. I didn’t bother telling him that I had absolutely no intention of getting to know him, or anyone else in the room.

“I’ll repeat the question: are you Columbine Wells?” Maximillion Greenley said.

I finally brough myself to nod.

“And is what I’ve heard true, Miss Wells?” He asked.

“Depends.” I finally choked.

“Depends on what?” He asked.

“On what you’ve heard.” I could feel my voice becoming smaller and smaller.

Maximillion Greenley looked down at the file in front of him again.

“According to various reports,” he cleared his throat, “you have a singular talent. I’ve been told that your blood plays music.”

My heart was in my throat now. I’d envision a scene like this ever since I’d discovered the same thing that Maximillion Greenley just had, and every time I’d gone over it in my head, I’d felt nothing but the purest terror. Now that the scene of my nightmares was being realized before my eyes, the terror was ten times what it had been in my imagination.

“Is this true?” Maximillion Greenley asked.

“Just test her already!” Doc suddenly spoke up. “I don’t see why you need to bother with questions.”

“Despite what you may think,” Maximillion Greenley said to Doc with some contempt in his voice, “we are not entirely uncivilized. Such crude procedures may be acceptable for the field agents, but the administrative offices never break procedure in such a fashion.”

“You tell yourself that.” Doc muttered. “In the meantime, we are wasting time with formalities.”

“You just want your fucking reward as soon as possible!” I suddenly yelled at Doc, before I had realized what I was doing.

“Well, that too.” Doc grinned.

Anger lashed at the base of my stomach, and I wanted more than anything to hurt the bastard that was responsible for my capture. He didn’t even have the decency to pretend he wasn’t just a greedy son of a bitch.

“Please answer the question, Miss Wells.” Maximillion Greenley said. “Is it true that your blood plays music?”

“And what if it doesn’t?” I asked. Maximillion seemed startled by the question.

“Well, you’d be dealt with as a witch’s familiar.” He said.

“And if it does?” I asked.

“Then you’d be held for questioning. So would your accomplices.” He said.

“Then it’s true.” I said. “Cut me open if you don’t believe me.”

“Oh, there’s no need for cutting you open, Miss Wells. We’re not entirely barbaric in these matters.” Maximillion said.

“You could have fooled me.” I said, still angry.

“We’ll simply take a small blood sample through a needle. If the rumors prove true, then we’ll have to determine what to do next.” Maximillion said.

“Finally!” Doc exclaimed, clapping his hands.

My fear had transformed into an odd sort of determination. It had occurred to me that it was almost entirely up to me to stretch out our time in Demataxt headquarters as far as possible, giving Damien and his friends time to come up with a plan to get us out.

“Take Miss Wells to the clinic.” Maximillion Greenley said to Damien. “Take Valentin to my office, and leave the other two here.”

I almost screamed at the prospect of separation from the others, but managed to hold myself back. At least I had Damien by my side, and that would just have to be good enough.

I tried my best to believe it would all work out as Damien led me to the clinic, accompanied by one of the mages in suits. I trembled the whole way.