Chapter 124
-James-
The city always looked different at dawn. Not gentler but more restless, the way a fighter looks after twelve rounds in the ring, shoulders hunched but still daring you to take the next swing. Broken but not defeated. That morning, stepping out with the others, my vision was drawn to the cracks in the street, the boarded-up windows, and the spray-painted demands on the walls, and I thought, "This city doesn't know how close it is to collapsing entirely."
We gathered our things and set out at the first break of dawn. We moved together through the shadows, keeping aware.
Even with sleep, we were still tired, held only together by some stitches, and hungry for answers. The city waited, indifferent and dangerous. Stepping out in the morning, carrying the weight but still clinging to a stubborn, ridiculous hope of what we still might save.
I moved toward the back, eyes searching, mind working as it usually did—counting patterns, analyzing angles, and observing faces. Everyone else, except Micah, appeared to be half-dead on their feet. She had that tenacious optimism that generally resulted in either miracles or injuries.
We couldn't afford to get hurt without Becky, our group's healer. Nor did we want to risk losing any more members. Not to mention, without her edge over time itself, where do we limp, blindfolded, into the lion's mouth?
Micah slowed first. "It's started already."
I didn't reply. My brain was busy, strategizing the crowds like a chessboard game. Something about the timing was off. Protests don't swell like this this early. The sun has even fought to burn through the fog of kicked-up dust. Too many people, too fast. Energy in the crowd was taut. Jittery, almost manufactured in some places.
"James?" Micah's voice pulled me back to our reality.
"Mm," I adjusted my bag's strap grip across my chest. "That crowd didn't get out of bed on its own. Someone gave them a push."
"They are angrier than yesterday, too. Crowds don't multiply naturally like this."
I nodded at the cluster of uniforms half-visible near the steps of city hall. "And the cops are already lined up waiting. That's not a protest forming. That's a trap being baited."
Micah's mouth tightened. She didn't argue, which meant she saw it too...
We should have kept moving and headed towards the lead about the construction worker, but none of us did. It was impossible to ignore what was boiling in front of us.
The crowd surged louder and louder as we drew closer. "No justice, no peace!" they kept repeating, voices thundering, fists pumping the air—signs bobbed with their protest. Most of the faces were exhausted and grief-ridden, but there was a dangerous edge threading through them—like a match about to kiss gasoline.
And then I saw him.
The chief. A squatting man with much self-importance for his frame. He shouldn't have really stood out—just another uniform there on the line—but my stomach went cold with a sharp tightness. His stance was wrong. Too steady, too still, like a puppet waiting to pull the following string in his act.
He raised a megaphone, and the sound that came out sent an invasive, slimy shiver sinking into my skin.
"Disperse immediately," he ordered, but the words carried something more—an undertow, a hook dragging at people's nerves.
The crowd flinched. Some shouted back. Some froze. Some turned wild-eyed toward each other as if suddenly convinced their neighbors were enemies.
I knew it then: a demon. The kind that didn't need claws or firepower. This one bent willpower like a steel wire around people's throats. A 'controller,' one that could possess others like a character in a video game.
Chaos ignited in seconds.
Angry words turned into hostile actions. Someone threw an aluminum water bottle. Shouts turned to screams. The line of officers surged forward, shields banging. Protesters shoved back. Tear gas popped off, white smoke blooming across the streets.
Micah shoved through from behind me, barging into the protesters, face red, eyes welling up, trying to fight back emotion. I caught her arm trying to pull her back, and she tried to push forward again—of course, she did—but I grabbed her and took her behind me.
"Micah, don't do something reckless." "I snapped," not meaning to worry, caught in my throat. Something about Micah evoked emotions in me, causing this once emotionless vessel to freeze. "You will get trampled." My voice eased as I took a deep breath.
She yanked free, chin turned with fire in her eyes. Once she's like this, there is no stopping her. "That's my nephew!"
My gaze snapped to where she was looking. A boy—maybe fifteen—pressed against the wall, a bit of blood on his chest, unsure if it was his own or someone else's. Two officers were closing in on him. Wrong place and wrong time, or maybe the right place, depending on what the demon was planning and wanted.
"Josh shouted, 'I got an opening!'" Having faced the Phoenix demon before, he recognized the boy Micah mentioned as the nephew her uncle had adopted.
Micah didn't hesitate. She bolted through the opening Josh found.
"Dang it," I swore under my breath, no plan, no strategy, but I followed behind her heels. To keep her safe. One overly emotional, big-hearted knucklehead to stabilize my cold, emotionless, slow-to-move big brain.
What a duo we were, I thought to myself.
The people swelled around, crashing into us as we made our way through. Our opening was short-lived. I ducked under an elbow and shoved my way past a shield. Eyes locked on Micah's braid that whipped through the smoke. She reached the boy just as one of the officers grabbed his arm.
"Stop!" She shouted, shoving herself between them.
The officer paused for a second. His face was blank, his eyes were glassy, and he was controlled. He shoved her back hard enough that she hit the wall beside the boy. She shook her head as she hit the ground. But still conscious.
That was enough for me. I shoved my shoulder into him, catching him off balance. He hit the ground, and his gas mask was barely hanging on his face.
The second officer lunged, but I was already moving. Calculations fired in my head—angles, force, probability. My fist connected with his stomach, and he folded. I never really hit another human being, only demons, with my weapons.
"Go," I barked at Micah. She dragged her nephew tight against her, shielding him with her own body.
The air chilled, and sudden, crushing silence fell over everything.
The chief stepped forward through the haze, megaphone discarded. His eyes weren't human anymore—obenian marbles swirling with deep hunger.
"Submit," he said, and the word cracked in the atmosphere like a whip.
Half the crowd dropped to their knees, clutching their heads. The other half screamed.
Micah gasped. "It's—"
"A demon," I finished for her, jaw clenched.
The thing smiled, fangs hiding on the sides, sharp. "Obedience," she purred, voice dripping like oil. 'Order through fear. Peace through chains as he spoke.'
I felt its pull calling me in like a cold finger scraping at the edges of my mind. It wanted me to bow and remain silent and empty. But I bent too much, too many times, to the authority that chained me with its control. Logic fought, and reasoning anchored me in place. I didn't need whispers or visions to see the patterns; it was trying to shatter us.
"Not today," I muttered. I closed my eyes for a second, regaining composure.
When I looked up, Micah was there by his side, his eyes dead but red like when the demon used to hold her captive, but this time dead and zombified. As though the darkness whispered from the depths of inside her, chaining her back once again. A small tear slid down her face as she stood beside the chief and his officers—a band of both civilians and actual peacekeepers from around our town.