A Terrible Fall of Angels (Zaniel Havelock #1)(18)

“Demons are your area, Havoc,” Charleston said. It was his way of asking me for a plan. I had seconds to come up with it. No pressure.

The demon’s deep voice matched the massive chest now as it rumbled, “What the fuck? Wings? I didn’t ask for wings.”

It was the demon’s voice, but the word choice, the cadence of it sounded more like Mark Cookson. He was still in there, but now instead of the demon being inside him, he was inside the demon. That was impossible; humans couldn’t possess demons, it just didn’t work in that direction.

“I warned you that the other humans could impact your desire.” That was the demon. They were both still in there—what in Heaven was going on?

“Oh yeah,” demon Mark said, and even at a bass deep enough to make James Earl Jones proud, the two words sounded uncertain and younger than the body that was trying to stand in the hallway.

One minute he was fighting to get the wings and horns out of the ceiling and walls and the next the wings were gone, and the horns had shrunk by a foot so the demon could move its head without getting stuck in the ceiling.

“That’s better,” demon Mark said, and he stood up, careful to keep his head bent low enough so that the points of his horns aimed our way. The hospital gown sleeves started to split as it stalked toward us, swinging arms that made me think things like movie Thor or the Incredible Hulk.

“Proud of you, boy,” the demon said.

The demon’s face grinned, pleased; they were both still in there. It wasn’t possession—it was a partnership. I stopped worrying that it was impossible and started thinking how to use the impossible in our favor.

I drew my gun and aimed at the center of the biggest chest I’d ever aimed at.

“Demons are bulletproof,” Charleston said.

“Illusions are bulletproof, but illusions don’t get caught in the ceiling,” I said.

He nodded and drew his gun to move up beside me and aim down the hallway. “How solid will it be?”

“Unsure.”

“Then watch your backstop, Havoc, we got civilians on the other side of this beastie.”

“Roger that, boss.”

The uniforms unholstered their guns and said, “Where you want us, Lieutenant?”

“You heard me say watch your backstop and the civvies, right?”

“Yes, sir,” both said.

“If Havoc and I empty our guns, then you move forward and fire while we reload; until then stay back, the hallway’s not that big.”

“Bullets don’t work on demons,” the demon said. There was a ceiling tile stuck on the tip of one of its horns.

“You sure about that?” I asked, and pulled the trigger.





CHAPTER ELEVEN




My bullet hit the demon in the middle of the chest. Charleston’s bullet hit beside mine. The demon lowered its head like a bull charging. We raised our guns as if we’d practiced the move and aimed for the head. If it had been a human-sized target, I wouldn’t have risked it, but the demon’s head was as oversized as the rest of it, bigger than the chest on an average man. I knew I could hit that, and I knew my boss could, too.

What we didn’t think of was that a skull hard enough to hold horns would be harder than normal skull. One of the bullets ricocheted right past us and into the wall. We ducked and I went to one knee. I yelled, “Top of skull is too hard.”

I had time for one more shot, so I aimed at a leg. It was a big enough target to risk taking the shot. If we couldn’t kill it before it reached us, maybe we could bring it down to us.

Charleston was emptying his magazine into the body that he could aim at around the horns and that hard head. I hit the leg because the demon stumbled and slowed down enough for me to have time to shoot it in the foot. I thought, A foot with the horns and claws, it should be a hoof, and just like that it was a hoof. But the other foot was still a foot, and hooves and feet don’t move the same. The demon fell right at us, horns and all. Charleston and the others ran, but I was still kneeling, so I tried to roll out of the way. I almost made it.





CHAPTER TWELVE




The demon fell on me and it was even denser than it looked. The breath was knocked out of me and if it hadn’t raised its torso off me the weight would have slowly suffocated me. I had a second to try to catch my breath as it used one hand to raise its torso off me, its lower body still pinning my legs, and then I felt claws at my stomach.

“I’m going to wear you like a puppet,” the demon growled.

Its talking let me catch my breath and raise my gun. I fired once into its chest; the claws tore my shirt away. “I like to see what I’m doing,” he said.

The other cops were firing into its body and the bullets were hitting it. The demon was too solid to be bulletproof, but it was like shooting a side of beef for all the harm it did. It wasn’t even bleeding.

The demon looked down at me. “I hate guys with great abs,” it growled. I felt the claws start to pierce my skin; I knew better than to look, but I couldn’t help myself.

“Yes, Detective, watch as we tear out all that hard work at the gym.”

I yelled, “God!” and thought, A hand, a hand to match the foot, and the claws vanished, just like the hoof had appeared. It wasn’t possible to change the shape of a spiritual being that easily, not once it had settled into a form, but it had worked anyway. I prayed, Thank you.