NOVEL WEB 13. In The Spirit Of Fairness
Circe Oratia Sheffield: Heartbeat Zero:
FATALITY!
Alfredo turned around and ran back to the body he had set upon the floor so gingerly just moments ago. He knelt down and shook her shoulder. Breath still released from between her lips, though it became increasingly thin and accompanied by a gurgle. His hand pushed against her chest.
“Hey, hey! Yuh can’t just die to spite me. That ain’t right.”
He stood up and screamed at the top of his booming voice, “Hey, I need a doctor over here, this lady is dyin' here!”
He knelt back down and pushed his hands against his face. They pressed deeply against his skin for a moment.
A breath tried to escape her throat but her body became increasingly pale and clammy. His fingers pressed against her sternum firmly but felt no rhythm. Yet her body shook and her back tensed in a gurgling struggle to breathe. He slapped her cheek.
“C’mon, c’mon, snap out of it. Circe! Circe! Circe!”
Knuckles cracked before fingers interlocked. Alfredo lifted his joined hands with every intention of slamming them full force against her sternum. He stopped himself but still tapped her sternum with enough force. Tha-dump. Panicking wouldn’t help her. He shook his head.
Brute force would only make it worse. A soft giggle was heard behind him. Sharp nails gently raked his shoulder blades as a spaded tail twirled against his skull into the graying hair just above his ear. He intertwined hands into one great ham-fist tensed above the technically already dead woman. A soft laughing whisper blew into his ear.
“Aren’t you going to save her? Too bad, you can’t. But you can break her. Use that strength of yours to smash her sternum into itty bitty pieces. Because that’s what’s going to happen if an oaf like you tries to help. You break everything you touch.”
Those wide-open eyes of the dead woman stared at him accusingly. He lifted his enclosed hands high and aimed for her chest.
An overly enthusiastic voice filled his head.
“Getting along with my coworkers is immpossible, and I think its my fault. Mostly. But once I save enough money, I’m going to open a bookstore, probably somewhere in Kent. I’ll sell novels, post cards, stationary, and souvenirs to tourists. I won’t be rich or anything, but I’m sure I can earn enough to be happy.”
A finger ran along his neck. Then it traced the edges of his outer ear.
“You would have died in the river if you weren’t here, and it’s all her fault.”
His ham fist coiled upwards and above his head and he slammed it down towards Circe’s chest with a battle cry.
“You never paid me back!”
It slowed just above her sternum but the momentum couldn’t be stopped. The ham-fist hit with enough force to cause her back to arch and legs to kick slightly. Tha-dump. He pulled himself back on his hands and knees. Fingers went outstretched on the floor. Tears dripped against his thumb, then landed in drops between his hands.
“Yuh can’t die, yuh never paid me back. I only met yuh once in all my life. None of this should work like any of this ain't workin'! Yuh never paid me back. Circe, do yuh hear me! Yuh can’t just gimme the finger and die like that! Yuh never paid me back! I said get up! Get up! Get up! In duh spirit of fairness, get up please!”
A fist pounded into the unforgiving floor. Forehead smacked down and pressed into the flat surface. He screamed for as long as he had breath. Then he pulled himself up and reached over to close the poor woman’s eyes.
She, in the spirit of fairness, deserved that much.
-----
Behind the beating walls of the cave large were hidden rooms and inside those rooms were large oval glass flasks filling with the liquid solution of raw human emotions. Red liquid bubbled and frothed in secret rooms on all four sides of the cave and a fifth above them. When the liquid reached the top of the flasks, it began to glow brighter to fill the empty rooms with harsh red light. But only a few of the flasks had filled. The mechanism to light the beacon of Azor could not be triggered without a greater sacrifice.
Azoria leaned over the podium and tapped the wood with her index finger as she rested her cheek on her other hand. Red glowing eyes glared between the bull and the empty podium shelf with finger indents crumbling each side.
“They’re not killing one another fast enough. Does this batch think they’re special or something?”
The bull continued cranking out a bass line as its tail turned like a wound gear. Azoria tapped her finger and lowered her eyelids. Mogg-dell had left the cavern, at least for now.
“Ugghhh! I have to do everything myself. No fair.”
Her cheeks puffed out until she heard something at least mildly interesting. A party of five had banded together to challenge her. They had an archer, a fire mage, a damage knight, a tanking knight, and a healer. No need to bother about checking names or powers. She already mostly forgot what she gave them anyway. Some worthless generic trash powers because they were only here to help light the beacon.
How cute. They were planning a strategy to lure her down from the stage but they couldn’t come up with anything. She appeared in the middle of their group. The figure they were watching on stage rolled her eyes and then ducked under the podium.
“Hi!”
They dispersed and took positions around the form that manifested in the center of their group. Azoria stretched, raised her tail, and gave a big yawn. The tank, a fairly muscular guy in jeans and a tank top stood a few inches over six foot tall. The archer, a short girl with sharp eyes and demeaning scowl, bit her knuckle. The damage knight hid behind the taller man. The wizard was ready with a dual cast fireball, his class being one of the few that didn’t need gear to use abilities. And finally, the healer, a young man in his twenties who had been studying medicine or something.
Upon closer examination, Azoria narrowed her eyes. As vanilla as this group was, they had managed to stay out of trouble and were hatching cunning plans against her. it almost felt threatening. Cheeks puffed out as she scanned them. What was she missing here?
“I’ve decided to spare four of you. Please choose who will be sacrificed within, let’s say, five minutes. If you fail to provide a unanimous choice, then I’m going to sacrifice you all to Moggy.”
“Unacceptable!” they shouted in near unison.
The tall man came forward just slightly, “We died together in our van after you stopped us on a mountain side and caused a land slide.”
A finger went to the side of her lip. Her brow furrowed slightly. The tail wrapped around her left leg and poked the top of her bare foot.
“I don’t remember that, that doesn’t sound imaginative at all. Are you sure it wasn’t another succubus demon lord?”
Azoria raised a hand. A small skull with an open mouth burst into flames as hushed high pitch sounds escaped its mouth. The skull clacked its jaws repeatedly as it bobbed up and down while rotating.
The shorter male who had been hiding behind the taller came forward and looked Azoria in the eye.
“We don’t even have weapons or armor lady! How is any of this fair? At least give us a fighting chance.”
Azoria blew a weak raspberry that faded fast as she snapped the fingers of her other hand. The archer found a bow of carved oak in her hand and quiver full of arrows on her back. Fine leather armor appeared over her clothes along with a leather helmet. The tank wore steel plate armor with a steel shield and a short sword to compliment his skills. The other knight wore chain mail armor and found himself holding a large two-handed steel sword. The healer wore full mana-diamond infused carbon alloy armor with joints that allowed for flexibility. The mage received a gnarled wooden staff, a gray robe, and a pointy hat.
The party looked at each other and checked their equipment as Azoria gave them a moment to adjust. The fiery skull continued to bounce as Azoria’s feet sunk into the floor. She shifted her hips and huffed at them.
“Okay, times up, no sacrifice is chosen. In the spirit of fairness, I won’t instantly sacrifice you because that would be mean and you’d probably hold it against me.”
The demon lord continued to sink in the floor. The flat granite hid her body from the chest down as she raised her arm and let the fiery skull bounce and clatter loudly on her palm. One bloodshot eye darted back and forth to glance at each member of the party. Flames puffed outward from the jaw and the goopy hair-like residue clinging to the parietal and occipital bones.
“But since I gave you all that free gear, it’s only fair that you put this cute little guy out of his misery, toodles.”
The last thing to sink under the floor was her hand, which left the flaming skull hovering a few inches as it rolled and bobbed with a clickety-clack of teeth. The group readied themselves, watching it carefully.
Clickety clack, clickety clack, clickety clickety, clickety clack.