Chapter Text
Buildings towered and stretched higher than any imp used to hope to dream of. They could go higher than the thick layer of smog and disappear on foggy days. It was one of those days.
Some say it blocks the sky so there ain't nothing there.
Ralmun was trying to change that mindset. He couldn't see the sky but it was there and it could be bright on the other side if he could reach it.
Hell was like that. There were opportunities everywhere if an imp knew where to look. Ral was good at looking. Opportunities were easier to find like that. Not easy. Easier. Ral was scrappy enough to make it work.
Need help adjusting the power lines but too scared to be zapped? He's got it handled in less than half an hour.
Want to reorganize the landscape on some shady property but are shit with the mental spacing? Call his number, or his sister's, he'd answer eventually.
Maybe someone needs to get smuggled across a Ring or two to get out of a bind. He knows at least ten guys for a task like that.
Ralmun was the imp for any kind of task. Even if he didn't know how to handle a problem then he'd figure it out and get right back to it. Imps are hardy like that. What wasn't the imp immune to?
There was always something for Ralmun to do.
Like everyone else, Ralmun hated getting caught in spontaneous rain.
Only, it wasn't so spontaneous. Ral knew about it since his aunt nagged him about it, insisted he'd need an umbrella. He took the one they had to go out to keep up the habit of roaming for odd jobs. There was always someone who wanted something and always a fellow imp who needed help.
So it wasn't spontaneous and it wasn't the rain that got to him and all his fellow imps…
Ralmun had his umbrella stolen at the first sight of a drizzle. The sky was getting that touch of it's cloudy— is that the smell of some rain coming on? And so he opened his umbrella then proceeded to have it mugged from him.
Really, he was somewhat grateful he hadn't been beaten with it after.
Some Envy Ring tourist saw the sky and Ral with his slightly in disrepair umbrella and yanked it from him.
Ral tried to shout at the demon but got a whack with his own umbrella before the demon stomped off with his umbrella.
So Ral was taking the streets as they were without his umbrella.
He mumbled to himself in an increasingly agitated manner, "Fuckin' piece of shit weather— fuckin' piece of shit scumbag— asshole umbrella stealer."
He stuffed his hands into his pockets to try to spare himself from the chilly wind and drizzle starting up. Normally, that'd be avoided. Never put your hands in your pockets, his mother, his brothers, his cousins, and every family friend used to say it. It was something of a running gag that started from something morbid.
His uncle got robbed and murdered in the street decades ago. The Rings were plenty different to imps those decades ago. His kids were with him at the time and saw the whole thing. Some Greed Ring demon was snapping his mandibles at them and forcing them to empty their already empty pockets. They didn't have anything so Ral's uncle got stabbed and his kids cried over him as he died.
Apparently that Greed demon kept shouting that he had to have something otherwise why did he have his hands in his pockets. Why are your hands in your damn pockets? Get your hands out of your fucking pockets.
Sometimes those sentences are still said at home. There was a sense of humor behind them if also a reminder to keep your hands out of your pockets. If you had something then don't let on to the fact that you have something and if not then why act like you do?
It also meant to keep your hands available to get scrappy if you had to. Always be ready.
Why are your hands in your damn pockets? Get your hands out of your fucking pockets.
Ralmun took his hands out of his pockets.
He resigned himself to going back home. He'd have to tell his aunt he lost her umbrella. She'd give him an earful as if he wasn't nearing an age where he'd be losing hair. Didn't matter that he was rather attached to his hair, time would tell if he had his grandfather's genes. Not that his grandfather lived long without his hair.
But that's what happens when an imp's brains get blown to bits trying to help someone put away groceries in unfamiliar territory.
Rest in pieces Gramp Mial.
But Ral wasn't going to tell her he got robbed. No reason to bring up his dead uncle in memory. He was in no mood to get a lecture on the parts of the city he was running in as if there was any part of the city that wouldn't have happened in. Maybe next time she wouldn't offer an umbrella and it'd spare him the whole ordeal.
It was a slower day, but he got some work in. Mandy couldn't go in for her shift, her kid was sick and there was no one to look after the little guy who still needed to feed from her so Ral went in Mandy's place for a few hours with the deal that he'd get half the pay and bring her the other half.
It spared her getting fired and got him half a shift's pay.
Ral could have insisted more. He saw it in her eyes with how she was rocking little Ley with sweat going down her brow. She fully expected him to probably even say he'd take the whole shift's pay, but he couldn't do it to her. The sigh of relief when he said half was all the sign he needed to not regret taking more.
Maybe his wallet would complain.
But his heart didn't.
That's all that mattered.
So a shift.
Did some maintenance work on an electrical box outside some Greed demon's business. Almost didn't get paid. Might have threatened the demon with something graphic that would make his mother throw the nearest item if she heard. Got paid.
He fixed a pipe outside. Didn't get paid for that but Old Marlly saw him do it and got him a hot coffee. Her family was doing alright if still worried about her grandson. They were still hoping Bozzun would turn up. He was a troublemaker but he was a good kid. Ral told her he'd keep an eye out and send him back to her if Bozzun turned up then left her in that shop when she said she'd wait out the rain that was coming even when he offered her his umbrella because there hadn't been any rain.
Then he went out looking for something else when clouds started forming and he took his umbrella out. Probably for the best that he didn't give it to Old Marlly.
Pretty much had Hell's skies and some Envy fuck tell him to go the fuck home.
So that's what Ral did.
He went home.
Viscera.
Ral was familiar with it.
It wasn't uncommon to see it when walking on the street.
Sinners in the Pride Ring were messy fuckers plenty of the time. The big ones liked making spectacles of it to make statements. Ral understood that idea all too well.
Making a statement is what killed his grandfather and several family friends.
Ral used too work with it too. Before he was freelance, Ral worked under management for collection and clean-up in Wrath, Lust, Greed— really, all of the Rings but mainly those. It was the kind of clean-up where there wasn't an end to the pieces found.
There had been some of the most vile aftermaths of acts indescribable that him and his team management told him to describe. Map it out, they'd say, as if a scene of a succubus having been dismembered and scattered with feces smeared over her body parts wasn't spelled out enough.
He'd been sent out with his team to clean leftovers of an execution in different courts around Wrath.
Ral wished there'd be a day he'd be sent out to clean up in the main court of Wrath. He'd sickly imagine the day him and his team could be called in for the aftermath of a court case where the fuck deserved it to the fullest.
Imps knew that courtroom was more in their favor than any other place but only if the king himself was there.
Wasn't because any Great Sin could read minds but because the king got out of hibernation and with him was someone looking out for them.
Ralmun remembered his family keeping track of it in the Wrath Ring. They were stuck there, scraping by with the dream of leaving to the Ring of Pride where maybe they'd find some pride for themselves. There was always talk that while that Ring had no real regulations, there were no masters either.
Things changed. They made more money. Ral's family didn't wait to see if things would get better, they all pitched in and even smuggled the little ones—including him—to have cheaper fare for transport.
They did it.
Then more changed after that too.
Things weren't all that better in the Pride Ring. Different, but better would be stretching it. There's bad everywhere. It's only a matter of what kind of bad an imp wants to deal with.
Pride was a place for opportunities. It was a place for second chances. It was a place of sinners and that meant most other demons didn't want to deal with it. They'd leave it alone and that meant imps could get left alone there too.
So, perfect, in other words.
Only it also meant not much attention was given to it. Any trouble had be to handled alone. There was no real authority keeping laws in check. That was only more of a thing in recent years and still shoddy work.
The Rings were changing unlike anything his parents, grandparents, or great grandparents had ever seen. Ralmun got to grow up with the new reality.
Nothing major to him since he grew up with it, but little things changed.
His parents read anything written by Beau and so did Ral.
They used to beat the paper on the table in Wrath saying this bastard won't last another year talking like this. Years passed. Money laws changed. They were able to flee to Pride.
Ral didn't know any better as a teenager and he didn't understand a lot of the fancy words on the paper so he didn't care. His parents still talked about it.
They'd scoff at the new articles but they were always reading them. Ral read some himself and found himself understanding them.
This Beau was a hopeful sort. That's what had his parents scoffing.
The other parts were practical and news. That's what they listened to.
Eventually, if a new article came out then the family and friends would come over so his father could read it out-loud for them. It didn't matter if he stuttered on a word or three when going through it, he'd read it and read it again and they'd all talk about it.
It was something that brought them together.
The thing that his parents scoffed at built them a community.
Beau talked about imps helping imps. He gave examples and it was all common sense but now they had something to point to as a driving force. Imps didn't trust kindness. There was always something to be exchanged or exploited if someone came up. But this was something they could "blame" and say King's orders.
Needed to help Old Marlly stitch her old dresses because her hands were shaky? Well Ral's sister did it and didn't get a coin in payment. She told Old Marlly King's orders for why she was doing it.
His cousins used it when there was a pipe burst in Scrap's scrap store. They fixed it good as new and told Scrap King's orders.
His mom couldn't get enough of it. She'd make his father lunch the night before and say King's orders or would fix the buttons on his shirt and say King's orders. She'd kiss him goodbye and say King's orders.
Imps helping imps.
That idea ran Ralmun's life.
As long as he was helping his neighbors, even if they were Rings away, then that's what it was all about.
Even the viscera was part of that.
Going to those scenes was Ral's way of trying to get imps closure on family and friends who disappeared. It wasn't the hopeful kind of work. He knew he was always working with the dead but being able to give those families closure is what drove him.
If he could help identify dead imps, and sometimes succubi and incubi, then he was helping put an end to the nightmare of wondering what happened for those families. He couldn't fix it and bring the dead back to life but he could start these families on the journey of peace where time could erode away the pain.
But his bosses didn't care about a job done correctly or effectively.
Collect items. Gather information. Get it clean. All per the new regulations the king issued. And then shut the fuck up.
That was the mantra.
They didn't care about why these systems were being set up in the first place. Beau's articles explained it. There was more to it than more "busy work" on behalf of some "imps." But the bosses didn't care about Ralmun's input or better techniques he brought up when facing these scenes. The industry standards were fucked and so were they.
When Ral's contract with them ended after years, he didn't attempt to renew it.
Suddenly, working with the mangled corpses of imps and hearing non-stop calls from imps pleading for help to know if he found a loved one was too much.
Ral went back to the Pride Ring having lost his.
Back to the basics.
Imps helping imps.
It's what he could do.
Ral used to have four sisters.
Now there was one.
His older twin sisters tried working as maids in different places. Seemed like good work. They heard the warnings, but like most imps, the twins figured they'd be more careful than the ones who slipped up and didn't get to go back home. It was good money. Sometimes the money made it worth the stress. They always said so.
One didn't come back home during her designated off-season. They were supposed to have her back home for a season.
Algruth always complained about the rich, annoying fucks. Her and Juzeroth bonded over it when they had their off-seasons together. It was rare for all of them to sit at the table together to laugh at the new stories Alggie and Juz brought home.
But Alggie didn't come home.
They tried getting answers. They tried finding out where she was. Even Mom began begging to have her remains because they all knew Alggie wouldn't be coming back alive.
But she never came back at all.
Mom begged Juz to quit but Juz couldn't. Contracts with those rich assholes was binding for however long someone signed up for and Juz signed up for a decade. Juz hugged them tightly when she left. She didn't want to go back. Out of all of them, Juz took Alggie's disappearance the worst, saying she lost her other half and how she would have rather cut off her own arm to have Alggie back.
Juz didn't come home one off-season either.
They waited in case she was late or kept overdue but she didn't come back.
They went asking like they did for Alggie but they all knew it'd be the same as Alggie.
Testrerith was his younger sister. She was a troublemaker from the start, but she was the baby of the family. She was his favorite. He used to sneak her candy, carry her on his back, and make her promises they would see the Rings together because with his smarts and her smile, they could go anywhere. She could charm anyone. Maybe that's what made it so impossible to imagine why she was attacked.
It was her death that urged Ralmun to work in Wrath, Lust, Greed—anywhere really—as clean-up. With Alggie and Juz gone without a trace and Tes dead, it felt like Ral needed to leave that Ring.
Ral couldn't keep walking around their home seeing Tes' tattered clothes, her scribbled notes on their newspapers, or her old diary he kept under his bed because for some reason he loved to torture himself by reading it.
Mun's gonna get us money and we're gonna try Gluttony's honey. Pa doesn't know about it yet but we'll bring him some too.
Mun's an idiot if he thinks I'm not going to try to paint that shiny rock building in Envy one day. I told him so when we saw it on the cover of an old magazine. That ugly building needs a splash of fun.
"Look out for yourself for no one else will. True enough sentiment but only true if everyone believes it. If you don't look out for others then who will look out for you?" and "Find yourself in what you do and become who you want to be" were my favorite lines this time. Beau's a poet. Alggie says I could tape chalk to a dog's back leg and it'd write better than me, but I think I could be a writer like Beau if I tried.
"Tomorrow is far, but look for it in today." Easy for a sinner to say. He's got all of forever unless an exorcist shanks him, but I'm trying to look at his stuff and he's talking about lighting flames and hearing voices in the past. Sometimes I think he's snorting something I should have, but I think I'm getting him more now.
"Demand. There is no concession without demand. Never has there been a pleasant way to make demands for acknowledgement." Beau doesn't say it but it's in-between the lines that he's saying to kill some motherfuckers. It's basically that. He's talking about dignity and respect but that's only gonna be possible with action! Kill a motherfucker and they pay attention.
It's stupid, but I think I'm gonna try for Mun and I to go to Wrath first. Maybe we can meet Beau. I heard he's there for almost every major case. We could wait outside and try to see him. I have something written up he might like.
One day I'm gonna see all the Rings. Everyone else has been to two and I've only been to one. It's not fair. I'm gonna see them all.
Maybe it was a different form of torturing himself, but when Ral was cleaning up in all the different Rings, he felt like he was cleaning up someone else's Tes.
Each clean up would get the respect it deserved that way.
Besides, it was traveling so part of Tes' dream went with him then stayed in one of those Rings when he went back home.
Sometimes, problems from home were enough to juggle.
It wasn't a warm welcome when he did get back. Ral knew it wouldn't be. He left a note saying he was leaving last he was home. He only sent the sparest of coin back home and didn't know if they got it.
His brother punched him in the jaw then hugged him when helping him back to his feet.
He stayed.
Imps helping imps.
Ralmun stuck to what he knew.
His brother did much of the same except he stuck to mainly taking the jobs that guaranteed pay. Sometimes it was dangerous.
"No more dangerous than the shit you pull, man. At least I'm getting paid for it."
Working with demons who weren't imps wasn't the same.
The occasional—often enough—times Ral did, there was always some shit.
Greed demons always snuck in contracts to fuck an imp over.
Envy demons tried to pin shit on imps any chance they got whether true or not.
Sloth demons never wanted to pay for services they called for.
Lust demons liked being condescending and twisting words on imps.
Pride demons were all snobbish assholes.
Sinners were explosive with no way of predicting their moods.
And Hellhounds never had any money to pay for anything so they weren't paying anyone for shit anytime soon unless the Sin of Gluttony was going to sponsor every single one of the mutts.
That was tough work.
For Ralmun, handling his own family and community was enough. They had a couple hellhounds in their community and they were rough to look out for.
Those articles did say that there was only so much a person could do.
Sometimes Beau had practical words in the hopeful shit.
Sometimes Ralmun wanted to sucker punch the sinner for giving him all these big ideas that he couldn't follow through on.
What was the point of having a changed mindset if the Rings didn't change with it?
What happened to Tes proved that.
"Ral!"
Ralmun shifted in bed. The sheet was half off the bed and he might have been half off the bed himself but he was clinging to sleep.
"Ral!"
A sliver of light cut through the room because the curtains had a cut in them from when Tes tried climbing them then slipped and sliced through fortunately only one part.
"Ralmun!"
Ralmun jolted awake instantly. He tripped over the sheet, face-planting onto the stained carpet. "Satan's ass-crack." He staggered to a stand. "Up! I'm up!" He trudged through the hall and to the kitchen.
"Ralmun!"
"I'm up." He wiped sleep from his eyes as he entered the kitchen.
"Letter," his mom said.
"Mhmm." He sat at the table, sank into one of the seats really. The one that had a wobbly leg.
"Letter for Tes."
Ral sat up. His attention now snapped onto his mom who was holding a clean paper she was crumbling with her tight hold as she read it. She looked near tears. Ral moved to stand but she put her hand on his shoulder to keep him in place.
"Here, baby. It's…" she trailed off, unable to keep going as she handed it to him.
The words were in a fancy script but still legible so Ralmun read it
Testrerith,
Your writings were unfortunately discarded in transit. I had not heard of this and would be none the wiser had someone not informed me of the ill-managed handling of my mail. It's not often something comes addressed to me directly. Fortunately, many of your works were salvaged, and I was able to go through them.
It's always a pleasure to see a fellow artist at work. Quite frankly, I would want to throttle whoever tried to keep these from me and would throttle them again for the pieces lost. At multiple instances, I found myself in a flurry of sensations. No doubt this was your goal..
In my opinion, there is always a need for good writers. I have the strongest ties to Gluttony if you wish for a position right away though your writing mentioned Wrath on multiple occasions. I gather you have family in Wrath, if so, then I can see what can be done if you wish to reside in Wrath. Of course, one often finds themselves attached to home so the Pride Ring may be where you wish to stay. If that is the case there is an office that can be made yours as long as you see fit to run it.
I hope we can meet soon to discuss what you would like to do for your future.
An avid admirer of your work,
Beau
A line curled under his name. It had that same blotted, scratch look to it like his signature in all of his articles.
Ralmun stared.
He read it again.
Then again because he didn't understand.
No.
He understood this was Beau trying to offer his sister her dream job. He got that pretty fucking clear. He could picture Tes squealing and jumping for joy while hugging the letter to her chest and then actually telling them what she did to get Beau himself to be mailing their address.
He understood this was everything Tes would have wanted and more.
He understood it was years too late.
Tes was dead.
Tes' writings— fuck, Ral knew she wrote, knew she loved it since she was a kid, knew she kept it up way passed her diaries— they all knew she went into journalism—little things for their city. They all knew it had to be why she was attacked in the first place.
Tes took her work seriously.
Tes was a kid in Ral's eyes long after she was grown.
Tes. Tes. Tes.
"Ral, you're crushing the paper."
He slammed it on the table and bit his knuckle.
Had she gotten this years ago and went off to Gluttony or maybe gone to work with Beau directly then she wouldn't have—
"Ral…" his mother's hand on his shoulder squeezed him and grounded in place. "Do you know where she kept any of her scribbles?"
They always called them scribbles. Her handwriting was like claws on a page until she got to typing on a busted typewriter Scrap got her for her birthday. King's Orders. Then she used that thing all the time. Sometimes drove them crazy to hear it going off in the middle of the night with her light on.
"Beau might… appreciate them more than we would leaving them to gather dust in a cabinet."
Ral shook his head as he laughed. "And tell him what? She died years ago. You're too fucking late."
"You know that's unfair," she soothed. "This is what she would have wanted."
"She's dead."
"She is." His mom nodded. The same woman who made Tes a plate of food for an entire week after she died, leaving it at the table in Tes' spot as if she'd pop in and sit with them again. "But this mattered to her and it would matter to him too."
He didn't care. Beau didn't know Tes. He didn't…
"This is a chance for her to see the Rings, Ral." Her other hand pet his hair. "You always get worked up about her, but let her have this."
Ral didn't want to let a single piece of her go. "She didn't have copies, Ma."
"Then you make Beau make the copies and we keep the rest. Don't tell me you can't make it happen."
He laughed wetly.
Ral raked a hand over his face then nodded. "I'll write him now."
So he did. Ralmun wrote back to Beau—as weird as that was to say—and a lot came out during it: Tes' passion for writing, her passing, her writing still being holed up at home, her typewriter collecting dust— and he sent it out to the address the letter came from.
Walking that out to have it mailed…
Mailing Beau.
Only his sister would have been daring enough to do it.
Guess it was Ral's turn. He always was the second bravest of his family.
Mandy needed help the following days for her shift. Ley didn't get better overnight and Mandy was still afraid to leave him on his own in someone else's care.
Ralmun handled her shifts for a week, half pay agreement as usual.
After his shift, Old Marlly told him Scrap was having issues in the shop so Ral legged it over there. A couple of sinners were eyeing the place strangely when Ral came in and spoke to Scrap like he would any other day. He noticed Scrap had his rifle ready under his register.
Ral nodded to Scrap to let him know he understood the situation.
"Don't see sinners around here often," he stated as he lit a cigarette. He casually offered the two sinners from his box. Only one took him up on it. "What brings you to Imp City?"
"The scenery," one joked. He had shaggy blue hair and plaid pants. He sucked in a deep breath and held in the smoke before blowing it out.
"Oh yeah?" Ral pretended to take it seriously as he strolled around the store as if he was shopping. He waved his cigarette around. "The city line is to die for, huh? Get a view on a clear night and it's all nightlife. You sinners love that, right? Haven't met a sinner who doesn't love it."
"Depends. You know good clubs around?"
The other sinner grinned a green-toothed grin through mossy-looking hair. "Got any pros?" He chuckled. "The girls here are the perfect height for fun." He gestured to his waist, slightly thrusting in the air.
Ral tried to ignore the fact that Scrap's nieces were playing with chalk right outside his shop, still in their line of sight before they'd go to their mom for lunch.
"Huh…" He nodded to himself then chuckled with them. "Well, we've got the prettiest women, but nightlife is more a Pentagram City thing. Heard sinners know how to party which is why all our girls go there." He motioned with his head to the door. "Sure you'll find what you want there."
"Think we found what we're looking for here," the blue one said while sucking down another breath of smoke.
Ral saw the mossy one look out the window.
The blue one coughed. "Shit, man. The fuck is in these things."
Ral played with his unsmoked cigarette. "Strong shit. You wanna try?" He waved it at the moss one who turned to him from the window, eyed him up and down then yanked the cigarette from him.
He sucked in a lungful of it.
"Strongest shit rolled in Hell," Ral said as he watched the moss sinner blow out a breath into the ceiling.
The blue sinner coughed again. "What the—fuck—man." He rasped.
His friend laughed at him while sucking in another lungful and then blew it into his friends face.
The coughing continued.
The mossy sinner rolled his eyes. "You're such a bitch."
While the blue one coughed, the moss one looked over the counter. "Got any good shit here?"
"Depends," Scrap said. He cleared his throat. "You looking for what I'm selling?"
Moss glanced around. "Got anything behind the counter?"
"If you mean anything to give you a hit then I ain't that kind of shop."
Scrap did have stuff like that, but it wasn't the kind of shit sinners were after. The crazy ones took enough to kill them so they could do it again and again. Imps weren't like that.
Moss nodded. "Everybody's got a price."
The blue one kept coughing.
"Would you quit it?"
But the blue one was starting to claw his throat.
"The fuck are you doing?"
He crashed into the shelf behind him, two shelves collapsed under the pressure and he sank to the floor with trinkets and tools raining over him. They clanged and clattered on the ground with the sinner who thrashed.
Loose cogs and screws went flying, boxes tumbled, something glass broke and shards stuck in the sinner's hand when his hand went flying into a box in an attempt to catch himself.
Then the moss one started hacking.
Ral swore under his breath. He was hoping it'd work on both of them at the same time but that didn't work out. He saw Scrap's nieces take notice. He waved them off and they disappeared from his view in the window.
Moss jerked and coughed then glared at them in a frenzy as he realized his friend coughing and now him wasn't a coincidence. He went for Ral who was closer—he was about to reach for the first thing off a shelf to bash at the sinner—but Scrap swung a pipe at the sinner's crotch. The sinner went down and hacked on the floor while clutching his junk.
Ral stepped over to the moss one, turning the sinner's face to look at him with the tip of his shoe. He grabbed the slightly used cigarette from the sinner and used the sinner's forehead to put it out then packed it away in its box for a later occasion.
A minute passed with the blue one dead and the moss one's eyes going still.
Both dead.
Ral and Scrap took a breath. Scrap wiped his brow with his rag. "Pentagram fuckers. If those sick assholes took another look at Mazzy and Willex— I swear I would—" He groaned.
Ral fidgeted. He took slow breaths to calm himself. There was never any telling if something like that could go worse. Mazzy or Willex could have accidentally come inside. Maybe the sinners would have opened with bullets and Scrap would have been dead before Ral entered the shop. Maybe Ral coming in could have gotten himself killed.
Those sinners could have realized Ralmun wasn't smoking and mention it. They could have not accepted the poisoned cigarette. They could have stopped after one puff which wouldn't do shit to them.
Outside the window was Foblina with a pistol. Scrap waved her to come in. The bell rang when she did.
"Satan's ballsack, Scrap," she exclaimed when she saw the bodies. "Lexi told me a fight broke out."
"Never happened." He flipped the pipe in his hand. "Ended that fast with Ral here." Scrap pointed at him. "Figured you had something planned to stall like that."
"I did." Ral nodded. "King's order."
Foblina pressed her hand to her chest and closed her eyes. She began to laugh in relief until she opened her eyes and saw the bodies again. "Fuck."
Scrap nodded. "Fuck."
They all looked at the bodies.
"You got that spear in the back?"
Scrap nodded again. "I do."
Foblina held a hand to her mouth but didn't say a word to oppose what they were planning.
They all knew sinners could come back unless angelic steel was involved. Scrap specifically kept a piece—a plain spear—for this exact purpose. They didn't want these two coming back with a grudge.
Without a word being spoken between them, Ral knew that he and Scrap didn't stand a chance against prepared sinners.
Robust as imps were, there was something spiteful and sadistic about some sinners especially when they knew they couldn't die. No imp wants to deal with that.
"Take care of the girls."
Foblina nodded silently and left them to it.
There were another couple minutes of silence as the uncomfortable reality of what they'd have to do settled on them. Wordlessly, Scrap grabbed what they needed from the back.
Ral waited and watched the two sinners.
Scrap came back with the spear and some old tarpaulin.
They laid out the tarp and rolled the sinners onto it. Their bodies flopped and gave them a hard time as it was to get them on their backs.
Another minute passed as they built up the courage to do what they had to do.
Ral used to deal with corpses all the time. He saw some of the most vile of scenes creativity could devise. The smell of rotting flesh was potent. Blood is thick and dried blood is a bitch to remove. Burnt hair is distinguishable from any other smell. Death was not foreign.
Killing was.
But it was necessary.
He'd never been on this side of the scene.
Ralmun took the spear from Scrap when he didn't budge from his spot. They didn't have a lot of time. Or maybe they did. Ral didn't know how long it took for a sinner to get back up and he wasn't about to find out with a couple of revengeful ones. Ralmun snatched the spear and held it tightly in his hands. It was a heavy thing, smooth, perfect. Angelic steel from Heaven, the big, bright, glowing ball so far in the sky. Moving it back and forth in his hands in a steadying motion, Ralmun took a slow breath.
Then proceeded to spin it to gather momentum and force the pointed blade down into the blue sinner's neck. The neck burst under the force. Angelic steel sliced through without any issue. It was designed to cut down sinners and it made it easy.
"Fucking fuck." Scrap flinched.
Ralmun twisted the spear to carve a hole in the sinner's neck. Flesh tore and immediately a gush of blood came from the wound.
No coming back.
He pulled the spear out. The sinner's wound made a squelching sound as he tugged it out. Blood oozed out and made a puddle on the tarp.
The other sinner's eyes were still open, unseeing.
Ral opened the moss one's throat in the same way. The blade cut through just as fast. The squish of wet, tearing flesh echoed in the shop. He could have sworn he saw the sinner's hand twitch as he finished it.
No coming back.
He sighed in relief then pulled the spear out. He held it at his side.
Scrap took the spear from him and disappeared into the back. He didn't come back for an hour.
Or it only felt like an hour and he was back in a few minutes.
Ral stared at the dead sinners.
He blinked.
This scene was familiar.
Clean-up. He knew how to do that. It'd be even faster without needing to gather items and collect information on the scene. He already knew how it happened and he wasn't writing any reports for it.
"Grab the edges on that side there. I'll grab here and roll this together for transport."
"Dammit, Ral, we're making a sinner burrito."
He snorted. It fell out of him unwillingly. "You think we could carry this all the way down to Cannibal Town?"
"We'd make a fortune." Scrap joked back.
"What're you buying with your fortune?"
"A new car, man. Mine's been smoking for two years."
His shoulders began to shake as his chuckles rolled out.
They laughed at their awful situation, something about it was the only thing they could do instead of panicking. They rolled the tarp up with the sinners in it. Ral had them clip the edges together so no blood would spill on the floor of Scrap's shop.
Obviously no money was to be made for two dead sinners. Transporting two dead sinners to that Cannibal Town or whatever to Pentagram City was more trouble than it was worth. The likelihood they'd get paid for the trouble and not eaten was slim. Not like they were in that business.
Scrap let Ralmun take his car with the two sinners in the back. Scrap wouldn't have agreed to something where Ralmun would take his car without him but Ral could see it on Scrap that he was shaken up. He didn't want to keep seeing those sinners. Ral knew the dead. Sometimes they were more familiar than the living. There wasn't a question about it when Ral took the keys so he could drive off to the edge of Pentagram City and dump the bodies.
It was hard to do by himself but not having to handle the bodies with care made it easier.
Ral shook the tarp out best he could before rolling it up again and shoving it in the backseat to bring back to Scrap.
It was a long fucking day of driving and trying not to get too close to Pentagram City to get carjacked.
It was night and Ral had barely anything to show for the day being over.
The relief that Scrap's shop was safe was enough. It had to be. His hands shook on the steering wheel.
He returned the car and keys.
He walked home.
He went to bed.