The messengers hadn't lied. When Carlos's funnel cloud came to a swirling rest at the edge of the were-demon realms of Level Five, all howling ceased. Heads lowered, bodies shuddered, and he stared at an old werewolf senator that came out of hiding, his tail between his legs in dog-pack submission. A were-jaguar senator crept forward from the big cat clan and crouched low, holding his breath.
"Your Excellency," the wolfen clan senator said, keeping his head lowered, "we do hope you will forgive the previous... uh... disrespect shown to you while you were a vampire. The tensions between Level Five and Level Six are legendary, but had we known you were being groomed for ultimate descent - I assure you, our response would have been much different."
"Woulda, coulda, shoulda," Carlos said in a bored tone as he stared out into the black forest. Thousands of gleaming yellow eyes stared back at him, unblinking, waiting for his word and his determination of their realm's fate. He walked with his hands behind his back, a cunning smile on his face as he circled the huge werewolf senator and shook his head. Bones from thousands of years of feedings cracked and crunched under his feet like gravel.
"Forgiveness. Hmmm... Don't have it in me," Carlos said, removing his hands from behind his back and staring down at his neatly manicured nails. "Matter of fact, talk of forgiveness down here is considered blasphemy. Am I wrong?"
A collective gasp filtered through the looming, black trees.
The huge beast began to snuffle and whimper. "Sir, yes, but, really, all I am asking for is - "
"Mercy?" Carlos hollered. Then he laughed. "Motherfucker, you are trying my patience."
Wails and sulfuric ash followed Carlos in an angry chimney, the bright red glow of a total inferno helping to jettison his transport to Level Four. "I want that entire level smoked, do you hear me?" Carlos commanded his messenger as they came to the swamplands of the Amanthras. He absently brushed the intermittent rain of maggots off his shoulders and surveyed the bubbling black tars and slithering dampness all around them on Level Four. "If the fire goes out on Five, and the explosions stop, I'm holding every messenger on Six accountable."
Again, his courier was prostrate, shaking his head as hard as his scythe trembled. "Your desire is our every command, sir."
"Good. Then get up off this nasty, slimy shit, and be a man," Carlos said, pure disgust entering him. He snapped his fingers and the wetlands dried into desert region. Immediately, huge black serpentine Amanthras rushed forward, gasping.
"Your Excellency," the presiding member of the Amanthra Congress croaked. "We beseech you - we cannot survive without the liquid slurry of dark dreams and fetid desires."
Carlos watched the body of the huge serpent begin to decay without emotion. Once-gleaming black scales withered and began to peel off the beast, dripping yellow and green acidic blood to the dry ground, as they fell like singed roofing tiles to the hot sand. The gills behind its Volkswagen-size, serpentine head struggled open and then shut in shuddering gasps of agony. Smaller serpents squealed and writhed closer to their leader, until a knot of smoldering demon flesh began to melt in one putrid heap.
"Yo holmes," Carlos said smiling at his messenger. "Ain't these the guys that sided with Fallon Nuit against me and my lady?"
"Yeth, thirrrr," the messenger lisped, his eyes glowing red within his faceless hood. "Traitors."
The huge Amanthra banged its head against the hot sand, and Carlos watched the sand heat go from a low blue glow, to red, to white hot.
"Please..." it croaked, a viper fang dropping off and torching on impact as it hit the sand.
"Turn off the water on Levels Three and Four," Carlos ordered. "Send the wetlands to the f**king ghosts gangs - and let's see how they like their new decor on Levels One and Two. Fuck the terror cells, too. No more dry boulders and canyons for those motherfuckers to hide in. Let the succubae and incubi drown in their own bullshit. Vamanos."
Long agonized wails of pleas and shouts followed him. The word nooooooo still echoed in Carlos's ears as he materialized not far from where his Jeep had been wrecked.
The messenger bowed. "Your instructions will be adhered to with all the resources of our realm, sir."
"Cool," Carlos said, walking away. "Kill the sulfur and take your raggedy ass back from whence it came. Don't come up here unless I call you."
"Sir, your wish is my command. However, do you need protective escort?" The messenger seemed frightened and confused as it stared at Carlos. It began to amass a dark cloud around itself as a precaution in case Carlos's temper flared at the question. "Someone of your stature could be a direct assassination target by the dreaded Light," the entity added in an apologetic, shaky voice.
Carlos hesitated, and held up his hand, making his courier forestall his departure. The two stared at each other. The courier lowered his gaze and waited for instructions. Carlos wasn't angry, just concerned. In truth, he'd never considered that aspect of risk. But then he brushed aside his doubts.
He wasn't worried about the other demon realms, visiting them had told him all he needed to know. They had been sufficiently punked down. Anyway, the Light had sent him back down there to get the book. This was their mission, so why would they smoke him? The book was missing, and like before, he'd come back stronger and with critical information - plus he'd really f**ked up the realms as a show of good faith. They knew the deal. Power was worthless unless one used it, and power always demanded that it be used. He could handle this shit, just like he'd handled everything else before.
True, he'd taken an accidental tumble in the chair he wasn't supposed to sit in, and had gotten a little blood in his mouth, but he also found out the semi-accurate location of the book. So, it was all good. It had to be. If it was topside, with all this new power at his disposal, he could get to it in no time - so what would be the problem?
Carlos yanked on his suit lapels to straighten them and lifted his chin, smoothing his collarless black silk shirt with a cool palm. "Naw, man," he finally said. "I always roll solo, and I don't need no witnesses to the throw down I'm about to lay on my woman."
The entity smiled as a sulfuric plume swirled at the hem of its robe. It cut into the earth with its scythe, creating a ragged fissure that belched black smoke. "As you command, sir. Always as you command."
The Chairman looked out over the pristine, deserted beach that sprawled beyond him like a crystalline white carpet beneath the moon. He'd always loved the Mediterranean, and had forgotten how majestic it was. A clandestine meeting with her, here? He'd already been seduced by her voice from the moment she called.
If she would agree to meet him here like this, alone and unarmed, her potential for getting whatever she wished to extract from him was excellent - even if she didn't need to know that.
He'd worn Greek gladiator armor for her, to suit the occasion. Had she any idea of what she did to him just from a call? He smiled and tried to stem the roiling anticipation that waiting for her produced. He just hoped that the diversions he'd thrown in the searchers' paths would keep his father off his trail at least for the night. But when he didn't immediately see her, it began to occur to him that his father's powers could have produced her call.
Panic swiftly set in. Topside pressures and atmospheric distortions had possibly eroded some of his keen perceptions. He should have known...