Crimson Reborn Ch. 18

As it was officially an incorporated town, Small Creek had a mayor. At the time Lucy imbibed the Crimson, the mayor happened to be Darcy Meadows. Darcy was a middle aged woman, noted for owning a local restaurant, which was all the qualification needed to be mayor for three terms. Darcy had served two already, the highlight of which was opening the annual Christmas parade by blowing a whistle. Those who attended the parade assumed she was a parent of someone in the local high school band or at best assumed her position as a business owner merited the honor. She was elected by a mere seventy-seven votes, but, as her name was the only one on the ballot, it remained a landslide.

Darcy often thought of herself as earthy. She had ruddy cheeks and permanent circles under her eyes that made her look more mysterious than tired. On the contrary, she brimmed with energy, like a buzzing shade flitting through the world. She never married, though she'd come close. His name was Paul, and he was a safe choice, a thing Darcy avoided whenever she could. The two dated in high school. Most called them high school sweethearts, but Darcy knew that wasn't true. She was never sweet on Paul, even if he was sweet on her. Paul gave Darcy some stability and support in the years after their graduation. Despite her lack of feeling, Darcy never saw it as using Paul. For his part of the bargain, he got to have sex with her, which was something no other man or woman could boast. The sex wasn't good, but Paul didn't know any different. That had to count for something, she figured.

She didn't know what became of Paul once he left Small Creek. The only reason he came to her mind at all was because of the hard cock sticking out from the statue standing in front of her. She recognized the face, vaguely, and the eyes seemed eerily lifelike. "You have an interesting choice of artwork for a church sanctuary, pastor."

"As I've said, Darcy, that's not a statue. It's a man." A few feet behind the mayor stood a short man with white hair and a pair of gold rimmed glasses. Darcy thought him ancient, as much a fixture of the town as the old church. Pastor Colin had been around since she was a girl, but if she focused, she could remember him as a young man back then, which would put him a little over sixty. "If you'd come to church more often, you'd recognize him. Pastor Tanner."

The name caused a flicker of memory to become a flame. Of course she knew him. He'd been right alongside her at a dozen charity functions over the past year. Her eyes looked down again, admiring the phallus probing out from the statue. It looked nearly real. Real enough to... "Why's he naked?" She turned away from the statue. More importantly, she turned away from the thoughts of yanking down her skirt and skewering herself on a stone dick. And turning worked, as soon as she looked away, the idea vanished entirely.

Colin sighed and took of his glasses. He squeezed the bridge of his nose. "I've told you. They did this to him."

Darcy matched the old pastor's frustration with her own exasperation. "Oh, right. The demons."

"Explain it then, Darcy. Look at that statue and explain to me why it exists." He gestured wildly to the statue. His whole body rattled with charms. She could see the prayer beads, crosses, saint emblems, and little ichthys symbols. Darcy didn't think half of the charms applied to the pastor's denomination. He noticed her look and smoothed out his composure. "Go on. Tell me how a solid stone man got there, let alone how it exists."

"I don't know," she answered. "In through the door? Yes, it's heavy. Yes, it looks like Tanner. But it is a statue, Colin. You have to appreciate what you're asking me to believe. In one scenario, a bunch of kids or some wacko adult commissions a statue and has it delivered in the dead of night just to make a statement on sexuality in religion. In the other scenario, your co-pastor was turned into a statue by magic. Even then, I'm not sure the goal of doing it." Her thoughts drifted for a second to the hardness of stone and the one exciting part of the statue.

"Where is Tanner then? Or his wife? Where are the customers for your place? Where is my congregation?" Colin looked on the verge of tears, but behind that pleading waited a frustrated anger.

"Again, I can't tell you the goings on of your coworker. As for my downturn in business, that's perfectly explainable. The Hanging Moss is packed every night. Couldn't tell you why, but there's a finite number of people in Small Creek." She bit her lip, "They'll change soon as the wind does, and I'll have customers again."

Colin clenched his hands together and muttered prayers to himself. Darcy waited for a few seconds to be polite. "Are we done? Colin, I came down as a favor. I haven't any idea what this has to do with me. If you're worried about a missing person call the county sheriff."

He grabbed her hand. The old man moved quicker than expected. He pressed some of his charms into her palm. "It's because you are important. You matter. It's why they haven't come for you yet. But they will. Soon. You must resist them, Darcy. Otherwise, everyone will be lost."

She snatched her hand away. The mayor considered several insults, but let them slide off her tongue. Instead, she coated her knife in kindness, "Get some help, Colin. Call it overwork or whatever you like, but see a doctor. The mind is the first thing to go, and we wouldn't want to see you embarrass yourself."

With that, she cast one last look at the statue -- had it changed? Were the eyes always looking up? -- and left the church.

***

Pastor Colin did not linger in the sanctuary after Darcy's departure. He offered a silent prayer for Pastor Tanner's soul and hurried out through the back. He scuttled to his car and locked the door once he was inside. As he glanced in the rear-view mirror, he saw the man in the backseat. He did not swear, for that would have been quite poorly received, but he sucked in a sharp breath that pained his ribs.

"We told you. She would not listen." The man spoke with more than one voice and in a quiet whisper. Still, it pained Colin's ears as much as standing near a jet engine.

"She saw it," he answered, hands against his ears and forehead dipped against the steering wheel. "Even a little preparation is better than nothing. She might resist now. When the demon comes for her. Darcy might know to reject it."

The man-like thing in the backseat rolled its head from one side to the other. As it did, the face changed. When he first saw it, months prior, it reminded Colin of the holograms on souvenir cups popular several decades before. Turn it one way and you saw Batman, turn it another and you saw The Penguin. Haephastael -- the creature, delusion, angel, whatever it was -- had many faces all layered one on top of the other. As the light changed, so did the face. Colin found none of them comforting or divine. "You do not have time," it said.

Colin's head raised at this. "You said I did. You said she was weak. Weaker than others like her. You said I could save everyone."

"Things have changed," he answered. "The demon has gained an ally. But ours is the cause absolute. You will stop her. Or you will be damned like every other soul in this town."

The dread tinged at the tips of Colin's trembling fingers. When Haephastael first came, the angel showed Colin a vision of damnation. No flames, no red devils with pokers -- a black place that was more feeling than physical. "It's not fair," he mumbled.

Haephastael's eye raised. "Fair? You have allowed a demon to take up host in your congregation. You allowed it to spread, unchecked, through your whole town. I would cast you into the pit now and save you the trouble of death. Our Lord certainly does not ask perfection of his mortal pets, but it is rare to find a man of the cloth carrying the magnitude of your failures."

Colin wanted to protest. He hadn't done anything wrong, after all. For his whole life, he worked with the church, bringing people to God. And yet, despite it all, the world around him changed. He wasn't confronted with a battle of wills or brought face to face with a demon to exorcise. He was simply living his life, tending his flock, when the demon was suddenly everywhere. Haephastael had been cruel in that first appearance and left Colin with little more than despair and questions. Colin was instructed to prepare the souls of the redeemed for their test against the demon, and he did. He coached them all in refusing the damnable gifts, in rejecting the advances of carnal thoughts. But it wasn't the demon that came for his sheep, but her minions, wolves among them.

It tested his faith, but not more than Haephastael himself. Colin told himself that the thing sat at the right hand of God. That it was a cold and unfeeling adjudicator of His will. But still, Colin couldn't help but feel like he'd done what he could. Short of being tested by the Red Woman herself.

"There exists now a manifestation of her power," Haephastael continued, "feeble though it might be. Fragile, even moreso. You must break it."

Colin could feel the blood slithering out from his ears. "Why me? Why can't you help?"

Haephastael's faces all filled with scorn and derision. A moment later, he was gone.

The pastor whimpered as he knew what would come next. His knuckles whitened as he gripped the steering wheel. Pain shot through him as muscles seized and neurons fired. In his mind he saw barn and in it a large, red egg.

***

It had been an interesting three days for Lucy. Perhaps the most interesting thing about it was that three days, sunrises and sunsets, had passed. The birth of her egg fixed time, which she found encouraging on the whole. It did bring consternation with it. Her menagerie of demons and minotaurs and other beasties were not accustomed to such well defined parameters of existence. The blur of an endless summer of sex was sliding into focus. Autumn was coming. Leaves withered into colors of gold and brown, the heat finally abated, and everyone was possessed by a new restlessness and larger appetites.

The nights were welcomed, though. Under the comfort of a moonlit sky, their frolicking took on a new, shadowy excitement. Lucy returned again to the small spot outside of her home where she'd first met the shade that turned her into the Crimson Lady. Naked and beautiful in the moonlight, she closed her eyes and surveyed her kingdom.

The town seethed with red. Flickers of light, like small flames, rolled over the familiar roads and twists of Small Creek. Not all had succumbed to Lucy's influence. Many remained in their homes as of yet unchanged by the magic or demonic influence flowing around them. Not to say they were unaffected. Some fucked hard and without much prompt. Others spent their days locked in their rooms masturbating with blank minds. Those would be the ones to fall first. The others continued the charade of their former lives. They went to work not noticing the dozens of empty offices. They went out to eat, eyes glancing over the rutting couple behind the kitchen door. They glugged down delicious milkshakes made with the corrupting cream from a barn full of transformed cows.

The pillars of her world seethed energy and gave stability to her reality, but one pillar was unclaimed. The school had gone. The church was not entirely hers, but mostly. Only City Hall remained, the last vestige of the old reality. It was filled up with the beliefs in stability by all those in Small Creek, even Lucy herself. And to take it would be a contest of wills between herself and the mayor. Darcy's symbolic position mattered an annoying amount. Lucy's gaze settled on the woman. Darcy was at home watching television. At the back of her mind, she thought of shopping online for a personal massager. She'd never had much use of one, but lately, she'd had an itch that needed to be scratched.

The crack of a snapping twig brought Lucy back to the moment. A young man stood ten feet away from her. He held something in his hand, and his eyes widened with fear as Lucy stared at him. Why didn't I know he was there? The man moved, a quick and clumsy lunge forward. The object in his hands thudded into Lucy's body and stuck, hissing against her skin. Her eyes twitched as her pupils darkened red and her commands thundered out through her song.

When she moved, Lucy became a blur. Her hand gripped the polished metal burning into her skin. With a flick of her hand, she pried it free and the metal went cool in her hand as its power fizzled. With her other hand, she grabbed the intruder by his shirt, lifting him up with no effort. He grunted in fear as he looked down at her darkened eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, but she wasn't interested in talking. His head jerked back from the force of her intruding thoughts. He wanted to scream or kick or something, but a song thundered in his head, beautiful and terrible. Through it he heard a demand, SHOW ME WHO SENT YOU.

The young man -- Ben -- sitting in a church, hymnal clutched between his hands. His head is sunk forward in prayer. A voice drones in the pulpit, Pastor Colin. A young woman sits beside him, his fiance, Kylie. The thought flickers and changes. Ben and Kylie again, standing outside in the rain. Lost like the untouched, stepping through the world in a dream. A man appears in front of them, puts a hand on Ben's shoulder, and the world rattles into focus. Everything except the man. The man has too many faces. Haephastael opens his mouth to speak. A flicker in one of the faces, mirth where it shouldn't be. The angel's mouth forms a word as the sound of crashing ships fills the air. A trap.

Lucy withdrew herself from Ben's thoughts. She tossed him down like swatting away a bug. As his body hit the ground, his eyes flashed with pure white. "No...no, you were supposed to see him," the young man whimpered.

The anger inside of Lucy knotted, swirling in her chest before shooting down her limbs. Tendrils of crackling red light shot from her arms and enveloped the man. If he screamed, Lucy did not hear it. Her attention focused on the soul dancing erratically before her. Without care and without hesitation, she stripped away all that Ben was, shaving off segments as though whittling wood. She didn't stop until she found the sliver of silvery light stitched to Ben's existence. Disgusted, she bent her will toward it and wrenched it free, casting it into nothingness. What remained was a tattered and ruined bit of faint light, and its presence fueled her rage. She continued her work filling the sliver's spot with something of her own.

Others arrived. Humphrey and Oliver watched from the nearby shadows. They saw only a flash of light, a screaming body, and their wrathful mistress. In the next second, Lucy regained her composure. "Come here," she ordered. They shuffled forward, for once uneasy about being naked in front of her. Ben remained on the ground, but peered back at them with vacant eyes. He looked maddened, afraid, and ready to strike all in the same instant. "Someone sent an assassin. I want you to send him back. Take him to the house on Sycamore Road near the first big curve. See that he gets inside, and then come home."

"Yes, mistress," they said. Ben lifted easily between the two, legs kicking happily as they carried him away.

***

Kylie knelt bedroom, knees pressed into the hardwood and elbows dug into the foot board as she prayed. The angel had told her that pain would help keep them focused, that it would draw their sin to the surface and not let it corrupt her soul. She whispered in a steady rhythm, breaking only a few times to offer specific prayers for Ben. Her eye opened long enough to look at the clock. It only became reliable in the past few days, but Ben was late.

Their mission began weeks earlier. The angel ordered them to destroy Lucy. If they didn't, they would be damned just as much as all the others in Small Creek. So, the angel gave them power. Power to be hidden until they needed to be caught. And when the demon laid hands on either of them, she would be destroyed by the power of God. Ben devised a plan to stake out the place where they knew the demons often congregated. It was Kylie who decided only one of them should go per night. So if one of the lesser creatures caught them, perhaps the other could still succeed. Kylie didn't know what it would feel like if Ben managed to do it, but the only thing she felt at the moment was growing dread.

A noise stirred her from the vigil. She rose from her aching knees and crossed through the house. She carried one of the blessed crosses with her, ready to repel any of the horrible monsters that plagued the city. Instead, she found the love of her life standing idly in the living room. "Ben? Oh, you scared me."

He turned to her as she moved to embrace him. As her arms pushed around his ribs for a hug, she locked on to his eyes. They weren't pale green, but deep pools of black. No, not black, nothingness. Kylie didn't scream or try to escape, even as the crooked grin spread across Ben's face. She stared into the voids and something pulled at her thoughts. Little by little, the thoughts of prayer or virtue fell into those pits, and from beneath bubbled up the hidden thoughts of lust and want. Kylie pushed her body against Ben, finding a hard lump swollen in his pants. She gasped, tearing her eyes away long enough to look down at her modest dress. With a grunt of frustration, she ripped away her clothes.

Ben remained idle, the nothing inside him happy to have some company with the slivers of Kylie that had already been siphoned off. More would come. She would give it to him happily.

Stripped down and pulling out her tits felt vaguely wrong, but Kylie couldn't remember why. She knelt in front of Ben pleased not to feel pain, but a little bloom of pleasure in her scuffed knees. Her hands moved to his pants, unzipping and pulling them down. Ben didn't protest, only stroked her hair as she fished out his cock. When the throbbing meat popped free of his boxers, she made a wrenching gasp and looked up at those empty eyes. Staring into oblivion, she opened her mouth and took his cock into her lips.

Ben came immediately. Thick globs of black ichor gushed into Kylie's waiting mouth. It tasted bitter, but she slurped it down eagerly, eyes still locked on his. With each spurt of corrupting down her throat, she found his cock taking up more of her mouth. On the other hand, Ben seemed smaller than she thought he should be. His shirt bunched up around his chest. Her neck needed to lower in order to keep his dick in her mouth. He kept pumping into her, gush after gush as his balls emptied, filling her up the gaps in her soul. When it finally slowed, her disappointment was enough to pull her focus from the mesmerizing eyes. As she realized what she'd done, she scrambled back.

Her stomach knotted and writhed. She could hear a song, but it was twisted and distant. "No," she mumbled. "What did I..." Her gaze fell on her naked thighs. Tinges of red had bloomed in her skin. "Oh, no. No, please. God, please hear my prayer." She looked to Ben and her thoughts fluttered with panic.

The tall, young man was gone. In his place, a short, red skinned thing stood pulling off his shirt. Kylie hadn't seen more than two or three dicks in her life, but the red, angry cock bobbing up and down from Ben's body was by far the biggest. And it was at least twice as big as when she'd sucked it minutes ago. A pudgy belly hung over it, round and covered with a thin coat of coarse hair. His head was squashed to match the wide grin. A pair of black horns nudged their way out of an otherwise bald scalp. His hand moved down to his dick and stroked while he made a low laugh.