Potential

Potential

by Pan

Chapter 1

The first thing I noticed when I walked in was that Devlin was at the club.

Again.

Here in Antioch, he's just a regular guy...well, that's not really fair. He stands out, even in this demon-infested city. Devlin always dresses well - sharp suits, nice watch, blindingly white teeth. His smile can charm the paint off walls - I know who he really is and even I've found myself swooning slightly when he aims his attention in my direction.

Not that I'd ever go there, of course. Ew.

My name's Amanda Fell. I'd offer a nickname, but I've never really had one - I didn't really have much time for friends when I was in school, and now that I'm an adult (in inverted commas), not much has changed. So Amanda will have to do.

When I was a girl, I got visited by the Oracles of the Gateway. Freaked my mum right out - that's probably why she bailed. They said that I had the Potential, whatever that meant. I was too young to really understand what was going on, but my parents got the whole run-down, instructions on how to deal with my Potential, what my training entailed...and how I'd learn that I was The One.

The Protector.

See, turns out that Antioch - sleepy-looking town, maybe containing a higher-than-average percentage of eccentrics - is one of the Gateways between our world and the Demon Realm. And for whatever reason, demons always want to pass through, take over the planet and turn it into some kind of weird demon paradise or whatever.

Not all demons, I guess. Devlin seems happy enough just running schemes. I don't know what his end-game is, admittedly; it could be more than just money. That would explain why he keeps coming back here, to the cheapest strip club in town. Either that, or he's got some kind of deal with my boss, Marty.

I'm not a stripper, by the way. Nothing against girls who do, but it's not for me. I wait tables, keep an eye on things. Keep an eye on Devlin.

But yeah, Antioch needs a Protector. And just in case something happens to that Protector, it needs backups - spares.

Girls with the Potential.

So that's me. My parents waited in fear that my Potential would awaken one day, that I'd suddenly be told that the city's fate rested in my hands. At least, they did until Mum left. After that, Dad was suddenly more worried about whether or not he was going to see a pair of tits on any given day, and I don't even know what Mum got up to.

Until I started working here, this was Dad's favorite joint. That's sort of how I got the job in the first place. Marty offered me a job on-stage, but I've seen the trashy types that he ropes into that line of work. They're nice enough to talk to, but they've obviously got no self-respect.

No, I'm just a waitress. Well...waitress slash protection. Quite often when a demon enters a human form, they get a bit overwhelmed by the desires. Marty was disappointed when I turned down a job on the pole, but he quickly saw my worth - if dancers start going missing, then suddenly he's out of business...or worse.

I've never asked what he did before I got here. I don't want to know, and he's certainly better off without me investigating. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't like what I found.

So yeah - I get paid to bus tables and serve behind the bar, but Marty and I both know that I keep my job because of my unique skills.

See, while I don't have the full powers of the Protector, my Potential gave me a few heightened abilities. Strength, speed - it's pretty hard to take me down. Not to mention my ability to sense demons...especially when they're about to do something wicked.

Anyway, Devlin. I think he must be recruiting or something, because he's been in here every night this week, surrounded by teenagers - all eighteen-year old boys, of course - who simultaneously set off my creep-o-meter AND my ability to detect demons.

I don't know why, but when a demon enters the human realm, they almost always take the form of a male. Maybe it's a power thing, maybe it just feels right. Maybe they have genders back home, and for whatever reason, the males are more likely to cross over.

Honestly, I don't know that much about how it all works. See, my Potential was never realized. I never got assigned a Mentor, was never given the whole rundown. I worked out what I could, but there's still a lot of grey areas in my knowledge.

Being the Protector became a bit of an obsession for me, right throughout high school - I guess I never even considered the idea that the current Protector would just...survive.

When I graduated, I looked back and realized that I'd wasted my entire life until that point waiting for something that never came. I never really made any friends, I barely even dated - I think to most of the school I was just "that weird dyke with the muscles" (I'm not gay, but I did spend a lot of time working out, just waiting for it to be my time to beat up demons).

And so after school, I decided it was time to focus. I signed up for college, and I'm halfway through my journalism course. The job at Marty's pays the bills and means I get to flex my demon-hunting muscles every now and again. It's nice, putting all my hours of teenage research to use.

Plus - trust me - there's nothing like beating up a demon to let off steam.

As I approached Devlin's table, one of the teenagers gave me a wolf-whistle. I wanted to roll my eyes, but I forced a smile to appear instead - Marty lets me get away with a lot, but Devlin is a regular, so sometimes I just have to play nice.

He's good tipper, too, so I tried to make the nice look natural.

"Can I get you a drink, boys?"

I expected a lewd comment or two, but everyone at the table waited for Devlin to pull the cigar from his lips and speak.

"When are we going to see you up the stage, girly?"

"When pigs fly," I responded immediately, and Devlin's huge lips slowly curved into a smile.

"I could make that happen," he said, and I rolled my eyes playfully in response. He probably could, too - I don't mind Devlin, if I'm being honest. For a demon, he's not bad.

Well, he's probably bad, but he's at least fun.

"Whisky on the rocks?" I asked, writing down his usual order. I'd been working at Marty's for a bit over a year, and he'd never ordered anything else - a demon of habit, I suppose.

"You got it," he replied in his deep, husky voice, and a shiver ran up my spine.

If I were to ever...well, I wouldn't. Not with a demon. But if I were to, it would be with Devlin.

"The rest of you?"

A few of the teens asked for beers, some of them - in an attempt to impress their new boss - asked for what he was having. One of them, a cute guy with blond hair, ordered a cocktail. One of our best, too. It got him a few boo's, but I wrote it down. Normally Marty's actually quite a stickler for ID, but with demons I know he doesn't care - they're thousands of years old, who really gives a shit whether or not they managed to forge an ID or not. If the police raided the place, it's not like a bunch of demons would let themselves be taken away in cuffs.

As I wandered away, the blond-haired boy checked me out. Again, something I'm more than used to...but for some reason, this time it made me blush.

I shook it off quickly and got back to work. I hadn't slept properly the last few nights, and my reaction was probably more from exhaustion than anything.

The rest of the night passed without incident, right until closing time - I exchanged a few more pleasantries (and snarky comments) with Devlin, and watched as his cohort of rowdy teens slowly got drunker and drunker. I don't know for sure what Devlin does, and I make a point of never asking. He seems happy to keep it professional, and so that's what we do - I bring him drinks, he makes flirty comments and drinks them.

What he does outside of the club is his business. I just hope he doesn't skin babies or anything like that.

Marty seemed on edge that night; I've no idea why. I find it hard to care about anything Marty does. He hands over my pay and that's all I need him to do. At some point he disappeared, leaving me to manage the bar and serve the patrons at the same time. I coped, but I was a bit annoyed at the extra work.

He was probably upstairs, fucking one of the dancers. Lech.

Devlin, ever the gentleman, left me his standard, generous tip, and swooped out. Most of his crew went with him, but a handful remained...including the blond. They moved closer to the stage, tipping the dancers almost as generously as Devlin had tipped me. Whatever racket Devlin ran, it was clearly a well-paying one.

I called for last drinks, and as I took the orders, noticed the blond was missing.

For some reason, this made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. After I brought everyone their drinks, I started sniffing around for him.

It didn't take long for me to sense him - he was upstairs, inside one of the private rooms. Exactly what went on there was another of those areas that I was happy not to know much about...when I'd accepted the job, it was under the condition that I never be expected to wipe down anything other than the bar, and - after I'd threatened to fracture his spine - Marty had stopped asking me.

I guess you could say we had a rocky relationship, though I'd be happier if you never put me, Marty and relationship in the same sentence again.

Standing outside the door, however, I suddenly had a burning desire to know what was happening in there. The blond was inside...and he was no longer in human form.

I didn't hesitate - kicking down the door, I burst inside.

"Freeze!" I cried out, feeling like a cop, the familiar surge of adrenaline pumping through my veins.

In high-school, I'd considered myself a bit of an... amateur demon-hunter, I suppose. I'd stay up late, reading about this or that, and when I thought a demon was up to something, I was truly relentless.

It wasn't until I got suspended for taking out the principal's daughter (who, in my defense, was a demon) that Dad made me cut it out. "Wait until you become the Protector," he said, and so I waited and waited, for a day that never came.

The scene in front of me brought it all back, just like that.

The blond teen had transformed into a bluey-black demon - a type of succubus, if my memory was to be relied upon. He'd clearly cast some kind of thrall onto Misty, one of our strippers. She was looking at him with adoration and awe as he crept closer to her, ready to pounce.

Ready to eat her alive.

Without hesitation, I leaped forward, plunging the corkscrew in my pocket deep into the demon's throat. A thick, black stream of blood began oozing out, mixing with the various other fluids on the floor, and Misty's eyes suddenly focused.

"Jesus!"

"Get out of here, Misty!"

Unfortunately, the demon and I were positioned directly between Misty and her escape. As she tried to squeeze past, she jostled my arm, and a fresh wave of the black goo spurted out, hitting her right in the face.

"Fucking hell," I muttered under my breath, and tried to push the corkscrew deeper into the demon's neck. He seemed to have regained his strength, however, and fought back, making me the second person in twenty seconds to be doused with his thick blood.

He was strong - stronger than I expected - however he was losing steam quickly, and it wasn't long before I was straddled on top of him, screaming at the spluttering dancer to get out.

By the time Marty came up to see what Misty was screaming about, the blond was dead, and I'd managed to wipe off most of the oozing blood off my skin.

"God damn it," Marty muttered. For a second I thought he was angry at me, and I was going to rip him a new one for being so ungrateful, but I took a few deep breaths and realized I was still riled up and that his curse wasn't directed at me. I went to wash myself off and calm down.

When I returned, both Marty and the body were gone. What did he do with it? That's another question I don't want to know the answer to.

I found my boss downstairs, in his office - he leered at me as I entered, no trace of anger remaining. It was like the incident we'd just been through had never happened.

"So how about it?" he asked, and I rolled my eyes. He could have been talking about the demon I'd just killed, about my shift...he could have been talking about any number of things, but we both knew exactly what he meant.

Ever since I'd started working at the club, every shift ended with the same question - Marty asking me when I was going to become a dancer. He'd offered me everything - a pay-rise, my choice of hours. One time he'd even offered me a stake in the club - I admit, that one had almost been tempting.

Aside from the fact that he wanted me (which, as I may have mentioned, was never going to happen) I think Marty really just wanted someone with Potential up on the pole. It would be a niche market, that's for sure - most every demon in town has had their face smacked by the Protector at some point or another, and having me stripping for their entertainment would be a major draw.

But that night, my answer was the same same as it always was:

"Fuck off and die, Marty."

I used to threaten him. Long, detailed threats...threats that we both know I was capable of following through on, but even that hadn't been enough to stop the question. It rankled - it told me exactly what he thought of me (just a Potential with a pair of tits) but clearly the possibility of getting me to dance was enough for him to brave my threats, and so at the end of each shift, I'd grit my teeth and answer the question.

He laughed, as he always did. It was hard to really hurt Marty's feelings - one time I'd seen a stripper break up with him, and call him names that would make even Devlin blush. He'd just shrugged, and immediately started hitting on his newest recruit.

As he cackled, Marty started counting out my pay. Cash, of course - Marty doesn't trust banks. I don't think he trusts anything. He's always got a scheme on the go, and if he had half a brain, I might even be worried about it. Fortunately, he's just a shyster.

I flashed him one of my rare smiles (a genuine one, at that - what can I say? I like money), and left for home.

###

The first thing I noticed when I walked into my apartment was the smell.

Takeout, embarrassingly enough, is my main source of sustenance - when you study full-time and work part-time, it's hard to put the effort into cooking...especially since no matter what I eat, I never gain an inch of fat.

It's a perk of having the Potential.

But I don't have a fridge, and so sometimes I play the game of roulette known as "will this last long enough to be my dinner tomorrow?"

Tonight I lost.

Throwing it out, I was surprised to find an egg in the cupboard - it didn't seem like it was going to kill me, and so I put it on to boil (exciting dinner, I know) and counted up my pay for the night.

That son of a bitch.

Marty's always been sketchy, but he's at least been reliably sketchy. Like I can 100% rely on the fact that as soon as we get a new dancer, he's going to hit on her. I can depend on him firing her if she doesn't sleep with him within a few weeks, and I can always count on the fact that if she goes through with that repulsive act, he'll dump her for the next pretty face.

And hell, I can practically set my watch on the knowledge that he'll hit on me, each and every time he sees me.

But one of those reliable aspects has always been my pay. I don't make much, as a waitress, and I especially don't make much if you take into account my bodyguard duties as well. But it's enough to live on, enough to buy take-out and the occasional egg, apparently, and I get the added bonus of knowing I'm making the world a slightly better place.

Not that Marty's strip club could be a much worse place.

So yeah. Finding Marty suddenly short-changing me, that took me by surprise. I knew that tomorrow, I'd have to kick his ass for it, but I didn't much feel like trekking back over town to deal with it tonight, and I didn't want to go to sleep angry.

Back when I thought I was going to be the Protector, I convinced my parents to sign me up for some martial art classes. Antioch isn't exactly a cultural hub, but there were still a few options - turns out white folk love their kids learning Asian fighting styles.

Thanks to my (super)natural abilities, I mastered them all pretty quickly. Nowadays I barely even use them on the rare occasion I get into a scuffle, but I find them pretty relaxing. Most nights I'll run through a few katas before bed - if I'm particularly worked up, I can spend up to an hour just doing them over and over, the repetitive exactness relaxing me until I can just fall into bed and have a mostly-dreamless sleep.

That night, I was so riled up from the fight (and Marty's cheapness) that after eating one lonely egg, I spent a full 90-minutes doing routines, going through every form I could remember over and over until I finally felt like my mind was clear and my anger was...well, not gone, but definitely postponed.

But when I stripped off and collapsed into my bed, it wasn't a dreamless night that met me.

Quite the opposite.

###

I was on a stage.

I don't think it was the stage at the club - it was too clean, for one. But there were definitely elements of it - I could smell the cigar smoke that's always present at Marty's, the lights looked like they were arranged in the same way, and the whole room had this weird sense of familiarity.

But, unlike Marty's, it was packed.

There were people everywhere. Men, most of them, but peering into the crowd, I could see the occasional woman as well. Some of them were dancers, some of them were old high school friends, but most of them were strangers.

And they were all looking at me.

Stage fright has never really been a factor in my life - I've never really had any interest in performing, but on the few occasions I've had to stand in front of a crowd, I've always been too busy looking out for something suspicious to be nervous.

But standing in front of all those strangers, I was suddenly shy. They were all looking so...expectant. They were here to see me, and I couldn't for the life of me work out why.

And then...I looked down.

I was wearing a tight black top, barely enough to cover my boobs yet somehow managing to push them up. It had a strap on either side, connecting to the collar I suddenly realized I was wearing. My panties were equally revealing - a tiny scrap of fabric, only just preventing me from being completely naked.

My hands were encased in gloves, and my feet were adorned with something similar - black, shiny boots which ended just above my knee, making them by far the part of my outfit that covered the most skin.

I was standing in front of an enormous crowd, almost entirely naked.

And they were waiting for me to start.

A spotlight suddenly hit me, proving without a doubt that I wasn't in Marty's club - he didn't have the setup for a spotlight, let alone the budget to pay someone to operate it. I opened my mouth to try to explain to the impatient crowd that something had gone wrong, that I wasn't meant to be up here...when someone started hissing.

"Hssssss."

It was such a simple, disappointed sound. I squinted, trying to see through the light and through the haze who was voicing their dissent, but I could only see an outline, a silhouette. Whoever it was, they were clearly a male, and there was something strangely familiar about them, but I couldn't make out a face, and soon their hissing was being echoed by the rest of the crowd.

"Hssssss."

"No," I tried to feebly protest, but before I could continue, it was as though someone yanked an invisible leash, and my collar jerked forward. Suddenly I was on my knees, tears welling up in my eyes, looking at the huge crowd, silently begging them not to put me through this...