Dark Pink Carnations: Demon Curse

Though half-asleep, Jase sensed the gentle sway of motion. He felt warm and safe and didn't want to open his eyes because he could almost feel the pressure of the bright light that pressed upon his lids. As soon as he pried his eyes open, that light would assail his Optic Nerve with sufficient intensity to cause pain. He tried to coax his mind back into slumber, but it refused to comply. Questions about the swaying motion and other odd sounds shifted his brain into overdrive. His body felt anxious to the point where his muscles twitched.

Then there was the matter of his bladder. Once he awoke, it began a persistent pinging. It wasn't quite an alarm claxon, but if he didn't take care of it, that claxon may well drum all other thoughts from his mind.

Jase was distressingly familiar with all of those reactions. Left with no other choice by his traitorous body, he exposed a sliver of his eyeballs to test the true weight of the light on the other side of his eyelids. Yep, it was definitely bright enough to cause pain. Technically, the eyes possessed no pain receptors, so the feeling was obviously psychosomatic. But they say that your perception is your reality, so, metaphysically speaking, he felt pain regardless of biology. In short, the thrice-damned light hurt. Then he heard something completely out of place. A train whistle.

The sound thrust him bolt upright, and Jase opened his eyes fully. A pair of large, beautiful, light brown eyes that rested in an attractive dark brown, angular face with a broad, flat nose framed by wavy, black, shoulder-length hair gazed into his eyes, almost lovingly. Wonderfully imperfect white teeth gleamed at him as full lips stretched into a wide, welcoming smile that highlighted high cheekbones and deep laugh lines. Apparently, she smiled a lot. Though he couldn't remember anything about her, a part of him hoped he'd been responsible for those smiles.

"Well, it's about time you woke up. I was getting lonely."

A name frustratingly teetered on the edge of Jase's consciousness, right along with a few thousand questions about where he was and how he got there. The train whistle sounded again, and he almost jumped because he remained so focused on the woman before him that nothing else mattered. The woman's name finally chose on which side of his consciousness to fall.

"Wait. I know...Olabisi. Your name's Olabisi."

"I should hope you remember my name, especially after all we've been through."

Olabisi laid her hand on his arm, softened her eyes, and hid her teeth behind a smile that spoke volumes to a part of him she had just awakened. A part he had previously thought long dead, and possibly irrevocably so.

"And what we've shared, Jase."

"I-I'm sorry, but my mind isn't working yet."

"No. I'm sorry. That demon did a number on you before you took them out."

Demon? What demon? Is she crazy?

Before he had a chance to force the words through his lips, his mind cleared enough for his brain to at least partially accept her statement as fact. The details would take a bit to sink in, however. It was like dragging his memory through a tarpit, but perhaps it was best that his mind released the details a little at a time. He still felt off balance, as though a part of him were missing.

That missing piece was Lealu, whose memory rushed in to fill the gap. She'd been his high school crush, no, more than that. Jase had been in love with her, and he'd bungled his opportunity. Two years after graduation, he'd bungled it again when she called him out of the blue to tell him that she'd been in love with him as well. At the time, he rejected her because he was with someone else.

Lealu took her own life, but her spirit came back to save him from a daimona/succubus named Apate, who wanted to use him to trap Lealu's spirit, then collect his soul as a bonus.

As she ascended, Lealu's first parting gift had given him the ability to recognize and slay demons and other outworld creatures.

Okay, that partly explains the demon bit, but why the hell do I hear a train whistle?

Jase swiveled his head and took in his surroundings. He and Olabisi sat in what looked like a private berthing compartment on a train. He searched his slowly unscrolling memory, but he could find no clue as to why they were there.

"Our battle with Tokoloshe was epic, and you protected me from their soul-stealing touch. If you hadn't, they would have killed me. I'm so glad they didn't take you from me, Jase. I don't know..."

Olabisi's words dissolved into soft sobbing. Something told him that she didn't give in to such strong emotions frequently, and the fact that he was the reason for it told him just how much he meant to her. Jase opened his arms, and she flowed into them as though she'd done it a thousand times. Perhaps she had. Jase's memory had not yet fully recovered enough to remember such details.

"I don't have the words to comfort you, Olabisi, but know that I understand your pain. I'm here, and I will be for as long as you need me."

She clung to him more tightly until her tears subsided. Then she pulled back slightly, gazed into his eyes, then kissed his lips ever so lightly. That act helped clear some of the tar from his neurons and freed another portion of his memory, including a little of their history. Without a thought, his hand cupped her cheek, and Olabisi closed her eyes, leaned into it, then covered it with her own.

"Tokoloshe didn't take everything from you then. Good. Because I do need you."

Still unsure of his true feelings for the magnificent woman before him, Jase chose to change the topic rather than delve into a subject for which he was unprepared.

"Tokoloshe. Yes, I remember now. Someone paid a Zulu shaman to conjure them to eliminate an enemy. Once they were done with their prey, they turned on the rest of the villagers, then the shaman, and finally, the one who had him summoned. Then, they came after you."

"Correct. Are you feeling better, love?"

"My brain's slowly waking up, but I'm still fuzzy on how we got on this train."

Olabisi filled in the missing pieces.

An instant before Jase descended Tokoloshe, they cursed both of them. She did her best to counter the curse while Jase performed the banishment, but she only succeeded in dimming its effects. Tokoloshe had been a very powerful demon.

The new revelation seemed to free the remainder of Jase's mind, and memories flowed freely. Too many memories to process at once. His eyes rolled back, then he swayed and fell forward.

Way back in the day, people called it swooning. Supposedly, only women swooned, and it was usually over a man, but sometimes swooning crossed over into fainting when a highly-charged, emotional situation occurred, also possibly due to a man. Of course, men swooned as well, but the misogynists in charge called it a simple brain overload.

Regardless of whether he swooned, fainted, or overloaded, Jase didn't care what you called it. Olabisi wrapped him in strong arms and spoke soft nothings in his ear. He had no idea what she said, but simply the sound of her voice kept him grounded as everything hit him all at once.

Lealu's spirit had saved him three years before and left a field of dark pink carnations in his front yard as a second parting gift. In high school, she used to leave those carnations on Jase's desk twice a week to tell him how much she cared for him, but he thought Lealu was just being a good bestie.

"I gotchu, Jase. I gotchu, just come back to me."

Olabisi's words dimly echoed in his mind, but the past would not be denied.

As far as he knew, the carnations still survived under the ministrations of his roommate and new bestie, Mitchell. No romantic attachments there, though if there ever were a man to whom he would be attracted, Mitch would be that guy.

During one long night of bar-hopping, Mitchell kissed Jase, and surprisingly, Jase kissed back. Until then, he'd never known that Mitch was queer, and while it never went further than that one kiss, Jase found that he was not in the least repulsed by it. In fact, the two of them grew closer because of it.

Mitchell had not come out to Jase before their kiss for fear of losing his friendship. After the kiss, he openly shared that part of his life with Jase. In a way, they were tighter than he and Lealu had ever been.

She sang to him. Olabisi would never earn a living as a singer, but she had a pleasant, soothing voice, and the lyrics kept him grounded in the now while his mind searched the past for a firm foundation on which to build the present.

After the incident with Apate, he and Mitchell repaired the dilapidated house Jase's parents left him and built a tall fence around the backyard. Jase started training with Mitch as his coach. As it turned out, playing a Wizard in D-N-D had its advantages, and Mitchell retained a remarkable amount of information regarding mysticism in general. Jase would not allow the gift Lealu had given him to go to waste. There were other people plagued by demons, and they needed him. After the way Apate and her demonic companion Dolos used him, he had a large debt to repay to all demonkind.

Since there were no demon-slaying training dojos anywhere, and he had no manual on what abilities he possessed nor how to use them, it took Jase over a year to become even remotely proficient. Against Mitch's better judgment, he had gone on a few sojourns before he was ready. Those missions taught him that neither his death nor his failures would save lives or souls. So, after his wounds healed, he went back to a strict training regime. After two more years, Mitchell felt that Jase was ready for a real mission. Tokoloshe had been his first mission.

Abi continued to sing. Before their final conflict with Tokoloshe, Jase had taken her to his house while they prepared for the fight. He and Mitchell had protected their home with several wards and spells. While there, Abi had discovered Jase's notebook of love poems he'd written for Lealu. Instead of being jealous, she put them to music. Abi was definitely a keeper if he didn't drive her away with his stupidity.

I said I'd love you till the end of all time.

But you told me that maybe, one of those days,

During that long, hot summer, time would end,

And I'd find that I never truly loved you at all.

But my love is stronger than time itself,

And time will never end as long as I love you.

Tracking that one demon cost him six months of his life, but he'd gained a companion in the process. Maybe more than just a companion. Olabisi possessed power of her own, but it laid dormant until Jase came to her rescue. It was probably the reason the demon had targeted her. They knew he would come to protect her. The demon council, or whatever ruling system they had, simply underestimated Jase's strength. He wouldn't be so lucky next time, but then he now had Olabisi at his back.

As they worked to maneuver Tokoloshe into a trap, he trained her on how to use her abilities. Somewhere in the process, she fell for him. Jase wasn't sure how he felt about her, and he was honest with Olabisi. She vowed to wait for him until he was ready. Neither of them knew how long it would take, but she refused to walk away. A part of Jase had been very happy about that.

Elements of the present continued to thankfully intrude on the brutal mental reboot.

Jase cared for Olabisi a great deal, but did he love her? Would loving her feel the same as loving Lealu, or would it feel different? Could he even fall in love again?

The night before they sprung the trap on Tokoloshe, Olabisi seduced Jase. To be fair, it didn't take much convincing, not with a woman like her. Jase had not been with anyone in a very long time unless you counted Apate, but she'd been a daimona who'd cast a spell on him. Jase wasn't sure he could or would count that feral, evil beotch as a someone.

Olabisi had been plagued by an Incubus that called themselves Tokoloshe, a mischievous Zulu spirit. They were no devil, though, just a relatively powerful demon with the ability to turn invisible and steal life energy from its victims.

The fight had been so intense and Jase's victory so surprisingly quick that he didn't bother to seal the demon within a pentacle as he initiated the Descension spell. That was an almost life-ending mistake. Tokoloshe lunged at Olabisi in order to steal her life energy, but Jase was fast enough to absorb the spell himself and finish the Descension ritual. Somehow, Jase had repelled most of the Lifesteal at the temporary cost of his memory while descending the demon for all eternity.

Jase's truly horrible, arrhythmic poetry found new life in Olabisi's voice and music. It was enough to keep him grounded as the flood of memories threatened to overload his mind. He felt safe in her arms. Safe enough to be vulnerable and know she wouldn't hold it against him. It was a very good feeling despite the overwhelming flood of memories threatening to send his mind into an endless tailspin.

Unfortunately, descending a demon of Tokoloshe's power took time. They used that time to cast a curse on Jase and Olabisi, but she was able to attenuate it somewhat. Still, the two of them were stuck on some train, somewhere or somewhen, moving toward some unknown destination. It was better than being dead, which Jase was sure was the demon's ultimate goal. He and Olabisi had to find out what was going on before things got even more out of hand. All things considered, their current predicament was much better than death or worse.

Jase's brain reboot ended as abruptly as it had begun. While it answered many questions, it also posed a few more he was not quite ready to handle. Better to stick with the present and deal with the rest as it comes. One thing he was sure of was that he wanted Olabisi in his life. He just didn't know how she fit yet, or if he could fit into hers.

"Where are we going? Do you know?"

"Not at all, Jase. I just know that we haven't stopped since we arrived, and we've passed through three towns so far."

"Three? Did you maybe see their names?"

"No. I saw no signs, especially through that."

She pointed at the translucent window.

"Anyone else on the train?"

"As soon as I awakened, I locked the compartment door, but I've heard no indication that anyone else is on board. I was more concerned with protecting you."

"Believe me, I appreciate you for that."

Jase stood warily, testing his ability to stand but also waiting for his legs to give out or his brain to fog over again. Neither happened. Despite everything, he felt pretty steady on his feet. Jase tested his abilities by lighting his fingertips on fire, then cast a Blink Cantrip to teleport from one side of the compartment to another. Using magic infused him with energy. No issues there either, so he reached a hand out to Olabisi.

"Shall we?"

"You sure, Jase?"

"No, but when has that stopped us?"

"Not very often once I opened your mind to new possibilities."

There was that smile again and the hand on his arm. The one that drew him into bed before the fight and out of his slumber after. Jase grinned in spite of himself.

"We are talking about the train, right?"

"If that's what keeps you in the right frame of mind, then go with it...lover."

The delightful pause between the last two words did not help his focus. Jase slowly opened the sliding door and peered into the gloom of the hallway. It was the first time he had actually looked at his surroundings. All of the windows in their berth and in the hallway were a milky white, as though time had oxidized the outside of the panes into a thin layer of silica. None of them were completely opaque, though it was hard to see details when you peered through their translucency.

The main color theme throughout was cream-colored walls, faux wood framing, and pale taupe carpeting, but the colors seemed muted. The lighting was as stark a white as Jase had ever seen, but the colors struggled to shine through, as though God had turned down the contrast.

Jase looked back at Olabisi, but her black jumpsuit blazed like a bonfire against the muted colors. So did his dark gray tech pants and shirt. Olabisi whispered to him.

"I noticed the colors too. Take care, Jase."

He perused the hallway in both directions but saw no one, so he took one cautious step out of the cabin with the Blink Cantrip ready in his mind. All he had to do with a cantrip was think it, and it would happen. Most cantrips were weak and little more than practical-joke-worthy, but their speed made them an effective defense when you needed a few seconds to collect yourself. Jase stood ready for something to happen. When no trap sprang to meet him, He beckoned Olabisi to join him.

"Which way, Abi."

Most people called her Ola, so Jase, who had never been the go-along-to-get-along type, called her Abi just to spite everyone else. As it turned out, Olabisi liked the nickname because he pronounced it awe-bee, not like the name Abby. Jase never bothered to find out why she liked it so much for one simple reason. She liked it, and that was all that mattered. Okay, technically, those were two reasons.

Abi could hear a flea scratch their butt two hundred paces away on the other side of a brick wall during a hurricane. Jase was not prone to over-exaggeration. It was one of her abilities. Abi never revealed if her super hearing was paranormal or inherited. It didn't matter to him, so he let it go.

She could hear several voices coming from their right, toward the locomotive, but she couldn't tell how many or how far away they were. It appeared that Jase and Abi had to add sound to the list of muted senses they experienced in whatever realm they presently occupied. The couple headed in that direction.

All of the windows on their left showed the same milky white translucence, and the glass doors to their right looked the same, but no numbers adorned them anywhere. If they had to come back to the berthing car, they would have to count doors to return to the compartment they occupied. Fortunately, the hallway in that direction only stretched for another ten meters or so before opening up into a sort of foyer the full width of the car, then ended in a door that likely led to the next car.

Abi took point, using her super hearing to detect any possible surprises, while Jase acted as rear guard. He checked behind them frequently because, for some reason, the hairs on the back of his neck prickled. Normally, that was a warning signal to him, but for the moment, it seemed to be the norm because since he had awakened, they hadn't even thought about laying down and leaving him alone.

Perhaps it was because of the swaying motion of the car, the occasional dull, clickety-clack of the wheels striking track transitions, or the muted sound of the wind outside the milky window glass that set him on edge. Whatever it was, Jase took extra care to watch their backs. It didn't help that a demon's final curse had sent them there, either.

Once they reached the door, Abi pressed her ear to its surface, then held her breath for a few seconds. She looked at Jase, raised her eyebrows, and shrugged her shoulders, then wrapped her fingers around the door latch. Jase nodded to her, so she pressed the latch down, but it didn't move. Abi pulled the latch upward, and the door opened toward them. A horrible stench rushed through the door and forced them back a few steps, but it passed quickly. It smelled like,

"Dead bodies."

"You okay, Abi?"

"I'm fine. I just hate that smell. It's like rotten pork and turned eggs mixed together with a huge dose of sulfur dioxide."

"I'm sorry you even recognize that smell, Abi."

"It's okay. Why do you?"

Jase swiveled his head to check behind them.

"Because of where I grew up. It wasn't a very nice neighborhood. Kind of a Blood in, Blood out situation. What's your story?"

"My family didn't leave Niger until I was ten. What was left of Boko Haram raided villages frequently. They rarely took much and seemed to kill just for the joy of it. We stayed on the move constantly and helped care for the survivors and buried the dead when we could."

"I didn't know that. I'm sorry, Abi."

"I didn't know how you grew up either, Jase. We have much to learn about each other, do we not?"

"It seems as though we both grew up with violence. We have more in common than I thought."

Jase accepted the hand she offered and the quick peck on the lips.

"I'm falling in love with you, you know."

She faced the doorway and took a step toward it before he could respond. Jase looked behind them one more time before Abi dragged him into the next car.

Empty booths and tables loaded with plates of half-eaten food in various stages of decomposition greeted them as they entered what appeared to be the dining car. It owned the same muted cream, faux wood, and taupe decor as the rest of the train, and the translucent windows partially concealed the exterior. Transitions with sconces split the windows along each side of the car. Tall, shadowy shapes that might have been trees rushed past. Perhaps they plowed through a forest, but Jase turned to the more immediate problem.

A host of diners just seemed to have walked away from partially-eaten meals several days before, and whatever staff there might have been never cleaned up. They slowly walked through the miasma toward the door at the other end.

"What about the voices, Abi."

She tilted her head so that one ear faced the door on the other side of the dining car and stood silent for a moment.

"Somehow, the voices seem even farther away than before, but we're heading in the right direction."

"Can you tell what they're saying?"

"I don't know that they're saying anything. It's the same with the colors. Something about this place mutes the sound like it does the colors. I can only hear a little more than a mumble."

Abi paused again about three meters away from the door. Jase added,

"Or groans."

Her wide eyes bored into his, and she tightened the grip on his hand. Abi responded in a voice barely louder than a whisper laced with a mixture of awe and fear.

"You might be right, Jase."

The filtered light from the blighted windows suddenly winked out. They must have entered a tunnel, he hoped.

Abi swam into his arms, and they held each other tightly as the Edison bulbs in the sconces flickered into some semblance of life. There was just enough light to cast ominous shadows around them, and the car swayed enough to set those shadows in motion as though something moved within them.

"Oh, God. I think you are right."

At that moment, the door on the other side of the car burst open, bathing them in an overwhelming, wet, fetid stench followed by what sounded like the moans of the undead as a horde of partially decayed bodies poured through the open doorway and directly toward them.

Though half-asleep, Jase sensed the gentle sway of motion....