Page 159 of Huntress

“They make the compound look like a decent work environment by comparison. Sam has an anger problem. Guys like him never make it far up the ranks. They’re spotted early on and held back by their inability to self-regulate and use their brains.”

They fell silent as the smell hit them. The room they’d entered was a huge rectangle, lit by yellowed lights high above, casting a sickly glow over the white-painted concrete bricks of hundreds of containment cells. It had four wide alleys with rough concrete floors, and each alley had cells on either side.

Elsie took the alley on the far left, steeling herself for what they might find. She approached the first cell, stretching on her toes to look through the thick, magic-proof glass set inside a heavy iron door.

Inside, a barefoot demon in gray scrubs curled up as close to the far back corner as his bindings would allow. His feet were shackled separately, heavy chains attaching each to a hook welded into the center of the floor. His head had been shaved, and there were still healing scars where someone had cut into his skull. He looked up at Elsie, a mixture of fear and subdued rage in his eyes.

She backed away, unable to look at Saint. She couldn’t face him after seeing this.

Next to the door was a whiteboard.

Subject 1809: Siren

Implantation successful

Scheduled for move to Worldbase 1

“What the fuck is Worldbase One?” she asked, but Saint had already moved across the alley to the captive across from the siren.

They moved silently from cell to cell, reading their information and taking a quick look at the demons inside. Each demon they saw either pretended not to know they were there, or looked at them with haunted eyes that begged them to leave.

Elsie paused long enough at one of the cells to draw Saint’s attention. Inside was a demon she didn’t recognize. Small and stuck in her half-form, she’d been adorable before they’d brought her here. She had little round ears and a stubby tail, both covered in brown fur. Dreadfully thin, she had loose skin, as though she’d rapidly lost weight. Her skin was pallid, and she lay painfully still.

She checked the whiteboard.

Subject 1843: Groundhog

Fusion Unsuccessful

Strong earth magic

Potential remains for DNA harvesting.

“Is she dead?” Elsie asked as Saint looked through the glass.

“Yeah, I think so,” he answered her unfinished question. Elsie crossed her arms over her chest and paced away, coming back to look one more time, tears stinging her eyes.

“Why would they leave her like this?”

“They probably don’t know yet.” He gazed down at her gently. “Be strong now. You can react later, when we’re alone, and it’s safe.”

After they’d each checked ten cells, another alley ran between all the others, sectioning every row into two. The cells in the back of their current alley were empty. They moved up and down the remaining three alleys, finding all sorts of atrocities, but nothing that gave them the proof they were looking for.

Elsie ached to set them free, but it would accomplish nothing. The facility was locked tight, and she had no idea how to get back to the surface. Her shoulders hunched and her steps slowed to a shuffle as they made their way back to where they’d started.

A fleet of men in dark blue jumpers occupied the main area when Elsie and Saint returned. They had bags of power tools and boxes of electronics.

“We’ve been at it non-stop since last month’s elopement,” one of the guys was saying to Powell. Elsie’s ears perked up.

“What’s that got to do with us? They didn’t get out on their own, someone let them out. They just so happened to escape while we were out for a security briefing?” Powell stressed. “There’s no other way.”

He spotted Saint. “Hey! You find what you wanted?”

“No, we asked for available specimens,” Elsie scoffed. “Those are all in recovery.”

“Those are the available specimens. What are you, new? Who even are you?” He grabbed a spiral-bound book. “Fuckin’ Sam. He didn’t get you in the logbook.”

“Does it matter? There’s nothing in there we can use.” Elsie approached the desk. She took the logbook and filled in the information on her stolen card. “Tell Sam that if he wants to talk shit, he’d better make sure the offerings are alive. How long has Subject 1843 been dead? She was already in full rigor when we got in there.”