Through hell - and back

I made some bad decisions on the way through Hell. Looking back, one of them was to wait to be sure that Cerberus stayed sleeping while the rest of the party went out through the dread portal that led from the dog's compound to the open plains of Hell. Getting the whole group safely past the Hellhound was my responsibility, so I made sure I did it right. I'm not sure who had decided that we should split into two separate groups when we did get past the dog but I'd known of the plan before we set out.

I think Cathy was to use her electric oracle to guide Group One to the lair of the Succubitch, where they would secure Percy West and take him to safety. I'd expected them to go straight there from the dog's lair. I'd thought that Group Two were the fighters guarding me through our part of the mission, to locate and kill the Succobitch.

She was my job. I'd offered to do it right at the start, because the Succobitch was a rogue demon. She'd taken a boy called Percy West as a kind of combination of bridegroom and breakfast and, from what I'd seen in a scrying glass, he'd have some interesting memories if he lived through it. But she'd had no right to take him at all. He hadn't invoked her or given any kind of consent. She was working as a nurse and just battened onto a random patient. That's one of the things that the Lore exists to prevent.

I'd had several reasons for taking the gig, not least that I'd wanted the people I mix with in Sunnydale to know what side of the Lore I'm on. Sometimes that matters.

If I couldn't make her burn from guilt I was going to have to call the Famine Winds to strip her of magic and to age and kill her. That's blackly dangerous - and I somehow hadn't mentioned to the group that I hadn't done anything quite like that before. It wouldn't be a standard gig, I'd have to do a lot of singing myself to bring justice upon her. Normally, I just let the music come, but this time I'd worked on the song; the scroll added substantially to the weight of the candy-bag clipped to my belt.

If everything went absolutely right the omens said I should survive all this myself.

Unfortunately, when I left Cerberus' lair I couldn't see the group I belonged with - I was alone on the plains of Hell! Sometimes I think that Humans just aren't reliable. This made so difficult that I wasn't sure what to do, so I made another bad decision and decided to wait. I'd thought Samantha and Stacey were in Group Two - Samantha would have been wearing charms that made her mind all but invisible to me, but I should have been able to sense Stacey. I'd seen no sign of them at all, or of the Countess, but I knew that Joan and Astraeia had been around earlier. I cast the sensing mojo on the friends wave-length for maximum range. Nothing.

That was bad. The only choice was to follow Group One, but I was too far behind now and couldn't even sense them properly as they headed towards the flare that we'd thought was an active volcano. There was no question of smoking on over. Even if I didn't land in the fire or halfway through a wall I'd drain too much mojo and lose the candy that was to keep my energy levels topped up. A fighter was supposed to carry my stuff to give me freedom of movement, because I couldn't teleport with it. If I tried that I'd lose everything from the song-scroll to the Kevlar vest. (There'd been some questions about that and I'd dodged them, but singing something to death is slow. Most of the things that could be done to me while I was doing it were much faster.)

I'd heard questions about why I worried about it and dodged them too. The fact is that sometimes Field Operatives don't come back. I may be functionally immortal but, whether I can be killed or not, I can certainly feel - pleasure and pain both. I tend to go on the principle that, if something manages to rip my lungs out through my rib-cage or something, I'll either die or spend a terribly long time wishing I could.

I was thinking about that (and not realising that I was still only checking for minds with the friends-sense) when something jumped me out of nowhere and took a broad strip out of my forehead! That took me down and its stinking weight was on top of me before I could react. I took one look down a throat ringed with fangs and smoked out by sheer terrified survival instinct!

I came down from much too high onto sharp rocks halfway up a cliff. I was looking down on something that looked like a bad cross between an hyena and a small squid as it ripped its way into the candybag and chewed the contents. As I opened my mouth to sing it some grief I heard voices coming though a crack in the rocks. I'd landed almost on top of a succubae nest. It wasn't the succubitch, but it was certainly her family and I learned rather too much about Percy's disgusting in-laws while I was trying to work myself away from the nest chimney and into a spot above the hyena-thing, as silently as I could. I was afraid that any of them might smell the blood, the forehead gash would not stop bleeding. It was drizzling blood into my eyes continually.

I didn't want to waste energy by casting more illusions, and dropped rocks sent the hyena-beast away without alerting the swarm of other predators chattering in earshot. I picked up my stuff with a sinking feeling. Some candy bars remained. The song-scroll had gone.

The slashes and bruises were starting to hurt; worse, wrenched or torn muscles were stiffening. I couldn't to keep the blood out of my eyes. I was going to have to save as much energy as possible. I'd be lucky if the remaining candy got me through the gig and out. Somewhere out there the Group was trying to get the boy away from the succubitch that I was supposed to kill. I wasn't going to be popular if they took casulties because I wasn't there. I felt a surge of vertigo as I straightened, and realised that one of the missing fighters was supposed to be carrying the soda. I had nothing to drink.

I cast the mojo that hyped up my mind-sense again - and even as I back-tracked to Cerberus' den I could hardly believe what I was sensing