The night had been a extended battle as Helmjastad seemed to empty its gates into the desert to strike out at the small group of Mithril operators trying to get a warhead out of the country and to a place where they could safely evac it.
It hadn't been until Sousuke directed them down into the hills that they achieved any sort of a break. It was then that they found a secured location to stop and compare notes for a moment.
And, as Sousuke stepped out of his machine, hidden in the shadow of a rock overhang, he saw their prisoner for the first time. The red marks on his face were unmistakable.
A demon.
"Double check his bonds," Sousuke said immediately.
"Are you about to go on another worry binge, Samurai Boy?" Andy asked.
"Quiet, Andy," Gray said. "Sousuke, do you know something about this?"
Sousuke thought for a moment how to proceed, but he certainly didn't have the authority to make the decision to reveal exactly what the prisoner was.
"The specifics are classified," he said. "I can, however say that he belongs to one of two...organizations that have substantial resources."
"Substantial resources," Bill said. "I've never seen those models they brought in, but they looked like they'd been in mothballs for decades."
"I concur," Sousuke said. "I am also aware of systems in place that would make either side's leadership hesitate to engage in such a risky affair."
He'd heard about the doublet system independently from Chidori-san and Satomi-san, each worried that he might find himself in a fight with a god or demon and end up killing them. He'd reported that to Tessa and gathered from the Captain's response that she'd gotten something similar out of Naiki's mental "babbling".
"In other words, this one's probably off the reservation," Andy said.
"Affirmative," Sousuke noted, looking at the demon with more than a hint of disdain.
Slowly, he noticed the man's eyes fluttering open before they snapped wide and he twisted his head about.
"Humans," he said surprised. "How did you...?"
And so much for classified, Sousuke noted with a sigh.
The Mithril agents looked up at each other for a moment at the man's first word. Gray and Bill looked over toward Sousuke.
"Before you start thinking about trying anything," Sousuke warned pistol out. "I a familiar with members of both your people and the others. If you try anything, you'll regret it."
It was at least half a bluff, since he wasn't sure whether or not he'd recognize or be able to notice every possible ability a demon could manifest, but hopefully it worked.
Of course, if it did, that probably meant a low-class demon.
"Where's MacDanan?" he asked looking about.
"If you're talking about your partner," Andy said. "He was fried when his AS went off like a firecracker."
The demon stared out at them shocked.
"He...died," the man said. "You saw the body?"
"That happens in a fight," Baptiste noted.
"Now, I'm going to ask you a few questions," Bill said. "You're going to answer them. If not, one of my men is going to put you out of our misery."
"You can't do that," the demon protested.
"And why not?" Bill asked.
"If I die, then so will someone else," he said sharply.
"What does that mean?" Andy asked.
"The system I spoke of before," Sousuke noted. "If a member of one group or the other dies, then a kill-signal of some sort is sent to a member of the other. This includes families and civilian support."
"How does a human know about the doublet system," the demon asked.
"I told you, I have encountered individuals on both sides," Sousuke informed him.
"Perhaps you'd like to ask the questions, Sergeant Sagara?" Bill asked a bit irritably.
"My apologies, sir, I did not mean to overstep myself," Sousuke noted.
"Sir, it might be best to have Sagara do the interrogation," Gray noted.
Bill seemed to think about it for a moment, but then turned back toward the captured demon.
"Who are you?" Bill asked.
Sousuke bent down, gun in hand and ready as he started to draw a circle in the ground, another bluff. He knew nothing about seals, aside from the fact that it was what demons and gods did instead of killing to take an opponent out long term. And even that he only knew from overheard snippets of conversation.
Enough to know that there was something to do with circles in a seal.
The action did draw attention, however from the demon, who seemed to look up toward Sousuke a bit concerned. The presence of a human that knew so much about demons and gods was dangerous, there was no telling what this "Sagara" would do.
The demon dropped back into his mind briefly and called up the one spell even low level Rakshasha could cast without words: the calling up of ancestral form.
The scales grew swiftly over his form as his muscles strengthened and the zip ties ripped away from his limbs. The nails lengthened into claws and...a wad of hot lead ripped through his shoulder followed by a rough barrage of physical impacts that tore apart his concentration before he could get his balance.
"I said, you'd regret if you tried anything," Sousuke snapped, bringing his gun to the demon's head. "Drop it."
"You have friends amongst the Gods and Demons, human," the demon said. "You won't risk them by killing me, and I doubt you know any seals."
"I said I was familiar with your people," Sousuke said, dramatically cocking the trigger. "I said nothing about friends."
"Tzelanit," the demon said quickly, shifting back to a bruised human-seeming form. "Demon of Pride, 3rd Class, Rakshasha recruit."
More than a couple of the Mithril soldiers gave Sousuke a long stare as he continued to lean on their apparently inhuman captive.
"And what were you doing here," Bill said, electing not to try and pronounce the name.
"The carapace," Tzelanit said quickly. "We wanted one of your human carapaces."
"What's a Carapace?" Bill asked.
"The machines," the demon noted. "We wanted...to make an impression on the higher ups."
"They wanted either the Arbalest or Gauron's arm-slave," Sousuke concluded, feeling an intense amount of disdain for this demon.
To risk one's own life on such a foolish notion was bad enough, but as a demon, he was risking the lives of a civilian in addition. That was inexcusable.
He stepped up away from the demon and let Andy and Jackson re-secure him, with a few extra zip-ties this time.
"Sergeant!" Bill said, calling Sousuke over. "What's going on, and I don't want to hear 'classified'. We're in a need to know situation now. Tell me about 'demons' and 'gods'."
Sousuke looked around and breathed a deep breath.
"I know only a limited amount," Sousuke said.
"More than I know," Bill said. "Are these things...aliens?"
"Negative," Sousuke said. "Terrestrial, survivors of pre-human civilizations"
"And your relationship?" Bill asked.
"There is...a girl," Sousuke said. "She is a goddess and her sister is half-demon. My regular assignment is as bodyguard to them and one other."
"So, we have non-hostile relations," Bill said.
"For now," Sousuke noted.
"Anything I should know?" the lieutenant asked.
"Gag him," Sousuke suggested.
"Are you afraid he'll cast a spell or something?" Bill asked disdainfully.
"Affirmative," Sousuke noted seriously.
*****
Somewhere between the worlds, a fortress sat at the top of hill in the center of a wide empty plain. One of the few places where servants of Nifelheim and Asgard intermixed freely and worked together on a daily basis.
After the last four thousand years, it was itself almost a completely separate power in the conflict between the two. The original source of demonic and godly defectors and intermarriages, a product of many centuries of daily interaction with the other species, it was certainly a symbol of what Hecate saw as the corruption of her kind.
And when she first thought of taking the system out, so long ago, she'd started to work out a plan to do so. And the first step was building herself a mole.
Which had been a delicate procedure.
It couldn't be a god or goddess, because her plan meant that she'd bee discovered before it was completed. And then they'd check on her associates.
Which had meant turning a demon.
That had been the first time she'd realized she had to work with the other side. It had been a...disgusting...development.
It still was, but now, some thousand years later, here she sat on Earth and waiting. Her mole had only a few more months to finish his task and then she could send her leashed human attack dog in to eliminate the doublet system, and then everything would fall quite literally into place.
She didn't realize that her "leashed attack dog" was accelerating matters yet, and that her mole no longer had a matter of months to finish, but something closer to weeks.