June 1, 1988
Crowne Plaza Airport Hotel
Room 409
11228 Lone Eagle Dr
Bridgeton, MO
Pam returns with the other half of the Scarab suit and Olympian to her hotel room to meet up with Albert Dinesen. “How exactly is this going to work?” Olympian asks after a quick introduction to the Demon Hunter.
“As simply as this,” Albert Dinesen answers, reaching out the tuning fork in his hand to strike it on the chunk of crushed metal that Olympian holds in his hands.
Olympian feels no vibration on the remains of the ship that brought him to Earth decades ago. All that is perceived is a high pitch ringing. “What will that do?” Olympian questions.
“That,” Pam says pointing as the black crumbs that spill out of the bottom of the hunk of metal. Olympian reaches out his arm to prevent the mess from hitting his feet. Pam giggles at his reaction. “No need to worry, they don’t want you.” The black crumbs hit the floor but continued to move right out the window that Albert had opened.
“What the hell?” Olympian exclaims. “Is that stuff alive?”
“Not in the way you are accustomed,” Albert explains. “Both of the halves are clean now, I need only go to where we have hidden the demon to banish it.”
“That means we can go back to the Mad-scientist’s compound,” Pam tells Olympian.
Dr. Bybo’s secret lab
Taum Sauk Mountains
Arcadia Township, MO
Olympian and Pam arrive at the helicopter access on the top of the mountain that she entered through previously. Finding this place again from the air was much easier and quicker then her first trip. Landing on the rim of the camouflaged metal plate in the ground Pam is surprised that it is damaged. “It wasn’t like this when we left,” she says.
Olympian kneels down to examine the edge of the large sliding door. “These look like claw marks,” he suggests. “Didn’t you say there was a demon or something here that was used to change the Nanny-ship?”
“Yeah, but Den and I took it with us when we left,” Pam explains. “We left the soldiers and the ‘Good Doctor’ behind, unconscious.” The duo step forward into the opening of the shaft. Neither falls as they begin to slowly descend into the darkness of what waits below.
“Well if those men are anything like the ones I met in the lobby of your hotel, then they have no idea who they are but they are still dangerous.” “Furthermore, these claw marks are on the outside like something trying to get in, not out.”
“I still can’t believe those guys broke into my room,” Pam ruminates. “Kinda funny how this all worked out isn’t it?”
“What do you mean?” Olympian questions.
“Well me meeting Howard Alameda at the Airport when the suitcase switch happened.” “Then you met us at the same bar.” “Followed by me saving your life in the storage warehouse.” “Which led to us taking down the Scarab together.” “Now we are back to where this all started, in a way for both of us,” Pam explains.
“Are you suggesting that Mr. Alameda had something to do with all of this?” Olympian asks almost defensively.
“No, I have no idea how he could have possibly switched the luggage tags,” Pam defends. “I know the one I put back on the belt said Pen Galden on it.” “Moreover how could that Mad-scientist have ended up with my bag when it had his name on it?”
“Clearly something got mixed up while the bags were being loaded or unloaded, there is no way Mr. Alameda could have been involved at all,” Olympian insists.
Pam’s feet are the first to touch the floor of the vehicle hangar deep within the mountain. She looks around commenting, “It is as I remember, minus the fifty guns pointed at me.” Pam tunes in her hearing to search for anyone converging on their location. “No one seems to even know we are here?” I can not hear any movement anywhere.” “The last time I was here they were on me instantly.”
“Maybe having their minds wiped clean made that slave army you describe less compliant,” Olympian suggests. “Those men probably just abandon ship like the others at the Hotel.” “What about vehicles, are there any missing?”
Pam looks at the many Jeeps, trucks and aircraft in the hangar. “I don’t really know, I wasn’t in here that long before I made a run for it.”
“Which way did you go?” he asks.
“That way,” she says pointing to the door under the catwalk where she remembers Dr. Bybo was standing. “Let’s have a look around, even if no one is here there might be clues to where they have gone.” The duo walk through the metal doors that are still bent open from Pam’s last visit here. Last time she was running down this hall, this time they are cautiously walking. Pam is given a much better chance to actually take in the environment. She examines the construction of the steel sheeting bolted to the walls. “This is a rather impressive place,” Pam comments. “How do you suppose this place got built here inside a mountain?”
“My father was something of a governmental scholar,” Olympian begins. “After World War two the United States began to build secret large bomb shelters to protect officials in the event of an A-bomb on American soil.” “Ironically in the early seventies most of them were decommissioned because lead was used in the construction to protect against the radiation. It was poisoning the troops stationed at the facilities.”
“Then calling this guy a Mad-scientist is hitting the nail on the head,” Pam responds, reaching the place where she made a left turn the last time. “He would have to be mad to use this place as his base.”
“Maybe he isn’t concerned by such things, I am not,” Olympian says following Pam to the right. “I’ve never been sick a day in my life, Earth contaminants do not affect me.”
“Neither have I,” Pam says, turning another corner where she is stopped in her tracks as they come upon a scene that almost makes her gag.
Mystic Source Point
Missouri River
near Brunswick, Missouri
Albert Dinesen arrives at the place where he and Pam Donaldson hid the Pawn Demon the previous day. Albert usually banished demons he had defeated using one of his artifacts. The case of this Pawn demon was different. All of its parts had to be rejoined to it before it could be banished, so until that was accomplished it needed to be stored somewhere safe. Albert knew that Bybo’s machine had held it prisoner in its weakened state, but he feared that when it was again at full strength the machine would not be enough. Bringing it to the Mystic Source Point along the river Albert had found was a way to strengthen the prison with magic.
Albert reaches into his backpack to take out an authentic Navajo Dream Catcher. It was something he picked up a few years back in Arizona. To most it would just appear to be an unimpressive souvenir. Albert saw more, he saw that it was a rare true mystic artifact. The Dream Catcher has the power to open a portal to the limbo that exists just outside the Earth plane. A power that only works at Mystic Source Points.
Albert holds up the Dream Catcher to glide it through the air, first east to west and then upward to north and down to south. An outline of two sparkling triangles are created following the path of the Dream Catcher in the air. As he moves the artifact to encompass the two shapes a circle is formed that opens a passage to limbo. On the other side of the passage Albert can see the glass cylinder that held the Pawn Demon. At first there is a glare of light from the breach of the dimensional fabric preventing him from seeing it clearly. But when his eyes clear he is startled by what he sees.
Held within the Mad-scientist’s prison is no longer the Pawn Demon but his Grandson, Topher! In shock Albert drops the Mystic Dream Catcher to the ground. Without a thought Albert grabs a large rock from the ground and rushes into the limbo void toward the piece of stolen machinery. The question, How is this possible? never crosses his mind. All he knows is his Grandson is trapped floating in the strange fluid inside the cylinder. Using the rock he pounds at the glass of the cylinder. He strikes it several times before concluding that it is over an inch thick. Far too thick for him to break with a rock.
Looking down to the electronic controls at the bottom of the apparatus he sees the lights are still illuminated. It has its own battery power source, that was one of the things that Pam insisted they make sure was intact when they moved it. Albert has no idea how the controls work because they are not labeled. He concludes the best solution to this problem is the rock on those controls. Albert begins smashing at the mental parts at the bottom of the cylinder. Breaking the plastic light covers and bending the metal sheeting cause sparks to shoot from the control panel.
There is an explosion that sends Albert back away from the cylinder and the portal he opened into limbo. He is stunned for a moment as he lays on the ground of this inter-dimensional pocket. His body still tingling from the electrical charge he got, he sits up to shake it off. Albert’s vision is completely clear as he watches the cylinder slide open to allow his Grandson Topher to step down out of it. “Topher! Topher! Are you alright?” he exclaims, moving to get up.
Stepping back toward the open portal Topher Stoneledge only smiles at the old man. As Albert scrambles toward his Grandson the young man points his palm at him to release a blast of mystic Bio-energy. Albert is struck by a blast and sent back to the ground farther still from the portal, nearly unconscious.
“I’m sure whoever Topher is, he is just fine,” the young man smiles as his appearance begins to change. His hair grows out becoming shaggier and his skin becomes a pale shade of green. “I knew you would come back for your little demon prize.” “I have been trapped here for over a hundred years and you putting this tube here was my ticket out.” “It was easy for me to switch places with the demon” “This device held it in stasis, me not so much.” “My mind was still active and I was able to take control of the demon.” “I learned what that human doctor had done to it, I was intrigued.” “That is why I sent it back to find its former master while I waited for you to return.”
“Who are you?” Albert manages to utter.
“You can call me Welois,” the green man dressed in a gray robe tells him.” “Well you could if I wasn’t going to leave you here.” Welois steps back through the portal and quickly grinds his foot down on the fragile Dream Catcher destroying it. The portal instantly closes before Albert can even make a step forward.
Dr. Bybo’s secret lab
Taum Sauk Mountains
Arcadia Township, MO
Blood is spattered on the walls all the way down the corridor in front of them. Chunks of flesh hang from the wall, glued on by the blood. On the floor are what remains of several of the guards’ slashed, cut and dismembered bodies in a large pool of blood that nearly covers the whole floor. Pam stands frozen in horror as Olympian steps forward into the corridor. The scene is all too horrific for her as she turns to look away back down the empty corridor behind them.
Olympian steps closer to the remains on the floor. He has never seen anything like it. Whatever he did to these men cut clean through bone. He can’t even be sure of how many men are here. The severed pieces make it hard to be sure. He can only guess at the number five, there may be more or less On the walls that are covered in blood spray there are scratches that clearly appear to be claw marks, by the spacing. The depth of the gouges in the walls are like nothing he has ever seen in any bear attack. Then he spots a rifle, or rather what is left of one protruding from under a torso severed at the chest. He reaches down to retrieve it.
“Oh my God, what are you doing?” Pam gasps when she thinks he is reaching to touch one of the bodies. Looking away she is too sickened by the scene to watch as she hears the sound of the metal scraping against the concrete floor.
“This rifle has been cleaved in half,” Olympian says, holding up the rifle stock and trigger arm. “Whatever weapon was used here it was incredibly strong and sharp.” “When it attacked these men they didn’t even have time to aim.” Looking up to the ceiling he adds, “Most of the bullets must have hit the ceiling from the looks of the dents.”
“Let’s just get out of here, this is too much for me,” Pam says, walking away from the scene. “This is not what I signed on for, it’s totally out of my league!”
Olympian tosses the piece of rifle back onto the corpses. “You can go if you want, I understand,” Olympian says to Pam as she walks away from him. “I have to keep going now,” “Whatever did this is too dangerous to let run loose.” “It could easily find its way back to the city.” “I’ve already let one alien killer run loose under my nose, I will not let another.”
Pam stops to turn and face him. There are tears in her eyes as she tells him, “I can’t do this, those men.” “I left them here to die!” “It is all my fault!” “All of that carnage is on me.” She raises her hands to her face to wipe her tears. “I should have never come here!” “I should have never put on this suit!” “I am not a hero!” “I am a middle school science teacher!” “I am not this person!”
“Hold it right there!” Olympian says, taking a tone that catches Pam off guard, not the laid back one he has used so far. “If you are going to leave because this is not the person you are or because you are frightened, I can understand that.” “But if you think I am going to let you leave because you think you caused this, you are mistaken!” “These men are here because they worked for the man running this place!” “The only person responsible for their deaths is that man, not you!” “They were here long before you found this place and there is no way your coming here caused their deaths!”
Pam stands dumbfounded. Only one other person has ever spoken to her this way before and that was Eileen. As much as she wants to hate him she has to admit to herself, he does make sense. She dries her tears on the sleeve of her rather water resistant shirt. “Like I said before, I’m not a hero.” “But I am no coward either.” “Sometimes the latter gets me in trouble.”
“This is not one of those times,” Olympian says, reaching out his hand. “Please come with me.” “Whatever attacked these men needs to be stopped and you have already shown me that you are the person I need to help me stop it.” Pam walks toward him pushing away his hand.
They return to the massacre corridor, Pam can feel the air stir in the sealed tunnel. She watches as Olympian’s feet lift off the floor as he floats up to cross over the bodies on the floor. Her eyes glow as she follows after him trying not to look down at the bloody mess below. “You fly differently than I do,” she comments.
“I can control the flow of air and decrease gravity, I use the air to guide my movement,” Olympian answers as they reach the other side of the dead bodies to touch down to the floor again. “How is it you fly?”
“Good question,” Pam replies. “Everything I do defies every rule of science I have ever learned.” “My skin has always been tough, the whole eye glow thing that happens when I use some of my powers make me think it is some kind of power held inside of me that is released to do these other things.”
“What do doctor’s say?” Olympian asks, hoping she might reveal something that would show that she too is an alien. Perhaps even like him.
“Aside from my tough skin, they have always said I am completely human,” Pam reveals. Then she stops walking. “Wait, what is that noise?” Pam tunes up her hearing power, trying to focus.
“I hear it too, now,” Olympian agrees. “It is moving closer.” “It sounds like a fast moving clock mechanism.”
“That is no clock!” Pam says pointing as a dark figure appears at the end of the corridor from around a corner ahead of them. It is unmoving watching them as much as they watch it. When it raises its arms, it reveals that it has two sets that are aligned on the sides of its oversized rib cage above its narrow waist. “It’s the demon that Den and I took from here!” Pam announces. “How did it get back here?”
“So what do we do, fight it?” Olympian questions.
“I have no idea, how do you fight a demon?” Pam retorts. “I want to say we run seeing what it has done to these men.”
“Clearly it attacked them physically,” Olympian reasoned. “If slice and dice is its only method of killing, it wouldn’t be killing us as easily.” “Think of it this way, two against one.”
“I have to admit I like those odds,” Pam agrees. “Actually we only need to contain it until Den gets here to banish it. Before they can take action something begins to happen to the creature standing in the shadows. Two of its four hands reach up to the top of its head taking hold of the foot long insect-antennas. Olympian and Pam watch from a distance as the demon pulls the antennas in opposite directions appearing to tear itself in half. It is a horrible ripping sound as the one demon splits into two. The two demons step forward into the light to reveal their strange form clearly. “So much for those odds,” Pam commented.
“We need to do something now, before we find out if it can do that again!” Olympian shouts as he raises his hand to release a blast of Null-force at the twin demons. To his surprise his power has no effect on the creatures at the end of the corridor. “That was unexpected.” “Looks like we do it the old fashion way.” Olympian turns to Pam to encourage her, “We can do this!” “I know it might seem scary at first but I’ve seen what you can do and you can handle this.” Then he turns to run toward the two demons.
Pam stands back watching as Olympian does not hesitate to tackle one of the Pawn demons in its thin midsection. He shoves the demon back against the wall in hopes to knock it unconscious. The physical attack appears to have little effect on the demon. It reaches down Olympian’s back with all four of its strange one fingered, two thumbed hands to grab the hero by the back of his belt. Pam is shocked back to reality as the demon lifts her new found partner from the floor by his belt to slam him against the ceiling. There is a loud cracking sound that Pam hopes is the ceiling and not Olympian’s spine.
As Olympian falls to the floor the two demons turn their attention to Pam. The strange clicking sound the demons make with their mandibles is unnerving as they move towards her out of the shadows. Pam is still frightened after seeing what the Pawn demons have done to Olympian. She knows he was right, she must try to do something to stop them. Then abruptly the demons stop several yards from her to stare again.
The demons appear confused by her. Pam looks to her clenched right fist to see it has begun to glow. Perhaps this is the non-physical answer, she thinks. Pam is not sure how this will work with this bulletproof suit on but she does it anyway. Focusing all of her energy on making her whole body glow it takes only a second for the corridor to be bathed in a light as bright as a star. Pam is well aware that this trick is blinding to everyone else around her but she is still able to see.
The Pawn demons clack their mandible even louder before scrambling away down another intersecting corridor. Looking to her arm she can see that the light does penetrate the suit without harming it. She is once again grateful that her light doesn’t give off heat. This suit is quickly becoming irreplaceable. Running to where Olympian lays on the floor she can see that the demons are completely gone from sight down the corridor. Switching off her glow power she kneels down to check on Olympian. He has blood dripping from his ears. Rolling him over she pulls open one of his eye lids.
“What are you doing? ” he asks as his other eye opens.
“I don’t know, I saw it on TV a couple of hundred times,” Pam replies. “I think you might have a concussion.”
“That is impossible!” Olympian tells her. He has a ringing in his ears and when he reaches to touch his right ear he feels that it is wet. Drawing back his fingers to look at them he sees the red liquid on them. “What is this?” he asks.
“It’s blood, your ears are bleeding, that is why I thought you had a concussion,” Pam answers.
“My blood?” he asks looking confused. “I’ve never seen my blood before, I guess now I know it is red.”
“I wish I could say the same once a month,” Pam jokes. “Can you get up?” She asks taking him by his big arm to help him. It still doesn’t phase her that she can lift this big oaf like he was a child.
“I’ll be fine,” Olympian says, pushing her away once he is on his feet again. Leaning his shoulder against the wall for a moment he asks, “What did you do to the demons?”
“Scared them off, for a while I hope,” Pam replies feeling proud of herself. “We need to figure out something more permanent though.”
“I feel like an idiot,” Olympian comments as he steps away from the wall. “I tell you we can do this and then I instantly get my ass kicked!”
“Turn around for a minute,” Pam says, confusing Olympian as he follows her instructions. She swings her hand out to smack his butt. “Your ass still looks good to me!”
“Did you just say you like my ass?” Olympian asks.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Pam asserts. “You are like my little brother who got beat up by the bullies that I had to rescue.” “Now let’s go before those things kill the Doctor.” Pam leads the way back to the laboratory where Bybo had examined her. The walls of the corridors are sprayed with bullet holes and blood. There are more mutilated bodies on the floor as they go.
As they walk, Olympian becomes fixated on how easily that demon tossed him around. It was like he had lost his powers momentarily. Like in the warehouse a few nights ago. Whatever that strange metal that weakened him, it was clearly created by these demons. Watching Pam walk in front of him as she steps over more dead guards he thinks about the slap on his ass she just gave him. He felt that too, with the strength she has displayed it isn’t surprising how much he felt it. He has to wonder if she was just being playful and not making a pass at him. “You said that metal chunk was giving off radiation that was killing me, how did you know that?” Olympian asks, walking up next to Pam.
“I could see it,” Pam answers. “The best I can figure is when I use my vision powers in the dark I can see the invisible spectrum.” “Whatever was coming off that chunk was being drawn right into your body.”
“What about the demons?” Olympian asks, “Were they giving off radiation?”
“I didn’t think to check, besides it doesn’t work in the light, it has to be dark,” Pam explains. “Did it feel the same to you when you got close to the demons?”
“No, I felt fine right up until I hit the ceiling,” Olympian explains. “You see I have this buffer field that surrounds my body.” “Nothing should be able to touch me unless I allow it.” “Those things should not have been able to grab my belt.”
“Look, even as a science teacher I can not even begin to understand all of the things that Den has told me and shown me about the supernatural in the past day,” Pam tells Olympian as they stop in the corridor. “Perhaps it is because your powers are of an alien nature.” “Maybe whatever demons are, they are immune to your powers.”
“Then what does that say about yours if they still work on the demons,” Olympian quizzes, as they look down at a large puddle of blood on the floor. Neither of them say anything about it as they look at the drag trail on the floor originating from it.
“I’ve spent some time studying my powers and although I don’t know how I got them, my powers are based in science,” Pam explains. “Mostly enhanced physical, hearing, sight, and the light thing I can do.” “I have hypothesized that I have some kind of energy in my body that I can change from one thing to another at will.” “I think that is why I am Invulnerable, because I need to be to hold that energy inside.” “The light is a by-product of that energy.” “One thing is for sure, these demons do not like it!”
“What about that truth thing you did to me?” Olympian asks, stepping across the trail of blood on the floor.
“You picked up on that did you?” Pam smiles as they begin to walk again on either side of the blood trail. “I really don’t know how I do that or how I can sense nearby living things.” “How did you feel when I did that to you?”
“Like I couldn’t lie to you,” he answers. “It was the strangest thing. like something bad would happen if I did.” The trail of blood they have been following turns and stops at a closed door. “What do you suppose was dragged in there?” he asks. “A body, a fallen demon?”
“I have no idea why one body would be more important than any other unless it was the Mad-scientist himself,” Pam guessed. “This is not one of the rooms I was in before when I was here.” “This place is a maze of rooms, no telling what this one was used for.”
“Only one way to find out,” Olympians says, raising his log to kick the door in.
“Stop!” A voice shouts from behind them down the corridor. “Do not cross the threshold into that room!” Pam and Olympian turn to see the Demon Hunter Albert Dinesen coming toward them down the corridor. “Only death awaits you beyond that door!”
Den’s words sound strange to Pam. In the short time she has known him he has never spoken in such a medieval dialect. This man also does not smell of the Hai-Karate cologne that the man she slept with last night douses himself in. “Den the demon we put into limbo at the Mystic Source has somehow escaped back here!” Pam replies as Olympian drops his leg to the floor, not kicking the door. “Where have you been all this time?”
“It took me some time to get here, but you are correct the abomination has escaped!” Den replies. “Only I can defeat the foul beast that lurks inside that room!” “Step aside!” Den gestures to move Olympian and Pam away from the door. “Please stay back, this may take several minutes,” Den grins slightly.
Pam leans in closer to Olympian so that only he can hear her whisper, “Something is off with Den.” “He is speaking strangely.”
“Are you sure?” Olympian questions. “He looks the same to me.”
“Where is his backpack, he would not enter that room to face a demon without one of his gadgets from his backpack,” Pam insists.
“Hold it,” Olympian shouts as Den moves to open the door. “If that is where the demon is hiding there could be too many for you to handle alone.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, I will be in full control of the creature in seconds!” Den replies.
“Control of the creature?” Pam repeats. “Why would you want to do that?”
“Just stay out of my way and do not interfere with my activity,” Den insisted, sounding rather angry at them.
“You are not Den,” Pam announces. “Maybe the demon has taken control of you somehow?”
“Aren’t you the clever one,” Albert grins, turning his attention to Olympian. “But I have already seen how vulnerable your friend here is to demon magic.” The appearance of Albert Dinesen now fades to be replaced by Welois’ true appearance and green skin. Welois raises his hand firing a beam of crackling green energy from it directly at Olympian.
Olympian stands up straight, chest out ready to receive whatever the strange green man has to dish out. Then Pam reacts without even thinking as she steps into the path of the beam. Her body shimmers with pale light in the dimly lit corridor as she is engulfed in the demonic power of Welois.
Welois cackles at the sight, “Foolish woman, you have saved his life for only a moment and ended yours sooner.” Then something incredible happens that shocks everyone, even Welois. Pam’s light appears to over power his magic and consume it. She stands completely unharmed.
“You were saying?” Pam comments as she and Olympian step forward. Welois gets a frightened look on his face, but not of them. His body starts to tremble and suddenly he vanishes.
An instant later, Albert Dinesen appears in the place where Welois stood. “It is another trick!” Olympian shouts. “Did you think you could fool us twice?”
“No, this is the real Den,” Pam says, smelling the fragrance of his cologne. “What the hell is going on here?” “Who was that?”
“He calls himself Welois, but in truth he is only the body of the man, possessed by a Necromancer Demon,” Den replies, taking his backpack from his shoulders. “It was him who freed the Pawn Demon and left me trapped in limbo. I had to wait for him to use his power so I could tap into it and switch places with him.”
“So where is he now?” Olympian asks.
“Trapped back in limbo, where he belongs,” Den replies. “He was looking for your Mad-scientist too.” “Wanted him to splice some of the Pawn Demon’s power onto his own.” Taking another strange artifact from his backpack that looks like a twisted twig he approaches Pam. “I was watching from limbo, I saw what happened.” He raises the twig toward Pam.
“What do you intend to do with that stick, Mr. Merlin?” Pam asks, raising her hand to push the wand away.
“I need to make sure that demonic energy did not infect you,” Den says, hoping she will allow him to proceed. He has seen this woman in action and if she intends to fight against him, he will need more than the Wand of Wotan to protect himself. “This wand will just reveal if that energy infected you.”
“Okay I trust you then,” Pam replies, removing her hand from his that holds the wand.
Albert speaks a single word as he waves the twisted stick over Pam, “MUNDA!”
“So what now?” Olympian asks. “Nothing happened.”
“I know,” Albert says, wrinkling his face more than usual. “It appears that the energy inside you incinerated the Necromancer’s power.” “I am not sure how that is possible.” “I felt that energy last night, but I wasn’t sure what it was.” “It appears to have the ability to protect you from any invader.” “That would explain what we talked about this morning.”
It is clear to Olympian that these two people are closer than he originally thought. He feels it would be inappropriate for him to ask any questions about what sounds rather personal.
“But what is that energy?” Pam asks. “That is what this whole weekend has been about for me.” “To find out where these powers came from.”
“I have no idea, but it certainly is not demonic, it is something much different,” Albert tells Pam. “Perhaps even stronger than magic.” Then Albert turns the wand toward Olympian. “MUNDA!” he says again. “You on the other hand, just being this close to a demon has robbed you of most of your superhuman powers.” “I suggest in the future you either avoid magic all together or be very very careful of it.” “Whatever it is the Pawn Demon created with the alien armor it is still affecting you.” Then he looks back to Pam, “But I think I can help you with that.” Pointing the wand at Pam he says, “TRANSFERENDIS” then moving it to Olympian he feels a sudden surge of power.
“What did you do?” Olympian asks. “I feel better than I have in days.”
“I let you borrow Pam’s power to heal the infection given to you by that demonic excrement,” Albert explains. “Which brings us back to the demon inside this room.”
Pam stands quietly contemplating what Den has told her. This energy inside her body is the reason she has never gotten pregnant. She had never really given it any thought beyond how great it was to not worry about it. What if she can never get pregnant, never be a mother. It is something she never considered. “Demons, you mean,” Pam corrects, rejoining the conversation. “It split in two.”
“Probably many more than that with all of the men it has killed,” Albert explains. “That is what Pawn Demons do.” “For every two souls it consumes it can create a split.” Albert turns to the sealed door behind him. “From what I saw it is frightened of Pam’s light.” “But I know how to reduce its numbers.” “All the two of you need to do is force the demons to touch their antennas together and they merge back together.” Albert returns the wand to his backpack.
“What about me losing my powers again?” Olympian asks.
“Now that I cleansed you of the infection the Pawn Demons can no longer defend against you,” Albert says, retrieving the tuning fork from his coat pocket. “Like I’ve been saying all along, the Pawn Demon must be joined as one to be banished.” “I’ll open the door, Pam, you turn on the light show, and Olympian moves as fast as you can to force the demons to touch the antenna.”
Pam takes a deep breath before focusing all of what she has come to know as a strange energy inside her body on a power she always thought of as insignificant. She glows nearly as bright as the sun as Albert moves to open the door.
“Ladies first,” Albert says, stepping aside not looking at the blinding light she is surrounded with. None of them really has time to react to the scene inside the room. The few guards that are still alive, just barely, are scattered around on the floor. The clicking of the Pawn Demon’s mandibles is loud as Olympian speeds around Pam into the room. He begins by grabbing two of the Demon splits and smashing their heads together. The moment their antenna touch, the two become one. Without missing a step at near blinding speed he uses the demon still in his grip to attack another, two become one. His task is made simpler as the Pawn demons huddle in fear of Pam’s glow. So frightened they take no notice as their number dwindles.
In minutes the many have become two and then only one Pawn Demon remains. The sight left the room with the crowd of multiple demons gone is hard for Pam to look at. She dims the light that illuminates the room as she turns back to the door. Albert strikes the fork on the edge of a blood covered stainless steel countertop. The ring of the sonic fork causes the demon to vibrate and then vanish.
Only the three humans remain in the room. Strewn all around them are the many bodies of the base guards. It is too much for Pam as she turns to leave the horrific scene. Only a few of the uniformed men still gasp for air as they bleed out. Olympian bends down over one of the morally injured men to take him by his shirt. “Where is your boss!” he demands. The man stares at him with glassy eyes completely confused. “It is no use, he is just like the men at the hotel, complete amnesia.”
“It is understandable, putting even a small amount of Pawn Demon into living men is unheard of!” Albert explains. “I can’t even understand how they lived like that.” “I would say the Doctor that Pam spoke about is long gone if he is smart enough to devise such a plan.”
“You’re right, Den,” Pam calls from the hallway. “We are the only three living things in this place now.” “I may have retrieved a piece of space rock, but other than that this weekend has been a dead end to finding out where my powers came from.”
June 2,1988
Pamela Donaldson’s apartment
Park Meadow Apartments
10550 Lake City Way
Seattle, Washington
The phone rings just as Pam gets in the door, reaching it just in time she answers it, “Hello.”
“Is this Miss Pamela Donaldson?” the woman on the other end of the call asks.
“Yes, this is her,” Pam replies.
“I’m calling from American Airlines to let you know we did find the tag to your suitcase at the Airport loading bay, but we have not found your bag as of yet.”
Pam looks at her bag she dropped at the door as she rushed for the phone. She had retrieved it from that Mad-Scientist Bybo’s lab. Bybo’s bag also sits there next to it. Even stranger is the fact that she never got a chance to even report it missing. “Excuse me, Miss, but who reported my bag missing?”
“Oh,” the woman replies, going silent for a moment. “You see, the airline tag system is very stringent.” “Where the tag was found, it did not receive the proper scans we assumed it had been lost in transit.”
Pam knows full well that all of the identical bags have been accounted for. What she does not know is how her bag got Pen Galden’s tag on it and how she ended up with his bag with no tag. She saw the Pen Galden tag and she also witnessed Howard Alameda put it back on the carousel to be claimed by Dr. Bybo. Which again leads her to suspect that Alameda somehow made all the switching of tags happen. “Looking any further for my bag will not be necessary, I have it.” “But thank you for your trouble.”
“Very well then I will remove it from my list,” the woman tells Pam. “You have a nice day, Miss Donaldson.”
“Thank you, too,” Pam replies before hanging up the phone. Walking back to the door she opens the case that was Dr. Bybo’s. He is in the wind so she saw no reason to not bring the bag home with her. Dr. Bybo has no idea who she is or even her name. But he did send those men looking for the bag at the hotel, so he must have some way of tracking it. Maybe bringing it home was not such a good idea.
Nevertheless the suits inside did come in handy. Pam takes the three blue and white suits to lay them out over her sofa. The chunk of meteor tumbles free onto the sofa. She figured if Bybo used the material of these suits to smuggle his device through security she could do the same with the meteor. Picking it up she squeezes it in her hand, whatever it is made from she can’t crush it in her bare hand. With any luck Hugh can identify what it is composed of.
She must admit she does like the look of these suits. Each one has a slightly different pattern arrangement in the same colors. The tops and pants are all inter-changeable and each also has a ski mask-like hood. Pam turns back to the suitcase to see if there is any kind of tracking device in it. Ripping out the lining and pulling off the lid she finds no sign of any electronic devices. Having effectively destroyed the case she goes to the kitchen to return with a garbage bag. She’ll make sure she dumps it across town just to be safe.
Then she looks back to the three suits on the couch. Much of the weekend was a bust but finding these suits is almost like what Eileen said happened to her. Super-suit in an old case, only thing is Pam already had the super powers. She has to admit she has ruined plenty of clothes on her nocturnal adventures. Maybe keeping these suits wasn’t a bad idea after all. Picking up the suit she wore this weekend something drops to the floor. It is a scrap of paper with some writing on it. “Hope to see you again, Den.” Well maybe the weekend had more than one bonus.