Reaper Society

Chapter 9: Cat Dust

"What did I say about not getting scratched?" Asher's voice asks from somewhere on the other side of the four-cat-squad still clawing at me. I make some sort of sound, a cross between a hiss of frustration and string of swear words, but my voice isn't working right. I rip the most immediate threat, the biḍālaḥ that's on my face and attempting to scalp me, from my body. My left hand grips the creature's sorry excuse for a tail in one hand while my right comes up to thrust the still-clasped knife into it's side.

The move's a little disjointed, unfortunately for me, and I miss my mark the first time. The knife cutting the biḍālaḥ's back rather than embedding in it's side. To my complete and utter surprise, the offending creature lets out a yowl and poofs. A shower of sour and bitter grey dust raining into my mouth and eyes and the fresh scratches along my forehead and in my hair.

Like an idiot, I gasp, and get a lungful of the gross dust in my mouth and lungs. In my defense, I was taken by surprise by the sudden Houdini act the soulless-cat pulled.

"Don't breathe it in!" Asher yells at me - a few seconds too late. My airways explode in pain, as if the dust were acid and not some twisted cremation of the demon-spawn that died. I fall to my knees as the pressure in my forehead from the mark reaches new and throbbing heights. The knife I'd been holding falls from my hands, the sound of it clattering ringing through my head before everything gets drowned by a high-pitched whine.

The rest of the biḍālaḥ that had been ripping into me are gone. Their weight disappearing as if their jobs have been done. My own hands are now clawing at my throat as I struggle to breathe - the normally easy function a distant memory to my body. Something grabs my face by my cheeks, forcing my fish-gulping jaws to stop moving as liquid ice spills onto my tongue and cascades into my throat and lungs. The urge to hack up whatever's just gone into me never comes. Almost immediately, the ringing in my head stops and the pounding begins to subside.

The thing gripping my face releases me and I hit something solid, my skull banging against a wall as my vision clears. I hadn't even noticed the darkness that had descend over my eyes and have to blink several times to clear it away completely. I'm gasping in fresh air, my lungs still aching along with my throat, but at least the haze is clearing from my brain. I'm on the ground, an alley wall at my back, tan jumpsuit almost completely shredded from the knee down with extra tears over my stomach, and splotches of already-drying blood around the edges of the holes. The knife Asher had given me is resting beside my bare foot, silver glinting dully under a coat of grey dust.

My mentor is about a foot in front of me, blocking wave upon wave of the very-pissed-off looking biḍālaḥ. They're a cyclone now, the demonic creatures, roiling masses of fur and claws and horrible yowls. Several clumps of them are spread out over the alley now. Two black- leather-clad people with glowing ink and blades stand back-to-back with two other people - people dressed like me. In identical tan jumpsuits like the one I woke up in.

The ones in black are quick and efficient in dispatching the biḍālaḥ that come their way, barely moving an inch away from their partners - trainees? - for more than a second. I stare at what must be two mentors and with their trainees in complete shock. The two pairs are working together seamlessly, at opposite ends of the alley, but just as efficiently.

"Some help would be nice." Asher growls at me after a moment. I tear my gaze from the other Reapers and look up at him. He's back to normal, well as normal-looking as he was before, tan skin the usual hue and reddish-brown eyes no longer glowing. When he glances back at me and grits his teeth, I see they're normal too. "Or you can just lay there." He adds icily, his words biting at me...but also doing that whiplash thing again where some of the bite feels...kinda nice. I blink again, taking a deep, calming breath, and get up from the ground.