The Old Gods

Melody Black

'We'd like three tickets to King's Cross, please.' Robin said at the ticketing booth. They were all panting and sweating from their narrow escape. The road to the Paraketic Railway had not been a smooth one. They were still on edge. Anyone in the station could be the Kemurigami. When the demons you were fleeing from had the ability to shapeshift, it messed with your ability to trust the people around you. Amir shuddered at the thought of the thousands of Kemurigami fighting in the Old War. Those must've been dark times, Amir thought to himself. He couldn't imagine a world where everyone was your enemy and no one was to be trusted.

The group stayed huddled together, keeping away from the coffeeshops and the bookstores. Amir smelled coffee coming from one of them. They hadn't slept properly tonight. Leigh kept rubbing her eyes and Robin was yawning.

'Maybe we should take a break. Get some coffee. I don't think we're going to get too far if we fall asleep while running away from demons.' Amir suggested. Leigh nodded as vigorously as she could. Robin shrugged.

'Let's go into that one. It's the emptiest one.' Amir said.

'Nuh uh, Amir. If I've learnt anything from all my mystery novels, we should go to the one with the most people. It's called hiding in plain sight.' Robin said, leading the group into a surprisingly bright and loud coffeeshop just facing the tracks. It smelled like bacon, croissants, coffee and hot chocolate and everything you wanted to eat after running from two murderous demons.

'Y'all wait here. I'll go order something for us.' Robin said. He joined the queue, tapping his feet impatiently. Amir faced Leigh in the booth. His sister was already asleep, her body slumped on the cushioned seats. Amir reclined slightly in his seat, twiddling his fingers. He pulled the Angelonomous out of his bag and flipped to the page on Kemurigami. The book was thicker than any dictionary Amir had seen. It took him quite a while to find the Kemurigami in the huge mass of information that was the Angelonomous.

'The Kemurigami are shapeshifting demons from Nippon. They were first sighted out on the battlefield in Hokkaido, where a local villager mentioned seeing his own doppelganger. Two days later, the villager was found dead. In the following weeks, people reported seeing someone that looked exactly like him. A squadron of soldiers stationed there was sent to seek out the doppelganger. They were confronted with the first recognised Kemurigami, who engaged them in battle by shapeshifting into multiple physically fit forms.

The soldiers had trouble putting down the Kemurigami, but it was defeated when one of the lower-ranked members in the squad uttered a prayer to his God and held out a cross. The Kemurigami's shapeshifting was halted and its illusions fell apart. The soldiers were then able to dispatch the demon with regular weaponry.' Amir read out. Leigh had woken up in the middle of his light reading session. She was listening raptly, which was something unlike her. She almost never did that.

'Leigh? Are you-' Leigh looked up. Her eyes were ice-blue.

'EEYUCK!' Amir shrieked in the middle of the coffeeshop. Everyone turned to look at them. Not-Leigh stood up, her hand contorting into a singular talon.

'Shhh. It's all going to be all right, dear brother.'

Two gunshots cracked into Not-Leigh's chest. A patrolling policeman was trembling, his pistol wobbling unsteadily in his hands. Not-Leigh's head turned around to face him, its jaw morphing into a sick smile. The policeman squeezed off a few more shots. The demon was unfazed by his attacks, advancing slowly.

But it didn't notice Robin.

He hurled a cup of steaming hot coffee at Not-Leigh's head. The brown liquid scalded the demon and clouded its vision. Amir and Robin escaped in the ensuing confusion.