Mimi's Demons

Chapter 69: So Batman's Real?

"You made her pass out."

Duke glared at Travis Cromwell, who was once again in a wheely computer chair as though his butt couldn't stand anything else, but he wasn't spinning this time. He was looking at Duke in flat disappointment. They weren't even in Duke's office, they were in the hallway underneath his haunt since it had been closer to Mimi's room. He'd watched the idiot toss down his computer chair after him when he'd caught Duke calling a doctor on the cameras.

"Dude..." he said.

"I did not make her pass out," said Duke.

"Lies do not become us."

"I did not physically make her pass out. How was I to know getting mad at her would tip her over the edge? I usually can't get her to refrain from being sassy to save her life, literally! The panic attacks were supposed to be about going back home to her mom or—or getting kidnapped or whatever the hell, not just getting frustrated with her."

"You weren't just 'frustrated' with her," said Cromwell. "You used 'the voice.'"

"Oh please," Duke could not be hearing this. "You weren't even there."

"The voice that shakes nations."

"Travis."

"The voice which bring the mighty to their knees."

"I will shoot you. Again."

"Hey, this is a heavy subject, I'm trying to make it easier on you."

"I don't need you to make it easier."

"And I've known you since time immemorial, of course I know you used the voice."

"And I've used it before and she just pouted. Somethings up and I—shit, maybe those things were about."

Cromwell's expression did that flattening around his upper lip that always happened when he was getting ready to humor Duke and he didn't want him to know. "Demons?"

Duke glared, wondering if just kicking Cromwell might help him feel better about the whole situation when he saw the nerd's eyes flick to something over his shoulder and his eyebrows go high.

"Batman?"

Duke turned just as gray fury incarnate shot down the hall, filling the space with wings, fangs, claws, and glowing green eyes.

"What did you do?" snarled Honrye.

The pistol was in Duke's hand without him ever remembering reaching for it. Cromwell had his gun out as well, a skinny PP7 that rarely ever saw the light of day and which he mainly got as tribute to some old ass James Bond game.

The demon teenager was undeterred. His wings grew bigger and his face started to warp.

"What did you do to Mimi!"

"I'm trying to figure that out," Duke snapped. "Get your ass back!"

"I could taste her fear all the way in that hole, you liar!" Gray lips pulled back from gleaming, inhuman fangs. Knuckles cracked as he arched black claws.

"Boss?" Cromwell's voice had gone unnaturally low. Contrary to his boyish, casual personality, when he got scared he became steel: sure, hard, and unhesitant.

Duke could feel the unnatural terror creeping along his skin, looking for an opening. He tramped down the instinct to shoot with years of practice keeping a cool head in such situation, knowing shooting would just escalate an already bad situation. But Honrye's warping visage was peeling back that hold finger by finger.