Part 5

Rap was on Anar's case like an avenging Angel the second the door was opened; “what on Earth have you been doing?” he demanded, claws on scaly hips, “have you any idea how worried I've been? All my aromatherapy oils- used! Gone!”

“It's true, I'm either high or my brain has rotted,” Rave chimed in, “I'll be the best-smelling corpse on record.”

The air was indeed thick with the floral, calming scent of lavender. A window had been opened but the lack of breeze meant it wasn't helping any.

Rap barely drew a breathe, “I knew it was you they were talking about on the news! I knew it! I said it was him didn't I?”

“Sure did,” Rave agreed sounding very spaced-out indeed.

“You and your natural magic! Nothing but trouble! It's only a matter of time before the authorities figure out it was you! Oh, hello Crispin.”

The human demon took in his surroundings and wasn't sure if he was better off here or back at his destroyed residence. Anar rudely prodded him forward and closed the door, slinging The Bag to its customary resting place in the middle of the lounge floor as he plopped down on the battered sofa.

“T.V's still dead,” Rave told him. “No Home and Away for you again today.”

“I think that's the least of my worries to be honest.”

Rap threw one last dirty glance at the troublesome aardvark and turned to Crispin, smiling brittly, “come in, come in! Make yourself comfy dear, some of the chairs are still good. No, not that one!”

Crispin jumped back up as Rap guided him to safer seating options. “Are you hungry? Would you like a sandwich?”

“I'd like a sandwich,” Anar said hopefully.

Rap snapped at him, “I wasn't asking you! Ohhh it's just like you to go stirring up trouble! You make a new friend and just look at what you drag him into the poor dear!”

“He's in his own kind of trouble, don't look at me!”

“Stop shouting!” Rave whined, “my head can't take it. I'm seeing stars and just for once it's not because of that Astral moggy. Why did I have to fall in love with a nutter? If he's not burning funny smelling oils I have to put up with his meditation whale-song CD...”

Anar was grumbling about getting his own darned sandwich and clawed his bag back to him, reaching inside.

Crispin agreed to lunch if only to get the overly friendly dinosaur to leave him alone as the only remaining safe piece of furniture wobbled worryingly beneath his frame. He watched with growing hunger as Anar flung a pile of snacks out of his bag.

Rave nosed over the demon's shoulder, eyeing it all up.

“What do you want?” Anar asked, “I can see you begging.”

Rap appeared at the doorway to the kitchen, “he's having nothing! He'll ruin his appetite for tea!”

Rave flushed and pretended not to be interested in the Smarties tube, “yes dear.”

They both watched as Rap disappeared to grab a plate and Anar sneakily slid the desired item over. Rave hastily emptied the entire contents of the mini chocolate bean packet down his gullet and chewed madly before he could be found out. Then Anar pulled out a sandwich. Now if it had been a packaged, wrapped vending machine sandwich with a label and barcode Crispin would not have thought anything of it but this edible item that had appeared was half a baguette with a yard of lettuce and a pound of ham. Not the sort of thing that you left lying around in your shoulder bag mixed in with your paperwork.

“It's a shame you can't get that thing to produced cooked food,” Rave said. Well, this was a close enough approximation to what he said as his maw was crammed with half eaten chocolate and his actual sounds were more like 'itff a fame...'.

Crispin wasn't sure how to frame the question that had formed in his mind. It sounded ridiculous, but then he'd seen a good few ridiculous things since making friends with the unusual demon administrator; “is that some sort of magic bag? Like a 'Bag of Holding'?”

Anar gave a half-nod half-shrug, munching away on his ham salad roll. He waited until his mouth was empty before explaining, “family heirloom, I can get almost anything out of it. Can't put it back in though, it's a one way deal. All our food, all my clothes, it comes from this,” he flipped it upside down and gave it a shake. His creased pile of interim reports fell out with a bundle of assorted junk. “See? Normal bag, but if I think clearly of what I want (and it fits) I can take it out. My uncle thinks its a portal but we're not sure. The book we have back at Warlock Court goes into more detail about how it works but its written in a language we don't recognise,” he frowned. “I only found out how to use the thing because I had a funny dream about it after touching some magic in an old painting.”

Crispin sat, nodding in amazement. He wanted a magic bag! How did you get given a magic bag? Anar had so much cool stuff, he was utterly jealous.

Rap appeared with Crispin's lunch and tutted over the mess, “oh sure, just throw your things around - I should! No, don't get up, I'll clean up after you don't worry, same as I always do. Now-” he handed the human his lovingly prepared food and sat on Rave's lap, staring sternly once more at Anar, “-just what did you go and use your magic for?”

Crispin surprised everyone including himself by piping up in his friends defence; “he didn't mean to, go easy on the dude. Some shitheads rocked up to the recreation centre with massive wrenches 'n bike chains, sent by Matlock to rough us up.”

Rap still wasn't happy, “the recreation centre?”

“Yeah, we were playing pool...”

Now he folded his skinny green arms as Rave began to doze beneath him, thoroughly chilled out from all that lavender, “and what were you doing there instead of being at your desks?!” he demanded.

Anar threw Crispin a filthy look that said 'thanks, mate, this is so much better than letting me deal with the conversation.' “errr...” maybe he should shut up now.

“Crowley was being a cunt, he threatened Crisp so I threw a chair at him and was gonna knock his block off when he legged it like the scrawny chicken he is. We went wagging, I took him to the pool hall, that's when we got in a pickle and I had to save Superwimp here-” he jabbed a thumb at Crispin, “otherwise Infernal Security would be scraping him off the walls about now.”

Crispin nodded madly in agreement.

“Hmmm,” Rap hmmm'd.

Anar quickly played the pity card, “Crisp doesn't have anywhere to go now, you know. Matlock's heavies overturned his house; made a right mess of it too, windows smashed in and all his stuff everywhere. Poor fella!”

Rap's eyes grew wide, “really? He's... homeless?”

Anar nodded, letting his ears droop in sadness, “no friends, no home, no dinner...”

Crispin pulled at his collar, not used to this sort of attention.

Anar certainly knew how to manipulate his friends, Rap was immediately overcome with concern. “Well he'll have to stay here with us! We could have a quick shuffle next door. Sort him a bed out. Pull some frozen pizzas and beer from The Bag and we'll have ourselves a games night. What about your dad, Crispin? Is he going to be ok?”

“He's not coming out of his office until Monday's meeting,” he admitted.

“Right! That's sorted then. You're with us now, we'll look after you and Heaven help anyone who tries any funny business with us! Chop chop!”

They left Rave snoring and headed to the next apartment to put it into some sort of habitable order. It was going to be a monumental task.

The experience was overall a bizarre one for the human, Purgatory was not meant to be a space suitable for demons, let alone one in which a bunch of good friends hung out and chilled in. He'd had a privileged upbringing, spacious clean housing with maids to pick up after you and mod cons so you barely had to lift a finger to live your best life. Summers in the Bahamas, winters in the Alps. Safaris in Kenya. He'd never had to sift through literal rubble for a mattress that wasn't meant for an incinerator. He sure as Hell wasn't about to start now. “I wonder...” he said to himself.

“What?” Rap asked, brushing plaster and old tile from the uneven floor.

Well it was worth a try, wasn't it? He awkwardly waved his hands about, feeling a bit silly and out of practice.

He'd conjured a bed. Not just any bed – this was a fancy block of shiny polished hardwood that wouldn't look out of sorts in a Dubai hotel.

“How did you do that?!” Rap asked, gobsmacked.

Anar popped his head round to see what the fuss was about and stammered, “w-wait a minute, how did you-?”

Crispin beamed proudly, “we're not in Hell are we? We're in the wasteland. No limitations here, it's not a space meant for the likes of us!”

Rap threw Anar a look that could kill.

The aardvark backed away, “how was I meant to know I could use my magic here? Give me a break Rap.”

“Rave is going to murder you and I won't be saving your sorry backside this time!”

“I'll make him a nice sofa, I promise. I'll go do it now, imagine his happy little face when he wakes up...” he deftly nipped out to change the old furniture in the flat before he got the nagging of his afterlife. He wasn't sure what a happy Rave even looked like, he'd never seen the old git smile unless Anar had managed to hurt himself or get in trouble. Preferably both at the same time.

Of course he hadn't attempted to use his magic here. That would have been even stupider than his usual antics. Could you imagine? Infernal Security turning up at their door, hoisting them by the scruffs of their necks, taking them into the Correctional Facility and giving them a stern talking to? He shuddered at the thought. I mean yeah sure, he might be invited to the Inner Circle for being a demon Warlock but then he also might just be rendered into a million soul shards and stuck into amulets for the Infernal Holy College students to suck dry. It was a gamble that he was not prepared to take. He let the curious bubbling rise up again and wondered if this would be the last time he would use his magic? If his plan worked, if he passed through the gate and emerged Upstairs he wouldn't be able to do any of this ever again. His family had the ability to magnify magic and being a demon meant he was full of the stuff so technically he was a being of limitless power. Technically. He didn't want to have to put it to the test. He was just one daft aardvark and they, well... they were legion.

He stepped back and admired the new lounge. It looked like an Ikea showroom and in the middle on the Underworld's most comfy sofa sat Rave. Still snoring. Insufferable git. For all his griping about the big green death machine though they did have their chummy moments where they got along. Usually when Rave was being henpecked by Rap and needed a comrade. Like earlier with the Smarties. When the chips were down they had each others backs; it was a complicated friendship indeed.

He entered the kitchen and piled the countertops with junk food and alcohol. It really was a mystery where all this stuff he aquired came from and he just hoped that one day he didn't get a massive bill through the door from some intergalactic superstore that he'd been innocently raiding the shelves of everytime he'd used The Bag. He'd really be up the creek without a paddle because money was one of the things that it couldn't produce. Predictably it had been one of the first things he'd tried for, because what kind of teenager wouldn't?

The sky turned a deep shade of red and the storm clouds began to gather as he looked out the window at the empty expanse beyond. It was going to feel strange not being here anymore. The daily thunderstorm, the rattle of the windows, the trembling of the floor. He wouldn't miss the office block in any way shape or form but this had been his first actual home without an adult around and he'd grown rather attached to it. Sure the shower wasn't very hot or powerful and yes he had to walk up seven million steps to get into the apartment because the elevator didn't work and it was a fact that they could only pick up six channels and not even that now the TV had gone kaputt but... you never forget your first flat. And not many people could say that they'd lived in Purgatory. Or worked in the Underworld. It occurred to him that if his plan was successful he would have no proof of either of those statements. He'd never have existed down here. A smile crept on his lips, a nice evil smile that looked perfectly fitting for a demon. He couldn't wait to get his filthy mitts on that Millennium Bug disk.

Rap and Crispin came back in and Rave woke up damn near having a coronary at his bizarre surroundings. He whipped his head round and stared bug-eyed at his partner, “what the eff?”

“Nice, isn't it?”

“Nice... yeah. Hey this sofa is actually squishy!” he bounced happily on it like a giddy kid. He spied the human demon, “he still hanging around?” he asked, “can I keep this sofa? Are we out of purgatory?” A rumble of thunder rattled the window. “Ah, no, still here. Can't have everything I suppose.”

They gathered in the refurbished lounge while dinner cooked and entertained themselves with various board games. Rave was still feeling a bit out of the loop; “so Crisp's hanging with us now?”

“Yes dear,” Rap explained patiently, “he can't stay at his house. It's not safe.”

Rave's scaly brow creased, “it's safe here with us?” he asked incredulously.

“That's right. We're his friends.”

“I didn't agree to that!”

“Behave.”

“And Crispin got us new furniture?”

Anar gave Rap a pleading look.

“Yes, the nice human got us some new furniture while you took a nap. You like that sofa don't you?”

Rave grinned, widely, displaying razor teeth. He didn't grin very often. It wasn't always a sign of happiness when he did. This time however he really was chuffed to bits. He'd laid claim to this particular piece of upholstery and even Anar wasn't about to challenge him over it. After all, he wasn't going to get to enjoy it for very long.

The sky outside darkened, the storm whipped up into a crashing frenzy and as they ate pizza and argued over rules while chasing dice across the floor Anar felt more and more nervous about what he was about to try and do. He'd kept the conversation steered clear of the stolen disk and Mr. Hutgarts's imminent demotion and was almost satisfied that keeping everyone entertained and plying them with drink was going to make it all easier somehow. He was going to do a disappearing trick in the dead of night, try and break into Frank Matlock's house and he might even have to use his magic while he was there to recover that much coveted item. If it all went tits-up and everything went to Hell in a hand cart (quite literally) his friends might not see him again. He'd tried deleting his own personnel file from the database, had tried filling out internal vacancy positions to work Upstairs with the Poltergeist and Possessions department, had tried travelling across the Astral plane to get back to the mortal realm, he'd even tried using a roaming spell on himself to gain access to the world of the living in his attempts at escaping this hole. None of that had worked. This had to work. If only for the fact there was no way he could show his face back at Floor twenty two without severe repercussions from their earlier shenanigans. Alexis would be after his hide. He might even have to go to HR. No, he'd choose straight up deletion over having to deal with those pricks. Rap and Rave would manage without him. They had a new friend now to fill his spot.

A new friend who had stopped on his way to retrieve the dice yet again after Rave had flung it too hard and was now waving a piece of paper around from Anar's pile on the floor.

“What's this?” he asked as Anar snatched it back.

“Probably just minutes from the last meeting,” he dismissed and then stopped as he scanned it.

“You said you hadn't seen draconish before,” Crispin insisted.

“What's that?” Rap nosed, “what you got?”

“It's... it's a scanned page from the book back at Warlock Court,” Anar explained, looking once again at the weird alien writing that no one had been able to read for generations. He'd carried it around in the hope of someday finding someone who could translate it. Looks like today was his lucky day. “You can read this?” he asked Crispin.

The human shrugged, “I'm a bit rusty but I know draconish when I see it.”

“Draconish?” Rap asked, still being nosey.

“Dragon tongue. The language of dragons. It's not far off Infernal as they're both ancient magical dialects.”

The small raptor looked at his mammalian grey friend, “a dragon wrote your family's history down?”

Anar was lost. “Don't ask me.” He handed it back to Crispin, “go on then. What does it say?”

He spent a moment deep in thought, “talks about a tricorn horn. Says 'The tricorn was a distant cousin of the unicorn having three connected spiralling horns upon it's brow. Unlike the unicorn whose living horn can be used for healing purposes, the tricorn horn if taken from the skull is a truly formidable weapon. Nisgarant the warlord was in possession of a tricorn horn from a beast he had personally slain and had strapped it to a slender golden sceptre. It became a treasure he guarded most jealously. Upon seeing it many enemies would immediately surrender. Nisgarant was not a merciful invader however and would insist on their deaths regardless. His General faithfully followed the warlord's orders until the day he was told to attack villagers who were all unarmed and mostly children'- sorry, is this your family history you say?” Crispin didn't seem keen to read any more.

Anar hesitated, “well it's supposed to explain how our distant ancestor became the first Warlock.”

“Sounds like a right bastard if he's killing kids,” Rave growled.

Anar shook his head, “no, that doesn't sound right. I'm sure Nisgarant is the bad guy.”

Crispin sniffed, “thank goodness for that, I mean I've nothing against an evil warlord but even demon's have standards. Ok – 'whereupon he refused and held his men back, shaking his head. Nisgarant flew into a blind rage at this insolence and swung his sceptre down in a graceful arc. As the blackened tip of the tricorn horn pierced his officer's armour and stabbed his fragile mortal flesh there at once appeared a curious web-like structure of tainted magic that flowed across his form and took his life force from within leeching it back into the magical artefact. The General slumped to the ground at the feet of Nisgarant's spectral steed and all were commanded to keep their distance and ignore the fallen officer. I had taken great pains not to reveal my true identity and it was only until after the slaughter of the enemy had been completed and night had fallen that I had opportunity to slip away and attend to him. He was of course quite dead but this was not a problem as my own magic could traverse the boundaries between the living and the deceased. He was rather surprised to be reanimated and was spoiling for a fight but a few carefully chosen words stayed his temper'- yeah Ok now he sounds like your ancestor.”

Anar shifted restlessly, “anything else?”

“Just this last bit – 'unfortunately my method of saving the noble warrior left a mark that I had not forseen; the blood that now flowed through his invigorated form was cursed with my dragon magic and that could only mean-'”

“Yes? Could only mean...?”

Crispin shook his head sadly, “sorry me ol buddy pal, that's it for this page.”

“Ooh that was quite exciting!” Rap cooed, “your ancestor got stabbed by a magical thingy, died and came back to life again. Busy day!”

“I was named after him you know,” Anar said. “Don't know anything about him – well I know a bit now, but I mean I didn't. I've only got that page because of the drawing of the tricorn horn sceptre. Thought it was pretty cool. I wish you could read me the rest of the book. I bet there's so much I could learn.”

“But you want out,” Crispin said softly, “and I won't see you again.”

Rave laughed, “he always wants out the daft sod! And he's still here. Probably with another madcap scheme lined up. Wouldn't be surprised if he only made friends with you cos he wants something!”

An uncomfortable hush fell upon the room.

“Who wants another drink?” Anar asked quickly, passing bottles around.

The timer went off in the kitchen, “pizzas done,” Rap said as everyone agreed they were hungry and the dinosaur nipped off to slice them up.

“We're safe here, right mate?” Crispin hissed from across the comfy chairs.

“Safe? Are you suffering from short term memory loss?” Anar snapped, “we're in the Underworld. Safe don't exist. If you mean 'are the big bad wraiths that work for Infernal Security gonna come knocking' then the answer is 'I bloody hope not'. If you mean 'are Matlock's hired thugs going to murder us in our beds?” then, again, the answer is 'I bloody hope not!'”

“Yeah. I wish I was brave like you.”

“I am not brave,” Anar cut in quick, “I just do the right thing without thinking. And look where it gets me! In a whole heap of trouble.”

Pizza smells took their attention away from the worries of the day and they munched happily while Rave reluctantly left his plush perch to dig through a pile of video tapes and select the evenings entertainment. The board game was still unfinished but that was nothing new. No one liked to lose anyway.

He dozed lightly with a full belly. He could hear gunfire coming from the massive speakers connected to the shiny new magically conjured television and assumed the good guys were winning. It was a funny sort of concept: good guys and bad guys. He had an Angelic brother who was under his father's evil influence and he himself was a demon who tried to do the right thing and told the truth whenever it was safe to do so. And what about all that business with his distant ancestor? Working for a warlord yet flat up refusing to murder those unarmed people and their kids? Blurred lines. Very blurred. Like retrieving that disk with the power to bring down Upstairs civilisation. People would die. Even worse maybe, they would suffer. And what for? Entertainment. That was all wretched mortals were good for. It was a good laugh when a plague broke out. Jolly japes when superpowers clashed and refugees fled across borders. Absolutely hysterical when dictators ruled with an iron fist leading to mass starvation and urgent headlines on the news channels. Heaven was no better. They did the same despicable acts, just without the giggles and instead with that moral superiority that screamed 'if we do it, then it's obviously ok and if anyone gets hurt they deserved it for being a bad person'. His eyes flew open. There was another way. He could retrieve the disk, get that appointment with the dragon and he could serve up some justice while he was at it. All in one weekend. His heart thumped steadily. The idea of causing so much trouble... unimaginable levels of trouble made him feel dizzy. If he had to resort to using his magic then so be it. The reward would be worth it.

He excused himself to take a much needed shower.