Spirit Girl

 Back when D.A.L.I. was an idea without a name...

An unimaginable shadow is cast across a small European village, not just for it's incredible size, but what managed to cast it. The entire upper half of the cathedral at the city's center flew overhead, holding together for one glorious moment before it truly felt the impact of what had sent it flying. A rain of terrible wooden splinters and shattered brick work scatter across a village already in disarray, the bell bounding across the ground with loud rhythmic clangs that barely covered up the shouts of anger from the armed citizens.

One of the few sounds louder though was the laugh of Zipacna, the demon admiring his handiwork as he pulls back the enormous pillar responsible for the deed. The death god already stood around 5 meters tall, but the pillar he wielded like a club was still taller, it stabbed through the top with the scythes of psychopomps who had quit or been disarmed as he had made his first moves in the land of mortals. The metal blades that pierced like nails into a bat hardly made a difference when it was swung, but this was the only "scythe" Zed would allow himself since leaving Xibalba.

"Never seen a building move like that!" he called out, looking for his ally among the enraged townspeople. An armored skeleton was being swarmed by villagers with daggers that seemed to have been meant more for ceremony, but Zipacna was more worried the undead knight he brought with him had missed the sight than for his own safety. After all, those daggers would really have to work to cut into bone! Zed's flesh would have technically been at greater risk, but few had the wherewithal to approach after what was still his only attack of this raid.

Unfortunately, his plans going forward meant Zipacna had to plant the pillar into the dirt, its size too unwieldy for what could still be charitably called the church's interior. No one seemed keen to stand in his path, Zed cracking the floor as he stomped forward, paying no mind to the small crowd behind him who imagined hopefully there could be a way to backstab him. The demon's four eyes were set on one individual though, perhaps the only human here who wasn't on edge.

"The strength of this demon Hell has sent for us only proves how mightily they fear our God!" the pastor calls out, his advanced age not robbing the brimstone from his passionate preaching. "This world's impurities can only be purged with our divine light and we are its only worthy vessels! Begone, beast, lest we show you the the divine wroth of one beyond your barbaric understanding!"

Zed's smile had faded once he saw the pastor, picking up his pace as he scowled at the clergyman before him. The pastor only laughed as he felt the fury barreling towards him, "Do you think our faith one without substance? These people follow my word for it is divinely gifted to me! My lord shall not abandon his greatest disciple!" he calls out, his robes billowing as the stole around his neck almost extended out like tentacles waving in water. His heels rise up, the air around him swirling with power and light as the pastor's eyes fade into a searing yellow glow that caused them to bleed around the edges. From above this dark night, the clouds are parted by beams of holy energy, some deity known only to these parishioners sending down its part of the divine bargain. The light pierces through Zipacna, caiman muscle carved out of one arm and a blast of bone coming out of his back sending the civilians scattering for safety.

The pastor let out a cry of glee and pain, the demon scoured by the light... but unimpeded. Zed continues to walk forward, grabbing the priest like he was scooping up a doll and just as quickly slamming him into the nearby stonework without even looking at the bloody pulp the act left behind. Zipacna did feel the pain of the holy attack, but he let out a little chuckle as he continued forward, pulling open a basement hatch. "That's the problem crossing pantheons: why would your holiness harm someone who doesn't respect it?" He was mostly talking to himself, trying to toughen up his resolve. He hadn't known for sure how he'd handle it, and he wasn't even sure he could lift his pillar after the injuries he was trying to look tough by ignoring. Still, he hadn't really come to do an extermination. He came because of what he heard was down in this basement.

The first few doors he opened he'd never tell anyone what he found. After all, there was nothing left to be done about it. He hadn't even expected such finds, but he wished he could go back up and smash that pastor a few more times. D'Angelo wasn't kidding in calling it a cult, their views on what should be done with people who defied death marked across those cold stone cells. However, Zed perked up when he heard movement, the death god moving quickly and actually pulling the door off its hinges without even trying. It meant he didn't notice it was locked from the outside, but when he looks in, he sees a cell in remarkably better shape.

However, the thin bed, the single dresser, and the ratty pillows and bedsheets had all been pushed together into one corner, Zipacna not able to make out what he was seeing amidst them at first. He takes a knee as he enters, trying to peer closer only to hear the shaking of a small form, a girl no more than ten nearly hidden amidst the bedding thanks to her ghostly white hair. Owlish eyes showed a fear that the girl's unmoving face did not, the blank stare like that of a deer who had seen a wolf's eyes glint in the moonlight.

"ROOK WAT I FUND!" A muffled cry pierces the staredown, Sir Daniel Fortescue walking up behind Zed and brandishing a multi-tailed whip that he shakes around in the air proudly. The skeletal knight only then looks in the cell Zed stood beside, noticing the girl trembling even more before he quickly hides it behind his back, his one eye trying to look around obliviously like he hadn't been the loud interruption that just came in.

Zipacna lets out a sigh before trying to be friendly with his ally. "Hey, I'll take care of everything down here. You... go look around and make sure there's no one else here to cause trouble. And get rid of that damn thing, we're not monsters." Despite realizing his action had been a faux pax, the jawless skeleton still mumbled indignantly as he tossed the switch aside, his pride meaning he didn't take even a reasonable dismissal well.

Zed looks back at the strange girl, trying to look less fearsome than usual. She couldn't have been more than ten years old he figured, and he holds a hand forward to try and start a dialogue. "Hey, I know you're probably-" was all he managed to say before the wide eyes snap shut and suddenly a strange looking spirit leaps from her form. Zipacna doesn't move, letting the ghost pass through him, but while he had expected injury, he instead felt an odd draining feeling. His confidence suddenly plummets, the ghost sapping it and carrying it in a small pink ball before it returned to the tiny girl. The ghost and the confidence both enter her, her white hair tinged pink as the pilfered emotion manages to help her once more glare at the strange demon in her cell.

"Wow... did you do that?" Zipacna cracks a smile. "That was amazing! I've never seen someone who can move emotions around!" His enthusiasm seemed true, but the girl still watched his every small movement cautiously. "Look, I get it, I know what I look like," he says, putting a hand to his chest.

"I'll be straight you with you. I'm a death god. No, I'm not here to kill you!" he quickly asserts, but he wasn't sure how afraid that claim had made her. "I heard about these awful people here and refused to let it stand. People are always quick to hurt things that make them uncomfortable. Would you believe I tried to talk to these people when I showed up? It took knocking the head off the church to get them to listen!"

Zed realizes his usual high energy ways weren't speaking to this girl, so he sighs, "I'm trying to build a world where people like you and me don't have to fear what others are going to do to us. We can't help what we are, right? We're just trying to life life, even if some of us are on our second go." The more he looked at her though, the more he realized this girl wasn't a spirit. She breathed rapidly, her cheeks were warm, and you don't keep undead in a cell with places to use the restroom. He wondered if D'Angelo knew the "spirit girl" was actually some girl who could manifest spirits, but considering that guy's way of looking at the world, it would be no surprise if he sent Sir Daniel and Zed in to save some kid even if it didn't line up with their burgeoning movement.

Zed was worried the gap between the living and dead might be too large to clear with a ten year old girl frightened by what she saw... so he lowered his head. "I get if you don't trust me. But, you can see into me in a way others can't, right? Take whatever emotions you want, you'll see there's no bit of deception in me." Zipacna wasn't sure what emotion might be tied to verisimilitude, but after a few heavy seconds of silence, two new ghosts appear from the girl and pass through him, delivering what seemed to be two feelings. Zed could tell one was nervousness, which he wasn't sure how deeply the girl could perceive the source of. The other though left him briefly angry, not because of the fact she took it, but taking away genuine enthusiasm meant a different emotion had to briefly surge before he could calm himself back down. Zipacna almost felt more weary having his feelings stolen than getting hit by the divine power of some backwoods god, but however the spirit girl interpreted the emotions, it seems they spoke better than the death god could.

She comes out from behind the bedding, legs still trembling, but before Zed could consider what to do, the girl throws herself against his arm, leaning against it for support. Raising his other arm, despite it being the wounded one, he pats her gently on the back, although it seemed the girl didn't have any tears left to shed as she realized she'd finally be able to leave this dark world behind. "What's your name kiddo?"

 

"...Her... hertekil fi... filth..." she said weakly.

 

"No, come on! We're not doing any of that," He says, standing up and hefting her up with his good arm now. "There's no creed or commandments here, just a love for everything alive and dead. Gonna try and give me that name again?" 

She hesitated, but she spoke with a little more life, "Perona."

"Perona! I like it. Italian, right?" he says, although Perona herself had no clue. He laughs as he can see a little confusion on her face, "Sorry about that, that's a boring kind of thing to talk about. Call me Zed! We'll talk about better things than name origins. I got people I want you to meet, and if any of them gives you trouble, I'll smash them into next week. That sound good?"

Perona nods rapidly, settling onto Zed's shoulder and letting her head rest as her terror fully subsides. However, ever the man for bad timing, Sir Daniel returns in time to see Zed walking out of the basement with only Perona in tow.

"Wuts dat?" he mumbles, "Jus one grl? Not reary a resue missin wordy of a nighd!" The skeleton complains, putting his hands on his hips as his one eye manages a glare at Perona.

"You fought off a village of crazy cultists! It may not be the heroics that put you in legend, but people like a story with a bunch of fights!" Zed laughs as he walks forward, Daniel tapping his foot impatiently. Since his resurrection a while back, he'd been hoping to wipe away the humiliation of dying ignominiously in battle back in the middle ages, but glory wasn't easily found. The prideful knight didn't seem to be here out of the goodness of his own heart, and as Perona realizes this, she sticks her tongue out at the gloryseeker.

Sir Daniel Fortescue's eye bulges as he raises his fist and shakes it at the little girl. "YOU SEE DAT? WAT A BWAT!" he tries to mumble angrily, but the gangly knight's impotent fury was a nice change of pace over what Perona was used to. A slight sly smile appears as she sticks her tongue out at him again, the knight stomping in place as Zed begins to walk off.

"WE SULD WEAVE HER BEHIN!" he adds grumpily, only to have a hand smack the back of his chestplate. The skeleton's head spins on its spinal column to see the culprit, but it wasn't a face many people would be happy to see.

"I can tell you one thing you don't want going down in legend: leaving a kid to rot in Hell on Earth." D'Angelo's voice sounded like plegm and rasp where battling for supremacy, the nosferatu sticking to the darkness since he knew that girl didn't need to see any other horrors this night.

"We're lucky this tale's got anything close to a market-friendly happy ending. Should have got us moving sooner when the rumors slithered my way. This town's pet cemetery would have a lot fewer coffins had I just pulled the trigger..."

Sir Daniel's single eye gawks at D'Angelo in confusion.

"If you dig up those coffins, Daniel, you won't find Fido's collar."

"OHHH! NOOO!!!" Daniel was angry again, "DID NOT WAN TO KNOW DAT!" he call out.

"Horror stories follow horrors, 'good sir'. If you really want to spin in your grave, I should tell you about what went down in Prague-"

"LALALALA!" Fortescue's hands were clasped on the side of his skull now, the knight starting to sprint away to avoid hearing anything else uncomfortable this night. D'Angelo looks back towards the open basement, letting out a grumble that sounded like boiling sludge.

"This mudball's got a lot of skeletons to dig up, and I've been granted an eternity to do it. These dead man are looking to write new tales, but will anyone on their first go round sit down and listen? Could be a kid like that might be the only way they listen, while the rest of them," he idly pushes a bloodied bone around with his foot, "Won't sympathize til they're force to join our side."

 

Gianni D'Angelo looks off towards his unlikely allies, almost flinching at the light they kept inside them somehow, but they needed his grimy ear to the ground to point them towards something that would make a difference. He could tell the bottle and the ashtray how pointless it felt, but the world had changed a lot the past few years. Everything that had been coming out of New York sounded like nonsense, but even if 1% of it was true, a repentant death god, a vainglorious skeleton, and a vampire detective were hardly the strangest things in this brave new world...