Suddenly A Succubus
Chapter 26.6

Vee braced herself against the pillar, watching as Amara charged Mr. Wellington. She released a sickening explosion of hellfire that caused Vee’s ears to ring, but thankfully it managed to knock the cult leader back to the edge of the portal. By the time Vee’s hearing had returned to normal, Mr. Wellington had fallen into the portal, but Amara’s attack seemed to have thrown off her balance. Vee watched as Amara lost her footing, and began falling towards the portal.

Reaching out, Vee grabbed Amara’s arm and held tight, grabbing the pillar to keep them both safe. The pull from the portal was immense, and Vee could feel her body straining as she tried to keep Amara from falling in.

Another shape appeared, seemingly another cultist, hurtling through the air. His dagger vanished into the portal, but at the last second, he managed to grab Amara’s tail. She winced in pain, and Vee felt her already tenuous grip threaten to give way entirely. She looked down, and time seemed to slow as she locked eyes with Amara.

Vee could see gallons of blood soaking her friend’s body, especially on her razor-sharp claws. Amara redoubled her grip, her demonic hands digging into Vee’s flesh. There was so much anger in Amara’s eyes, fury that had been brought out by the night’s events, and it terrified her. She recalled moments from earlier, when she’d caught glimpses of Amara’s fight with Mr. Wellington. Amara had been laughing maniacally, completely lost in the carnage she was creating. Was Vee’s friend still in there? Or had something finally snapped?

Amara’s eyes were still pitch black; her amber irises filled with fire as she stared up at Vee. Behind her, the last cultist was desperately holding on to Amara’s tail, doing everything in his power to avoid falling into the portal.

If I let go, not only do I end this cult, but I rid the world of… whatever Amara might become. She’s clearly still changing; how do I know where this ends?

As Vee stared down at her prior friend, she saw Amara’s eyes change. The demon’s sclera shifted from black to white, and the look of fury in her eyes changed to one of desperation. Tears formed, threatening to fall as she stared back. “Vee… please…”

No. Whatever Amara is, she’s trying to be better.

Vee reached deep inside herself, praying for every ounce of strength she could, and gripped Amara’s clawed wrist as hard as she could. She nodded slowly at Amara, who smiled back before looking down to start kicking the last cultist off her tail.

“Brandon!” Amara shouted. “Go to Hell, you fucker!”

Behind them, the portal at the center of the magic circle began flickering. The edges of it grew fuzzy, and it started to resemble a skewed, distorted VHS image as it struggled to stay open. Vee had no idea how much longer they had before the portal closed.

The cultist scowled at Amara, his other hand grabbing her tail as well as he tried to start climbing higher. Amara tried to flick her tail, to attack her with its bladed edge, but she seemed to be losing strength fast. Vee tried to think of something to do, but any magic she used would also endanger Amara.

Before she could think of anything, a switchblade appeared out of nowhere and buried itself in one of the cultist’s hands. Vee looked over to Tessa, her tattoos were glowing bright, and saw she was focusing on dislodging this last cultist. The dagger broke the cultist’s grip, and Tessa quickly attacked his other hand. The pain must have been too much, as the cultist finally flinched and lost his grip on Amara’s tail.

Behind him, the distortion of the portal was growing stronger, its edges scattering more and more. Vee was worried the portal might close before the cultist made it through, but thankfully that wasn’t the case. Just before the portal closed for good, the cultist fell inside. His screams filled the chamber, he continued reaching for something to grab onto as the portal closed around his wrist. A sickening crack reverberated through the room, accompanied by a strange electrical charge, and then all was quiet.

Vee and Amara fell to the ground, gasping from exertion. Once she had caught her breath, Vee slowly stood up, leaning against the pillar to keep steady. Without warning, Amara jumped at Vee, who nearly released a burst of angelic light in her surprise.

“Vee, thank you!” Amara whispered, tears in her eyes. “Without you, I… I would’ve…”

Vee looked down, stunned by the sudden burst of emotionality. Amara was hugging Vee tight, and crying into her shoulder. Despite everything Vee had just seen, the blood, the carnage, the terrifying power Amara had unleashed, she was nothing more than a scared college student at the moment.

Beside them, Tessa had rolled onto her back, her eyes wide as she gasped for air. She began grabbing her legs, her waist, her shoulders, almost in shock that everything was still there. "We... we did it. We survived! Fucking Hell! We're not dead!!" The witch started laughing, hugging herself tight in celebration. Her laughter filled the chamber, a welcome reprieve from the agonizing shrieks of demons and cultists.

Vee couldn't help but agree with Tessa's sentiment. She'd been so focused on stopping the cult, on wrestling with her complicated feelings about Amara, that she'd never thought about what might happen if they succeeded. She thought back to the fight they'd just won; how many times had she cheated death? What would have happened had Amara not jumped in to save them? She'd seen the horrible creature that Mr. Wellington had become, and Amara had single-handedly kept him away from her. With the gift of hindsight, she knew that whatever demon the mad cult leader had summoned would have easily killed her.

Whatever came next, whatever tension might still exist between the two of them, Vee was alive. A tear of her own fell down her cheek, and she wrapped her arms around Amara to hug her back. They had been friends once, and that was comfort enough for now.

A few more minutes passed, the girls each processing their victory in their own way. Amara's breathing started to slow, and she whispered into Vee's ear. "Vee... you saved my life."

Vee moved her arms off Amara, stammering for a second before responding. “You spared me, I spared you. Just… consider us even, Hellspawn.”

Amara pulled back, smirking as she wiped a tear off her cheek. “Right, totally no other reason,” she said. She took a deep breath, releasing the last of the tremors that had accompanied her tears. “Could you give me some space? I need to wash this blood off of me.”

Stepping back, Vee realized just how bloody Amara’s nearly naked body was. “Wash it off? How?”

Now several paces away, Amara summoned a torrent of hellfire around herself. For a few seconds, she let the flames circle and dance around her body, and when they finally vanished, it looked like she’d just finished a day at the spa. Her skin was practically flawless, unmarred from the battle, not a trace of blood to be seen. A disturbing thought crossed Vee’s mind, and she looked down at her own clothes. As she feared, they were completely soaked in blood.

“Oh, great. You couldn’t have cleaned yourself off before you hugged me? How am I supposed to get this off?”

“I’m sure you’ve got a spell in that book of yours somewhere, right?” Amara said, laughing quietly to herself.

From the center of the chamber, Tessa spoke up again. “Fuck. Fuck!”

Vee just now realized that Tessa had finally stopped laughing, and was now kneeling at the edge of the portal. “What happened?!”

“A few things. When I reverse engineered the portal, I was mostly working to counteract the damage the cult had done. I’d never seen the portal before today, though, so this is my first chance to see exactly what they did. I’m only now seeing that their work was horseshit.”

“Okay, so? They’re gone, right?” Amara asked.

“Yes, but that’s not the problem. If they had been more elegant with their alterations, then my reversal would have restored everything to normal. But, surprise surprise, they were a bunch of fuckwads! They practically brute forced their way past every protective measure. Previously, every circle on campus worked together to form a kind of Planar Gate. This counteracted the natural soft spot that exists here, making sure that nothing weird came through.”

“I don’t think I like where this is going,” Vee said.

“Well, tough luck. The cult had already done serious damage to the gate, and when I reversed their alterations, I basically blew the door off its hinges. The Gate is now totally inert, and we’re completely exposed to… well, anything and everything. At any point, if another plane happens to align with ours… something might slip though.”

Silence fell over the group, the girls all looking at each nervously. Their unspoken assumption was that ending the cult would return things to normal, but apparently that wasn’t the case. No one else on campus knew about the cult, the Gate, or this supposed soft spot. If anything else were to pop up, would it be their responsibility to handle it?

“Wait, you said a couple things were wrong, what else happened?” Amara flicked her tail, and after a small burst of fire, it returned to normal.

“Oh, that’s the worst part. When I stabbed Brandon, I wasn’t able to pull my switchblade out in time. The portal closed on his wrist and severed it, and I was hoping it would be the hand with my knife, but it wasn’t.”

“Wait, hold on,” Vee said, stepping closer. “The worst part of this whole night is that you lost your knife?”

“It was my favorite knife! It had, like, an oily rainbow effect on it!”

Vee rolled her eyes, but stepped closer to examine the circle itself. Just as Tessa had said, there was a severed hand lying on the floor. After everything she’d just seen, all the carnage Amara and Mr. Wellington had wrought, it was easy to suppress the urge to gag, but it was still gross to look at. As she kneeled down to get a closer look, the hand suddenly rose off the floor, its fingers curling into a point. It began moving towards Vee, who fell backwards in surprise.

“Ooooh watch out! Brandon’s coming back from the dead to get you!” Tessa began laughing hysterically, her tattoos glowing bright. Thankfully, before the hand could touch her, Amara snatched it out of the air.

“C’mon Tess, leave her alone.” Amara summoned another flash of hellfire, and after a few seconds, the hand was reduced to ashes.

“Ugh, fine. You’re no fun.” Tessa stood up, her back cracking as she started walking towards the elevator. “We should probably get back anyways, let Nick know that we fucking kicked ass tonight.”

“Wait, that’s it?” Vee asked. “We just… head home and go to sleep?”

“That’s how this works, holy girl,” Tessa said. “Unless you want to start calling in Church officials, the best thing to do is stay as far away as possible. We can’t tell anyone what happened, and it’s not like there are any bodies to find. Plus, this whole chamber is a secret anyways. Life will go on, it’ll be a little confusing for a while, but you either fucking deal with it or you don’t.”

Vee almost responded, but then hesitated. All her previous work for the Church had been small-scale, usually exorcisms or fighting minor demons that managed to sneak up to Earth. Was Tessa right? Would further action only make people more suspicious of her?

Amara spoke up next, stepping closer to Vee and putting a hand on her shoulder. “Hey, what if we comb this whole compound before heading out? I think there’s still two cultists left that weren’t involved in the final ceremony. They were trying to keep me busy so I wouldn’t intervene, and I never saw them join the big fight.”

The idea sounded nice, and Vee certainly appreciated a simpler task that would let her unwind from the chaos of the night. “Actually, Amara, what happened to you? You just vanished on us, and we had no idea what happened.”

“Oh, they set up another summoning circle with the blood I left behind from our first raid. Then Brandon and two other guys tried to, um… prevent me from stopping the ritual.” Amara was looking awkwardly at Vee, likely trying not to upset her.

Vee rolled her eyes as she responded. “Amara, just tell us what happened. It can’t be any worse than what we just went through.”

With a shrug, Amara responded. “Gangbang. But feeding on all three of them gave me the strength to break out and save you guys, so it all worked out in the end. Plus, honestly? I feel fucking amazing. I’ve never been that juiced up before!”

“No shit, seriously? ‘Atta girl, that’s my succubus!” Tessa ran closer, slapping Amara’s bare ass while they all started heading towards the back corridors. Amara started sharing details with Tessa, explaining exactly what happened and how she was able to break out. Tessa hung on her every word, excited both about the fucking and the apparent power spike that followed it.

Great, now there’s two of them.

Vee sighed in defeat, listening to Amara recount her sexual adventures while they started clearing out the rest of the compound. She watched them walk away, following a few steps behind, with absolutely no interest in joining the conversation. This meant, however, that she was faced with a very explicit reminder that Amara wasn't wearing any clothes, only covered up by a few strategic plates of chitinous exoskeleton. She'd been so flustered by the blood, and caught up in the excitement of surviving, that she hadn't registered the nudity when they'd been hugging earlier.

Before looking away, for one brief moment, a fraction of a second so infinitesimally tiny that Vee didn't even know it had happened, her eyes lingered on Amara's naked curves.