The Devil's Apprentice by Patrick Stewart (polar express read aloud TXT) 📕

she continued to stare at him, he decided to give her a wave. The demon did not wave back.

“How did you get up here?”

“The elevator,” Alex raised a hand and pointed behind with an extended thumb.

“You shouldn’t have access,” the demon said, her eyes bore into him. “You’re both unimportant Demon Hunters.”

“Are you trying to be hurtful?” Alex asked. He raised a hand to his chest, feigning pain. “Because it doesn’t look like you are, which makes it hurt so much more.”

“You’re annoying,” the receptionist commented.

“Sometimes,” Karen said quickly. “Um, is it at all possible to see Satani? It’s really important.”

“I don’t think Satani is in the mood for a visit from one of her Demon Hunters, especially not after one of them decided to get into a fight with an angel.”

Karen leaned forward, eyes wide. “Is that why the angels were here?” she asked in a hushed tone.

The demon nodded before her eyes came to rest on Alex once more. He instinctively raised his hands in a defensive manner, as if to say it wasn’t him. The demon girl rolled her eyes. She reminded him of some of the receptionists that worked in the same building he did security in. They were really pretty but came off arrogant and seemed to have a lack of interest in most things.

“You won’t be allowed to see Satani,” the demon receptionist said firmly. “But if you insist it is of the utmost importance-”

“Oh it really is,” Karen interrupted quickly.

The demon’s eyes flared. “If you insist it’s of the utmost importance,” she repeated, “I can let you through to see Scarlett.”

“Oh…” Karen stepped back from the desk, then turned to look up at Alex. “What do you think?” she whispered.

“About the angels?” Alex asked. “It wasn’t me,” he lied. It was so very much him…

“No, not the angels,” Karen said, then she paused. Her eyes watched him carefully. “You didn’t mess with the angels, did you?” she asked. Before Alex had a chance to impress her with his incredibly awful lying skills, Karen shook her head, frustrated. “Bigger things to worry about,” she muttered. “What do you think about seeing Scarlett?”

“I don’t like her,” Alex said immediately. “She’s a bitch.”

“Me neither,” Karen muttered her agreeance reluctantly. “Scarlett doesn’t hide her disdain for Demon Hunters. She sort of scares me too…”

“You’re afraid of stuff?” Alex asked.

Karen frowned. “Of course I am. being a Demon Hunter doesn’t take your fear away, dummy.”

“Good to know.”

“We might as well see Scarlett,” Karen muttered. “It’s better her than no one.”

 Alex shrugged. Scarlett didn’t strike him as the kind to care about the deaths of humans. The bitch had threatened to hurt him and to cause him pain. She’d enjoyed watching him suffer.

“Let’s meet her,” Karen said, mistaking his shrug of indifference for one of indecision. She turned towards the receptionist. “Please,” she said, her voice polite. “We’d love to be able to meet with Scarlett.”

The demon receptionist gave a curt nod of the head. The red glass doors parted. “Sit in the waiting area.”

They walked past the red doors and into the lobby of the hundredth floor. The floor of dark wood, the parquet octagrams, red walls with cornice mouldings of the same octagram, the staircase at the end that led up to darkness, Alex shivered. He had bad memories of the place. The two Demon Hunters dragging him up the stairs, their nails digging into his flesh, Satani standing over him, her claws digging into his chest, pulling his soul out…

“Wimp,” the voice said. 

Alex sat down on the red leather settee and ignored the voice in his head as they waited for Scarlett.

“I can sense your fear. You’re going to piss yourself, aren’t you?” 

Alex gritted his teeth. It was hard to ignore a voice that was literally inside your head. “Not afraid, dipshit. Just remembering what happened here the last time.”

“What happened?” 

“You really don’t remember?” Alex asked sceptically. “I was dragged up those stairs. Satani dug her claws into my chest and pulled my soul out,” he paused, before continuing, “you said that would be the death of you…” 

“Don’t remember any of that, but I’m still here cuz I’m a tough motherfucker,” the voice said. 

Alex rolled his eyes. “A tough motherfucker with dementia…”

“What?” Karen asked.

“Nothing,” Alex said quickly.

“Talking to yourself again?” Karen asked, an eyebrow raised.

Alex nodded sheepishly.

“You should stop doing that. The last thing we need is for Scarlett to think you’re crazy.”

It was at that precise moment Scarlett appeared at the bottom of the stairs, having stepped out of darkness. Alex hoped now that he had grown half a foot and forty pounds of muscle, he wouldn’t have been afraid of her. But Scarlett looked as intimidating as the first time Alex had lain his eyes on her.

She was still taller than him, if only by an inch. Her black eyes bore into him as she sat on the opposite settee. Though the wooden coffee table separated them, Alex thought he could feel this powerful heat radiating from her.

“Don’t be afraid of the bitch. We can take her, easy,” the voice muttered. 

“That’s what you said last time, right before we didn’t take her,” Alex muttered. “Please shut up!” 

“What,” Scarlett said.

A single word, yet it had both Karen and Alex sitting up straight. The tone of her voice, the commanding power, Alex remembered back to the first time he’d met her. He’d been afraid of her when she had been an unknown entity. Now he knew what she was. He’d met other demons, even the devil herself. But this power that seemed to radiate from her, it had him on edge.

Karen began to speak. The sound of her voice was soothing, and it relaxed Alex somewhat. Until he noticed Scarlett staring