Contractor: Chapter - 46

Every problem solved is another revealed.

            “Well… I’ll be honest that was not the sort of question I expected.”

Of course it wasn’t, it was kind of arbitrary actually, but I had been curious from the first second I’d been able to rest in my new life. No one wanted to tell me about that sort of thing, and when I asked about anything at all I only ended up knowing less. My new life was a frustratingly confusing existence and if I was going to know anything for sure I wanted to start from the top. How did you become a contractor, what did that mean, what is a contractor really, and how do you stop being a contractor… or better yet how can you kill one. My motives were completely pure of course though, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to ask lest I break one of my cardinal instructions that had been set in place on day one.

“I only ask because it seems important and it will help me do my job better… also no one seems too keen on letting me anywhere near the subject.” I shrugged like it was no big deal. It was though. It was a huge deal.

“And for good reason. What you’re asking for is knowledge forbidden to non-contractor, and I couldn’t possibly tell you anything about it even if I wanted to… although… we do technically have a contract and I should be empowered to hold up my end of the bargain.” Eleanor’s expression was odd, like she was working over something in her head, half frown half biting her tongue. It reminded me of the way Amy looked when she was trying to fight an order from Hope.

“So are we good, or do I need a new question?”

“No, you should be fine… I just need to think of how to start.” She paused again. “Right… So you know nothing about this?”

“Absolutely nothing.”

“Maybe not…” She paused out on me again. Clearly it wasn’t as much of an issue of whether or not she was allowed to talk about this, but it was just something that was hard to talk about. This was possibly due to having been restricted for so long. “You know how we write contracts, right?”

“Sort of…”

“We make a proposition of a trade, generally a soul or souls for a boon of sorts. It has to have proper consideration, be agreed upon by both parties, and generally takes written form to be signed as proof.”

“What does this have to do with becoming a contractor?”

“The process follows the same principles,” She sighed. “The contractor to be has to die for to loosen their soul from their mortal body, which normally would start to burn that soul up until it disappears, but before their soul dissipates another contactor places it in a special vessel.”

“What kind of vessel are we talking about here…?”

“A lot like this one.” Eleanor casually lifted the vial from the chain hanging around my neck. The sudden movement into my personal space startled me. “Only bigger. Or, preferably, if you already have one handy, a soul forge. And before you ask, a soul forge is the type of vessel that becomes a contractor’s body. They’re more durable, all around superior vessels which let us burn other souls in the place of our own. In essence just delaying the inevitable dissipation, but indefinitely.”

“So if it requires another contractor, how did the first contractor do it?” It seemed like a reasonable enough question, but not one that would have a reasonable answer.

“I’m not sure, but the contract which allows us to make more contractors is an extension of whatever happened then to let us exist in the first place. We don’t really even know how to do it fully, or how to make a soul forge. From what I understand contractors have to contract someone else to make them, sort of magically imparting the knowledge we never knew… or maybe it’s in our DNA. We are quite literally made of them after all.”

“So your body is like… a machine?” The only thing that came to mind at the word forge was a blacksmith hammering hot metal on an anvil.

“I guess… I don’t usually think about it.” Eleanor paused to look down at her hands for a second. “I feel… similar to when I was alive, but not as strongly. It’s almost like I have to work to get at the emotions and sensations I had before and even then they’re pale imitations.”

“I guess that sort of explains a few things, like why you guys are all so strong. But how do you actually put the soul in it… if that makes sense?”

“That’s actually a good question, or at least, I have a good answer for it. Because we can’t just claim every dying soul for our own, we can’t just take the soul. We have to move it into a vessel that we don’t own, one that nobody owns and that soul can make their own.”

“So if you can’t really touch what you don’t own, how do you use souls to kill people?”

“We don’t just burn souls to extend our lives, we use them as fuel for other things too. Like move between the mortal world and other places, powering contracts, and killing people.”

“But how?”

“I’m not really sure how I know how to do it, it’s a natural instinct. I don’t know what other contractors do, but when I’m threatened I go into autopilot and burn souls as fast and hot as I can to make this… aura. It’s like the extreme burn creates the opposite effect, the hot becomes cold and there’s like this negative zone that feeds off the souls of other people or contractors.”

“That mist thing…”

“Yes, it does look like mist or fog.” She trailed off into a sigh.

“Alright.” I’d been trying to take as long as possible to get to the last point I had in mind, but Eleanor was answering my questions so easily it was going pretty fast. “So how do you kill a contractor?”

“I was wondering when you’d get to that.” Eleanor frowned at the idea as she waited to see if I’d defend myself. I didn’t bother. She had to answer the question. “Fine. Like I said earlier, being a contractor is like a prolonging of the final stages of life. We burn other souls to keep our bodies, our forges, from using our own to sustain ourselves. So the most obvious method would be to get a contractor to burn everything they have through extreme effort. That’s generally very hard though, considering the amount of souls any given contractor may be carrying. It’s not like we store them anywhere else besides our own bodies… there are no soul banks… well… typically. That’s another question that doesn’t really matter.”

“Are there any other ways?” The gun I’d been given and used to shoot Albert came to mind. The man had said it could kill anything.

“Well, there are a few odd ways of going about it. That mirror, for one. Stupid piece of trash. Various other contracted tools. It really depends how many souls go into crafting a given weapon. Enhanced weapons follow the same concept of the original, they make a contractor expend more power to neutralize, but take about the same amount of souls to make. If you put the power of a few hundred billion souls into a single bullet, for instance, it’d probably kill a normal contractor… assuming they gave you the chance to aim at them.”

“I had some bullets like that…” I felt compelled to share the fact. If Albert had actually saved Hope, it might have been worth telling his mother.

“I know.” The response was blank, it made me nervous. After she’d literally beaten me to death, she was still making me nervous. “I have them… or most of them at least. One of the many considerations from the Death dynasty in exchange for my son.” She patted her purse, which I hadn’t really thought about until that moment. It was normal for women to carry a purse, but what did a contractor need one for? I had seen Hope carry one occasionally, but she never really touched it. “I wouldn’t be too worried, I couldn’t actually kill you even if I wanted to, hand cannon or not.”

“Sorry if that doesn’t make me feel safe.”

“Your type are the ultimate manifestation of the power we use… One soul, not even burning, but able to keep you alive forever. Trick or not, that’s what contractors really want, and yet it’s the one thing we can never have… and I imagine that’s why the cost of having it is so steep.” Eleanor looked at me for the first time since we’d sat down together. It was almost a glare, but still too soft to be truly terrifying. “Anyway, feel what you want, we’re almost done so at this point it doesn’t matter much. Did you have anything else you wanted to know about in this line of questioning?”

“Uh…” As our conversation had progressed it had become less and less casual feeling and I got the impression we had been drawing more and more attention. I’m sure there was more I wanted to ask, but I was seeing that it wasn’t actually a real no strings attached arrangement. The more we talked, the more dangerous she became in my mind. Fear is something I had always avoided, it caused panic, and panic was never good for anything. I needed to keep level headed so that I could trust my instincts. “None that I want to ask for now. Though I trust if you wanted to make a similar deal later, you wouldn’t mind too much. You seem lonely after all.”

“Don’t push it, girl. Now where’s my stalker?”

I looked around the mall. I had anticipated that he would be easy enough to see, considering we’d crossed paths before, but as I looked around I didn’t see him at all. Then I remembered, not sticking out was basically the thing he did best. He didn’t do well in awkward situations though, he’d just go back to being the psycho he was if he didn’t know what to do in a given circumstance.

“This really does go against everything I’ve conditioned myself against,” I sighed. It felt so wrong to do, but it was the easiest way to catch him off guard. “Ryan!”

My scream echoed off the walls of the mall, and for a second everyone froze in shock. Except for him. Almost immediately afterwards the clicking sound of footsteps on the marble tile floor resumed, and I was given only a handful of weird looks. I stood out now. And so did Eleanor, but I don’t think she minded much. I knew exactly where Ryan was though, and I wasted no time in getting up and grabbing hold of him before he could run away.

“I’m just trying to buy these sunglasses.” His protest were awful. If someone grabbed you, your first instinct should be to try and defend what you were doing… I couldn’t have him stealing though, so I grabbed the sunglasses off his face and threw them back at the kiosk he’d been lurking around.

“Eleanor, Ryan. Ryan, Eleanor.” My introduction as I dragged Ryan to the bench was a little strained with the effort of keeping hold of my prey. “Though I’m pretty sure you knew her name already…”

“This is it?” Eleanor didn’t seem impressed. “I cross the big bad of contractors, and he sends a scrawny little twig after me?” She massaged her temples in a mock effort to appear embarrassed for Dante’s little stakeout.

“To be fair, you had to ask for help to find me, so perhaps sometimes it’s the scrawny twigs that get the job done.” Ryan was still blank and not bothering to try and cover up his lack of feeling.

“Maybe.” A sigh hissed out from between her pressed lips. “At the very least I’ll commend you on not being a poor sport about this. Sadly, you have lost, so you will be paying the price.”

“I work for Death, I don’t expect you to be doing anything he can’t stop.” Now it was my turn to be embarrassed for Ryan. He didn’t have a clue just how miniscule Dante was in the world of contractors.

“Well then, I’ll consider that a challenge to be more creative.”

“I’d rather you didn’t.” Dante’s completely random and unexpected appearance was more than welcome in what had become a rather odd little adventure.

“Speak of the devil.” Eleanor muttered the phrase, but I could see Dante smile. The comparison wasn’t something I would have personally wanted, but he insisted on playing the bad guy.

“Perhaps we should disappear before we draw a bigger crowd. That hallways over there leads to the restrooms, and I think it will make for a more than suitable exit path.” Dante put a hand on my shoulder and the other on Ryan’s and began to lead us in the direction he’d indicated. “Feel free to follow if you also feel like staying apprised of recent events, Eleanor. Otherwise, I’m afraid all your effort will have been for nothing.”

“Of course.” Eleanor muttered her reply just loud enough to be heard over the ambient noise around us.

“Stay behind me, both of you.” Dante’s silent order surprised me.

The second we were out of public view Dante turned around to face Eleanor just as she reeled back to punch him. The punch didn’t land and Dante didn’t flinch as it was caught up in a mess of black webs just in front of his face. Eleanor was clearly caught off guard, I could see a look of panic as she struggled to free her hand. I recalled her statement about the pale blue mist she used as a self-defense mechanism and as if on cue it began to cascade off her body and jump at Dante.

“Step back, Ryan.” Dante’s instruction was stern, but his expression was as dead as ever. “You don’t want any of this on you.”

Black webs began to whip around the hallway we were standing in. The passage back into the rest of the mall was completely covered up and I could begin to hear the faint scratches of movement in the dark corners of the space Dante had created. Everywhere the webs were, Eleanor’s blue mist was unable to cross, like it was getting stuck.

“My little iteration works a little slower, but it’s much more effective, so I hope you won’t struggle much.” Dante slowly reached out and removed Eleanor’s hand from the webbing, finally free she stepped back to a ‘safer’ position. “Good, you don’t look like you want to fight anymore.” She looked horrified. “I know what you’re after, but you won’t get it. Your son’s body is buried where no one will ever find it… Unless you do something for me.”

I was disgusted now. Not because of the webbing, not because of the small blue glowing eyes skittering all around the floor and walls, not even because of Dante… what he was doing was disgusting. Extorting a woman by holding her son’s body hostage. It was wrong on so many levels, and yet he still had that dark deadpan glaze across his face.

“I want you to give me the bullets you received in exchange for his body the first time around. I know you have them on you now, the gun too, but you can keep that… and perhaps one or two of the bullets. I don’t like leaving a woman utterly defenseless when there are plenty of powerful people that want her dead. You’ll stay under our protection, of course, this little deal won’t change that.”

“No.” Eleanor’s response was quiet, but she’d regained some of her composure. More than anything, she just looked sad again. “I don’t want your protection. Victor demanded that, and I don’t want it. Take the bullets,” she produced a familiar pouch from her purse, “just give me back my son and leave me alone.” I thought I saw something like an emotional response cross Dante’s face, but it was very fast and hard to tell from where I was standing.

“I’m sorry, but that’s still non-negotiable.” Dante held out his hand. “The bullets for the body, take it or leave it.”