The Price of a Soul [Chapter 1.2]

Last Line(s) of Chapter 1.1: Quinn dug her fingers into the palms of her hands as she tried to fight the new wave of nausea. A selfish part of her was grateful that she had let Issac go alone; the other part hated how he had to deal with the sight of a dead man by himself. “We need to check the news again,” she said. “We need to see if you recognize any other faces-”

“We're not doing this together anymore.”

The nausea immediately vanished.

“But...”

“It's not safe,” Issac said. “I was a fool for thinking that it was.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked. “Nothing's changed-”

“The bullet was silver.”

Quinn stared up at him, even as he refused to meet her eyes. She waited for him to say more – to explain what that could possibly mean for their strange partnership and friendship – but he stayed frustratingly silent. The words finally registered as the person in the room next door flushed the toilet.

“...Silver bullets are how you kill werewolves,” Quinn realized.

Issac gave a tiny nod.

“But werewolves aren't real, right?” she managed to get out. “They're-They're just stories. And even if they were real, the bullet wouldn't have to be silver to kill someone when they're shot into the head.”

She searched Issac's face. He couldn't ever display emotions to their full extent, but he seemed so tired. He must have had a conversation like this a hundred times before with the countless other people he had made deals with. She wondered what other things he had conveniently left out before. Were werewolves just the tip of the iceberg?

“I had hoped I wouldn't have to tell you about this,” Issac admitted. He got to his feet and walked over to the desk's chair. Its wheels squeaked as he rolled it over to the end of the bed. It was only when he was sitting down again – this time across from her instead of beside her – that he finally met her desperate gaze. “Human don't like what is different from them, Quinn. Hunters, exorcists, paranormal investigators – their names may change, but they are all ultimately the same. They see the supernatural as a threat.”

He let out a sigh and leaned back in his chair.

“This body is a curse,” he said, “but it has its benefits. It's difficult for those who don't know me by my true name to realize that I'm a demon. So far, we've never interacted with someone who would want to harm me because we don't share the same kind of soul. But if hunters are getting involved with the people who made me this way, I can't allow you to stay by my side. Our contract has been completed. You fixed me. I helped you leave your family. I can't let you get hurt.”

Quinn took a deep breath.

“I'm not scared of getting hurt,” she said. She hoped he couldn't see how her hands were shaking as she balled them up in her lap.

“They can hurt you in ways that you can't imagine,” Issac said. “They may hate the supernatural, but they hate those that support us even more. They'll punish you for making a deal with a demon if they ever discover the truth behind our friendship.”

“Then teach me,” she said. “Teach me how to be safe. Teach me how to pick out a hunter in the crowd – and how to avoid them. You know I'm a fast learner. I can learn about the supernatural side of the world.”
Issac looked uncertain.

“You're my best friend, Issac,” she said. Her only friend. “I couldn't ever leave you over something like this.”

He didn't say anything.

Quinn kept watching his face, waiting for it to shift and reveal what he was really thinking behind the emotionless mask he always kept up. She listened to the chair creak as Issac sat forward again. The thin line his lips were usually drawn into was gone; instead, his lips were turned up in his best imitation of a smile. The moving metallic parts underneath his skin only let him do so much.

She couldn't help but smile, too.

“Fine,” he relented. “You can stay with me. But you have to listen to everything I say-”

He was cut off by her suddenly leaning forward and pulling him into an embrace.

“You won't regret this,” she promised.

After a moment of hesitation, Issac returned the hug.

xXx

The old motel room was dingy and disgusting. He could have sworn that he saw a cockroach crawling in one of the corners, and he could hear bits of the conversation in the room next door if he strained his ears hard enough. He had forgotten how much he loved places like this – the apartment he had been staying in for the past month was of a slightly better quality. Not enough to write home to his nonexistent family about, but was certainly enough to seem like a palace compared to this prime specimen of the American tourism industry.

As he exited the bathroom, his gaze traveled to the gun he had left on his dresser. He knew he probably should have tucked it in his suitcase, but he hated getting the blood on his spare leather jacket. He shook his head. He should have stepped farther away before firing the shot into that monster's head; the jacket he had been wearing then was reduced to a stained mess in the tub. Leather jackets weren't exactly cheap.

He grabbed his headphones from his dresser and scrolled through his playlists until he found just the artist he was looking for – one could never go wrong with Bon Jovi. Once his musical accompaniment was all set, he turned his attention back to the gun. It didn't take long for him to pull out the cleaning kit from the very bottom of his suitcase.

It had been some time since he had last fired it, but his muscles still remembered all of the motions to cleaning it. He pushed the window open. He wasn't bothered by the cool, October air blowing into the room as he sat down at the desk. What did bother him was the music being replaced by an ad. Still, he didn't have the luxury of lamenting too long on not being able to buy himself a subscription – instead, he had to vent his frustrations by irritably tapping his fingers against the desk in a questionable rendition of Livin' on a Prayer until the actual song started playing.

He slid the cleaning rod into the gun's barrel.

Maybe it was just the influence of Hollywood, but he had been sure that killing a werewolf would be harder than it actually was. Jean Sullivan was his second werewolf of the year, and his tenth since he had started this hunting spree. Jean, like his predecessors, was all-too-easily surprised by him whipping out a gun.

He reassembled said gun and leaned back in his chair. The trees littering the sides eerily empty road outside were a beautiful display of vibrant yellow, as scattered as they were. It was a shame that the town he'd be going back to in less than an hour lacked the same natural appeal.

He slipped his gun back into his suitcase.

A demon, he supposed, would be much more of a challenge, anyways.