Don't Feed After Midnight

Chapter 22: Extinction events

The doors to the dungeon rumbled open by a foot, followed soon after by halting, unsteady footsteps that stumbled and weaved across the space.

Then, something invisible, but about the mass of a terrier slumped heavily against his shin.

Oh joy, Crowley enthused sarcastically to himself, the aggravating little bastard was back.

"I'm guessing the noise up there is your doing, and I don't suppose you came down here to die, did you?" He asked dryly and jiggled his knee in irritation attempting to dislodge his unwelcome guest.

Unfortunately the annoying little pest didn't take the hint and die or piss off.

"Very much so, and no. Jus' been over indulgin'." It answered in a smug, slightly slurred voice, settling itself more comfortably against his leg.

Ah well, it was a diversion from the utter boredom.

"Oh, do tell."

"Thought they could trap me ina machine, made t' cook food, usin' electromagnetic radiation. Me!" The fae scoffed. "My kind taught 'em t' harness electrons. It's …" a snort of derision, " laughable."

"Electrons? Ha! I'd have believe your boast if you were running your mouth off about magic or toadstool circles, but what does a fairy know about that kind of thing."

"That's what you know, 'm not jus' any fairy. 'm a gremlin. We're spe-cial."

Crowley raised a brow. "Gremlin you say? I was under the impression Der Führer's pet necromancers, made a deal with the Unseelie court to banish all your lot, back in the late 1930's."

To be honest Crowley felt no small amount of bitterness over the whole debacle.
He'd been in Germany at the time with Lilith, in the midst of negotiations for the exact same purpose, when they'd been pipped to the post.

He'd quite liked Hitler's Germany. Had fond remembrances. A demon had been able to do exactly what they wanted and barely an eyebrow was raised. Lilith had been so busy taking her sadism out on the Jews she'd barely bothered with him. It had all been a kind of holiday.

"Ah, Queen Mab o' the Winter Court, that one knows how t' hold a grudge." The Gremlin mused drunkenly. "Both sides wanted us t' spy for them, t' pick a side in their stupid, endless war… wouldn't take no f'r 'n answer. We fled here, t' this realm. Our leaders figured, since 'mmunity to iron marked us out… teach humans t' use it, make machines, harness 'lectrons… poison this world 'gainst both sides o' the courts, make your lot 'n' ourselves safer."

Crowley bristled slightly, objecting to the gremlin lumping him in with humanity. Humans were just a bunch of soupy chrysalises, he was beyond any mere human!
But, ever the pragmatist, he forced himself to stay silent and listen.

"But nooo, the Courts couldn't leave us well enough alone, could they? Both o' em had t' come hunting us. Had t' punish us f'r not joining their damn war.
Then, you humans started warrin' too, usin' the things we taught you. Seelie, Unseelie, human, you bas'ards … all the same. Now 'm the las'. I was messing with one of them warplanes. Got trapped ina reconnaissance camera by some over educated airman. Bas'ard said his brother was a Man o' Letters. Guess tha's why I ended up here. This place's some kinda Man o' Letters store house... Been here for years, stuck ina camera. Til one o' 'em dropped it, let me ou'. This place's warded 'gainst practically ever'thin', even banishings 'pparently.
Lucky me."

"Men of Letters you say?" Crowley asked rhetorically, "I was under the impression they, like you lot, were gone.
Supposedly, they had a storehouse just chock full of lore and arcane treasures."

He looked around him with new, calculating eyes. Could he actually be sitting in the middle of the supernatural mother lode?

"Rumour also had it, that a certain knight of hell was looking for it.
The disrespectful scag disappeared, about the same time the entire American Men of Letters roster died in some fire, back in '58."

The gremlin didn't respond.

"Hmm… all of a sudden, Abbadon's back, and Moose and Squirrel are kicking round in a Men of Letters facility? Me thinks, you weren't the only thing the dumbass duo let out."

…./…../….

Authors note: Happy New Year folks, is anyone still reading this?

I know it's not Destiel, but ...come on. Could you throw a writer a cookie. A follow, a comment, some kind of scathing criticism ... anything. Even one of those hate trollers that tell me my writing sucks.
Please?
I'm truely past being fussy, just want to know I'm not alone.