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five-rivers · 1 year

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The Soul Trade(ing Card Game) Chapter 2

As was dictated to me by the poll, I have delivered.

(AO3)

“So, uh, Batman,” said Constantine, hating everything about this, “I’ve gotta ask you something.”

“Hn,” said Batman, and Constantine understood he had the man’s whole attention, even though he didn’t look away from the screens arrayed before him. Monitor duty. Constantine was glad the Justice League Dark didn’t have to do that.

(At least, he thought they didn’t. If anyone had ever told him they did, he had promptly forgotten about it.)

“I need you to look into whoever left me this letter.” He dropped the letter on the desk next to Batman and flexed his hands. Yeah, the magic in it was sure something, but it was passive, as far as he could tell, traces picked up from being around something infinitely nastier. It was safe. Probably. It hadn’t blasted any of the people who had handled it between the desk in the Hall of Justice and the Watchtower, anyway.

Batman glanced up only briefly before taking the letter. He read it, quickly, without his posture changing at all.

“Hm,” he said, the tone of the grunt just slightly more contemplative. “Are the claims in this letter legitimate?”

“Well,” said Constantine, “let’s just say that reading it felt like…” His face twisted as he tried to find the words to describe what it had felt like. “Yeah. Even if this bloke doesn’t have everything he says he does, he has… a lot. There are traces on the letter, magically speaking.”

“What’s the effect of that?”

“God if I know,” said Constantine. “I didn’t even notice this. At least, he could go ahead and cast whatever spells on me he wants. Soul’s a lot more intimate.”

With a press of a button, the screens went dark. “You shouldn’t be up here if you’re compromised.”

“Hey, I didn’t even know about this until ten minutes ago!”

“Return to ground.” Batman stood and loomed over him. “I’ll look into who sent this letter and tell you my findings.”

That was probably the best Constantine was going to get. Honestly, he didn’t even want to be on this glorified deathtrap in the sky.

He didn’t like the feeling of getting kicked out, though.

“I’m going to need the letter back. I’ve got my own tests to run on it. Get an idea of what kind of nasty we’re dealing with. Magic stuff.”

Batman handed it back. “I’ll walk you to the Zeta Tubes.”

“What do you mean someone bought your soul?” asked Zatanna. “I thought you’d already sold it ages ago.”

“Yeah, but I guess souls can be resold. Should’ve realized that demons would try to replicate the whole banking hellscape we have here.”

“Pardon?”

“Nevermind,” said Constantine, letting himself sprawl backwards in the chair. It leaned dangerously, the weak leg bending. “I did sell it. I sold it a bunch. Got it set up so no one could really claim it without the others freaking out. Set some time limits on a few earlier ones, that worked pretty well, but, eventually, that didn’t work anymore, no one would bargain for that, and I figured my soul was pretty much a lost cause anyway…” He tucked his hands in his pockets and fingered the lid of his flask.

“Don’t you dare start drinking while I’m here.”

He hauled himself forward. “Far as I can tell, what’s written in the letter is true, as far as the owning part goes. The whole sorry bit and the let’s meet bit, I’m less clear on.”

He did have some thoughts on how to deal with it. But he wasn’t sure how well it’d work, and the guy - if it even was a guy - was a complete unknown.

He shrugged. “I was hoping for a second opinion.” And maybe a bit of… comfort. Something. It felt like the only time he saw Zatanna anymore was if the Justice Morons were poking at stuff no one sane would come close to with a ten foot pole.

(He missed her.)

(He missed when they used to be an item.)

(Which was stupid of him. But he’d never claimed not to be.)

(She wanted to keep things professional though, so. He’d try.)

Zatanna paced around the table. It was clear except for the letter, Constantine having expended much effort into cleaning it off (dumping it onto the nearest alternate flat-ish surface, the seat of a sagging armchair).

“I don’t know how much more I can tell you. There’s magic here, but it’s traces, and it’s… muddled. Do you mind?”

“Go ahead, love.” So much for being professional. Sue him. Some things just slipped out.

Zatanna nodded, evidently not even noticing. “Laever ruoy sterces,” she said, staring intensely at the letter. She shook her head. “Laever sesruc. No, no curses, at least. That’s a relief?”

“Yeah, I guess. But he doesn’t exactly need to curse me through a letter if he’s got everything he says he’s got.”

“Don’t give up just yet. Let me try a few other things. Ezylana eht snigiro fo eht lacigam secart no sight retter. Wow, huh.”

“What?”

“Well, like I said, there are all sorts of magical traces on this thing. Demon magic, which is expected, bits of yours, some of the ambient stuff the Watchtower picks up… but there’s also a lot of spirit magic.”

“You think we’re dealing with some kind of shaman? A summoner?” In addition to demons and whatever else, that was.

“Maybe,” said Zatanna. “There’s death, here, too, but I can’t tell if it’s outright death magic or necromancy.”

Constantine groaned. “The difference is academic. I’m screwed. S’pose I should be grateful or something he didn’t hit me with a compulsion to show up and grovel in front of him, felt the need to give me a heads up before he tortures me for sport or whatever necromancers do for fun.”

Zatanna made a face, but it was very telling that she didn’t deny it was a possibility.

“Just promise me you won’t go looking for this person on your own.”

“Yeah, I’ve got the Bat on it. You know him. Tall scary guy. World famous detective. About as boring as he is scary with all his rules.”

“That’s not what I meant,” said Zatanna. “You’re going to need magical backup for this. Call me. Or at least someone who knows what they’re doing.”

The opposite of what he wanted to do, really. People died often enough around him without actively dragging them into his problems, and this was a massive problem.

“Can’t make any promises.”

Because Constantine couldn’t really do anything else about the letter or its contents (besides scream inside his head and swear at himself), he decided to go about business as usual. Exorcisms, investigations, a touch of vampire stabbing, a few (disappointingly dry) ghost hunts. Normal stuff.

At least, it was normal until the demons started to run away from him. They didn’t usually do that, not even the weak ones. He did have a reputation, but not one like that. His reputation was that of a cheat and a con… and someone who got people close to him killed. None of that really put off bloodthirsty demons, who were a right pain to genuinely kill, and who often as not had some connection to old Lucy.

But they were running now, and not just the weaker ones. They weren’t even fighting him. Not getting hellfire tossed at him was nice, but demons were not nice. Ever.

So, what could he do but catch one?

He walked around the circle, double checking to make sure the scuffle with the little imp hadn’t scuffed any lines. He’d made mistakes like that before, and they were never pretty.

“So,” he said, lighting a cigarette, “what’s a demon like you running from little old me for?”

The demon, predictably, hissed at him. Constantine rolled his eyes. Typical.

“I’m going to ask you again, and if you don’t answer, things are going to get real unpleasant for you.” He pointed at those circle. “Read ‘em, if you don’t believe me.”

The demon arched itself like a cat, which was an interesting choice seeing as it wasn’t at all cat shaped.

“You were chasing us, John Constantine,” it said in a deep voice that belayed its size.

“Yeah, and that’s usually your lot’s cue to turn around and jump me. What’s different?”

The demon laughed, unpleasant and high-pitched like a teakettle coming to a boil. “What’s different? What’s different? John Constantine, you know what’s different.”

“Humor me here.”

It chuckled and started pacing around the inside of the circle. “Who owns you, John Constantine?” it asked in a silky voice. “Where is your soul, John Constantine? Not with you. Not with the First of the Fallen. Not with any of the princes of hell, or any god in its palace. Who owns you, John Constantine?”

“What, you’re saying that just because Lucy doesn’t have dibs on me when I die anymore, none of you are interested? Try the other one, it has bells on it.”

“Fool!” shouted the demon, now sounding disturbingly human. “Fool! Fool! A fool you are, but we are not, oh, no. No, no, no, we are not. What manner of thing could steal from them? What manner of thing could satisfy so many demons? What manner of thing could have such essence that it clings to you even now? Who owns you, John Constantine?”

Those were some good goddamn questions. “You’ve got a name for me, or is this you saying you don’t actually know, you’re just so freaked by the idea of it you’re shaking in your boots? Scales. Whatever.”

“Do not mock us, John Constantine,” it said, back to sounding properly demonic. “We are no fool! We know you will suffer.”

Yeah, well, that was just the natural state of the universe, wasn’t it? In any case, it didn’t look like this little punk had any idea what it was talking about. They didn’t tend to be very bright, just smart enough to parrot what they overheard from more powerful demons and dumb enough to give up information when threatened with basic binding spells.

He banished the imp back to Hell with a twist of his fingers.

So. Whoever or whatever had gotten their hands on Constantine’s soul, they were scary enough that demons didn’t want to draw its attention by getting involved with Constantine. Which was. Yeah. Not great. Story of his life.

He’d known that they’d have to be nasty, sure. They’d have to be, to get all of Constantine’s contracts. Constantine hadn’t sold his soul to just anybody. Those first three bastards especially had power. Hell, they’d cured his terminal lung cancer. Partially to avoid a war but mostly to be petty.

Admittedly, after that, he hadn’t been quite so discerning. Or careful about the wording. But he knew that so long as old Lucy had his eyes on him and a finger on his soul, no one would dare collect.

A lot of good that did, in the end.

Who would Lucifer trade with? Why would he give up the right to torture Constantine eternally post-mortem?

Constantine was getting sick of not knowing. He was tempted to just go to that meeting spot, but without more information, that would be unforgivably stupid. Constantine was not stupid. Usually.

His Justice League communicator (foisted on him by the Bat) pinged obnoxiously at the bottom of one of his pockets. He’d forgotten it was in this coat. He sorted through his pockets crossly as it pinged again. It had better be important. He found it under a crumpled bag of crisps and yanked it out with a spray of crumbs.

“What?” he said, shortly.

“Constantine,” came Batman’s deep, gravelly rumble. “I have news.”

Well, crap. “You gonna share that news this century?”

“It would be better to discuss this in-person. You do not have a secure computer.”

“Jesus,” said Constantine. He would have argued, but, technically, Batman was doing him a favor. “Fine, you paranoid maniac. Where?”

‘Where’ turned out to be a low-risk interrogation room in the Hall of Justice. Constantine was not a fan of this arrangement, but he understood it. He was compromised, or whatever, and the interrogation rooms were private and had video screens.

On the other hand, it was in America, and even Zeta Tubes couldn’t help with jetlag. And, worse, it was nonsmoking.

Batman personally escorted him to the room, and turned on the main screen with a remote control. Pictures of a pale-skinned teen with blue eyes and black hair sprung up. School pictures, mostly, but some looked like ID pictures, one was on the cover of a magazine, and another looked like an avatar in a video game.

“Do you recognize this boy?”

“One of your kids?” asked Constantine.

“Answer the question.”

“No, I don’t know him. Should I?”

“He’s the one who dropped the letter off.”

“You’re joking.”

In answer, Batman clicked the remote again, bringing up surveillance videos of the Hall of Justice’s main desk taken from various angles. The clips started off looking normal, the overly clear, expensive footage characteristic of an organization associated with Batman.

But then, static swam over them. Not enough to fully obscure the figure walking into the frame, but enough to be obvious. The boy from the pictures. He walked to the desk, had a short conversation with the receptionist during which he handed over the letter, and then left, taking the static with him.

“Well, hell,” said Constantine. It had been a while since he’d seen a demon take a form like that, but he supposed this one must have learned that he had a soft spot for kids. Or maybe this was a kid. A demon kid. He’d thought he’d taken care of all of his, but wouldn’t have been the first time he’d screwed up, and this whole situation was a collection of screw ups.

“Do you know what could cause the static?”

“Whole range of spells, but I’m gonna bet you already knew that from Zatanna.”

“Hm,” said Batman. “The name of the boy is Daniel Fenton. He is fifteen years old, and his major claim to fame is discovering that a purple-backed gorilla on loan to his local zoo was female. He also makes an occasional appearance on the leaderboards of the video game ‘Doomed,’ where he is a well known player.”

“A demon playing video games. Now I’ve seen it all.” It wasn’t so much that demons couldn’t have hobbies, he just didn’t care to learn them, if they weren’t relevant to beating the crap out of them or tricking them into taking a holy water shower. Then again, there was an outside possibility that ‘Daniel’ wasn’t a demon. “Any of this have a point?”

“Establishing facts,” said Batman. “It is possible that you had encountered him via the internet.”

“Do I look like the kind of guy who plays video games?”

Batman clicked the remote again, a map appearing on the screen, a blinking dot appearing in the middle of nowhere, US. “Daniel lives with his older sister, Jasmine, and their parents Drs. Jack and Madeline Fenton in Amity Park.”

“Amity Park?” repeated Constantine.

“Is it familiar to you?”

“I think I looked into it once. Supposed to be haunted. Veil there is maybe a little thin, but nothing on the Tower of London, or, hell, the British Museum. You wouldn’t believe what all those stolen grave goods can get up to together. Your permanently overcast city is more haunted. It’s a dead end.”

“Maybe not. The Drs. Fenton are friends with the billionaire Vladimir Masters, but primarily derive their income from their patented inventions, which include customized ‘branding’ toasters, high-efficiency toilet paper, ultra-lightweight camping gear, various treatments for radiation poisoning, and several items that have been marked classified by the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Energy, for their use of dangerous energy sources.”

Constantine’s eyebrows went up. Mad scientists mucking about with radiation were generally not in his wheelhouse. Or even riding the same tracks, for that matter. “You think they went poking around in the occult for their ‘dangerous energy sources?’”

“Possibly,” said Batman. “In addition to their inventions, they are moderately well-known in ghost hunting communities, which explains their presence in the reportedly-haunted Amity Park. However, everything they’ve written on the subject indicates that they believe ghosts have a strictly scientific explanation. They also,” continued Batman, the corners of his mouth pulling into a slightly deeper frown, “believe that ghosts are nonsentient and nonsapient.”

“So, they have no idea what they’re talking about. Just some big brains that got sucked in by the kind of fraudsters who started the seance craze. Great. I’m sure Deadman’d love to have word with them. If they could even see him.” He rubbed his chin. “But the must’ve run into something real if their kid’s doing all this. Or if what looks like their kid’s doing all this.”

“You don’t believe Daniel Fenton is the one in the video?”

“Lemme put it this way. Odds of a random kid pulling one over on the demons I sold my soul to are about the same as you developing a sense of humor. Best case scenario, he’s just possessed, or he’s some kind of freak like Klarion.”

Batman grunted in acknowledgement. “Approximately six months ago, Jack Fenton purchased an ‘authentic demon soul contract’ from Ebay.”

Constantine opened and closed his mouth several times. “You’re joking.”

“As you are aware, I have no sense of humor.”

“Jesus Christ. Ebay?”

“The seller was a man named Eric Chambers. Zatanna investigated him earlier this week. He is, apparently, an amateur demonologist who wanted to ‘get out of the game’ and was in the process of selling off all his magical paraphernalia. He had sold several additional versions of your soul contract to another buyer in Amity Park. A known associate of Daniel Fenton named Samantha Manson. Are any of these names familiar to you?”

“Not exactly,” said Constantine. “But… Ebay?” He’d never thought his soul was anything special, but at least he’d thought it was worth enough to not be resold on Ebay. “And how did this Chambers bloke get them?”

“Apparently, the demons he’d summoned no longer wanted them, and he was under the impression that he could ‘put you under his thrall’ if he collected enough of them.”

So the guy who had his soul wasn’t even the first one to have the idea. Brilliant.

“And that’s it?”

“I could tell you Daniel Fenton’s grades and internet habits,” said Batman. “As well as those of his close friends and associates. Apart from his parents and his recent involvement with you, he is ordinary.”

“The thing with the gorilla is ordinary, then?”

“Most people have at least one outlier event in their lives. It would be of greater concern if he did not.” He paused, staring long and hard at Constantine. “What are your initial thoughts?”

“That I’m about to get screwed up the–”

“Regarding how Daniel Fenton got involved in this.”

“Like I said, it’s probably not Daniel Fenton. I’d guess… If I had to guess, I’d say that after Fenton’s dad got hold of that contract, he went and played around with it. Something like a genuine contract can be used to do a lot. It has the magical signatures of both the original demon and whatever sorry bastard signed it. If you’ve got that, you can ring up the demon.” He raised his hands, miming a scale. “Demon, inexperienced idiot teenager…” He tilted to one side. “You get the picture.”

And, yeah, wasn’t it great that he could cause people to die just by leaving his junk everywhere? He hadn’t learned anything from the dream sand.

“You believe Daniel Fenton summoned a demon that possessed him, which then proceeded to collect your soul contracts?”

“Yeah. Can you pull up a pic of the contract Jack Fenton bought?”

Batman briefly examined the remote, then flicked quickly through several slides, stopping, finally, on a very classic demonic soul contract. Constantine had signed several like that, so he had to squint at it and read through it line by line. It wasn’t like he memorized the handwriting of every demon he’d ever made a contract with. In fact, he’d memorized the handwriting of exactly zero demons. They didn’t precisely write a lot, and you either got illegible chicken scratch or equally illegible ornate gothic script.

He got to the name and swore. “That guy doesn’t have the power to go up against the First of the Fallen.” He rubbed his chin vigorously.

“It’s possible that Chambers sent a different contract to the Fentons,” said Batman, “or Daniel was… infected after receiving the other contracts.” More pictures popped up on the screens. “However, there is a problem with this theory.”

“Yeah?” asked Constantine, already scanning the contracts. The Bat didn’t like Constantine’s ideas. What else was new?

“Daniel’s behavior has had no significant changes in that six month time frame. But if we go back by just over a year, to when he was entering high school, his grades took a steep dive and several disciplinary actions were noted on his record. His close friends’ grades took similar, but smaller, hits at the same time.”

“You think he could have been possessed earlier.”

“I believe that something happened to him at that time. I am unconvinced it was possession.”

Constantine shook his head. “None of these guys are strong enough to begin with. Maybe if they were working together… Nah. None of them could work together. That’s why I picked them.” He rubbed his eyes. “Then again, I thought no one could get all my soul contracts, so who knows?”

“Are you sure possession is the only solution?”

“God, no. Hell, we could be dealing with a cabal of homo magi, or someone back from the grave who seriously hates me, that’d explain the death magic on the letter, at least, or maybe there’s a god hanging around getting their kicks poking at me. It’s just a giant blank. I’ve never heard of this kid. I’ve never heard of his family. I’ve barely heard of Vlad Masters. I’ve got nothing.”

“Hm,” said Batman. “What are you planning to do?”

“I’m guessing ignoring it forever isn’t something you’d let me do?”

“No.”

“I guess I’m gonna have to go investigate, then.”

“In that case,” said Batman, pulling a fat folder of papers out of his cape somehow, “you will need to know more about Daniel Fenton, his associates, and Amity Park.” He dropped the folder on the table with an audible thump.

“Great,” said Constantine. “Just what I wanted. Homework.”

Constantine and Zatanna zeta’d to the nearest tube near Amity Park. Batman had arranged an ‘untraceable’ rental car for them, paranoid bastard. Demons didn’t usually have the skillset required to trace license plates.

Then again, there might be more than demons involved. Even if necromancers generally had no skillset outside of necromancy.

There could be shamans, though! They were well known for their technological acumen!

Yeah, right. It was possible, but not bloody likely.

“I could teleport, you know,” he told Zatanna. “We could both teleport.”

“Into the home turf of an unknown magic user?”

Constantine rolled his eyes and knocked his head against the car window. “I’m surprised the ol’ Bat isn’t coming with us.”

“You know he is,” said Zatanna. “I’d give even odds that he’s already there, if I had any desire to gamble with you.”

“Hey! I could be good for it. I have steady work now!”

Zatanna shook her head. Constantine huffed.

“I’m going to take a nap. Might be my last one, after all.”

“John,” said Zatanna, “you’re not going to die. Don’t you think this is a little… excessive, considering all the stuff you’ve gotten out of before?”

“No one’s owned my whole soul before. Now, I really am going to go to sleep. Wake me up when we get there.”

Death.

That’s what pulled Constantine out of his dreams and into a nightmare, and from there into wakefulness. The feeling did not dissipate. Instead, it grew stronger.

He looked over at Zatanna, who was still driving. Her knuckles were white, her shoulders stiff.

“What the hell,” croaked Constantine.

“It’s been building as we get closer to Amity Park,” said Zatanna. “It doesn’t feel… actively malicious… More like a massive haunting. It’s been building slowly.”

Constantine swallowed and tried to rub sand out of his eyes. “That’s– Where are we?”

“About ten minutes out of Amity Park.”

“No. I’ve been to Amity Park. It doesn’t feel anything like this. It’s boring.”

“Well,” said Zatanna, strained, “something’s changed. At least we know where the letter picked up all that death magic.”

Constantine breathed in deeply through his nose. “Yeah, there’s enough of it here for me to feel it, God.” It was making his skin prickle. He shook himself all over. “Might as well stay awake now. Do you mind if I set my wards?”

“Knock yourself out.”

Constantine walked into the diner and looked around. It was very American. Retro. Quiet. Not entirely clean, but Constantine had been in way worse. The air smelled strongly of cinnamon, coffee, and hot chocolate. Not the kind of place he generally bartered for his soul, or away his soul, as the case might be.

An aggressive ‘No Smoking’ sign was positioned prominently next to the cheery ‘seat yourself’ sign. Constantine scowled at it. Sometimes it felt like there was nowhere to smoke anymore in the whole world.

Daniel Fenton, easily recognizable from a legion of school photos and a junior astronaut camp photo ID, was sitting alone at a booth, a cup of hot chocolate with whipped cream in front of him. He swung his legs back and forth and scribbled in a notebook. A few tables away, not nearly as sneaky as they clear-ly thought they were being, were his friends Manson and Foley.

Zatanna had entered the diner before him, of course, and Batman was most likely… somewhere. God only knew where. Constantine knew people who could turn invisible and shapeshift that weren’t as good at it as Batman.

Before coming in, Constantine had finished setting his wards. His pockets were full of all sorts of tests, charms, and apotropaics. As he stuck his hands into them, a spray bottle fit easily into his hand.

Walking to the table felt like walking to his execution. He made the comparison with confidence, because he had the relevant experience. When he stopped next to the table, Fenton looked up. His expression was confused at first, but in less than a second he lit up, clearly delighted.

Constantine also had relevant experience in spritzing demons with holy water.

Fenton flinched, but he didn’t start howling or melting. More’s the pity.

“Did you just spray me with holy water?” asked Fenton, blinking up at him with a realistic expression of befuddlement.

“Guy’s gotta know what he’s dealing with,” said Constantine.

“Well, I’m not a demon.” A slight furrow worked its way between his eyes. “Or a devil.”

“What are you, then?” asked Constantine.

Fenton shrugged. “I don’t know. An amateur demonologist? I don’t have any training in this kind of stuff, which is probably why all this happened.” He reached to the side and grabbed his hot chocolate. “Oh. You got my whipped cream with your water…”

“You don’t have any training?”

“Not in this,” stressed Fenton. “I go to school and stuff.”

And astronaut camp, assuming this really was Daniel Fenton and not something possessing or impersonating him.

“Anyway, are you going to sit down, or…?” Fenton looked him up and down.

Constantine scowled and slid into the booth. Then he threw some salt (purified) at Fenton.

“Hey,” complained Fenton, “you’re going to ruin my hot chocolate, jeez.” He picked up the mug, pulling it towards himself.

Constantine took the opportunity to grab his notebook off the table and flip through it.

“Maths?” blurted Constantine.

Fenton set the mug back on the table and leaned over to snatch the notebook back. “Like I said, I do have school. That’s why I can only hang out here on Saturdays. You did miss the last few meeting times.” He huffed. “I know this isn’t ideal, but can we work together here? I don’t actually want to own your soul.”

“Oh, yeah, amazing way of showing it, mate. I know who and what I sold my soul to, and I don’t believe you bartered with them without any training.” Or that he was human, but as long as he was invested in the facade, he probably wouldn’t eat Constantine’s face off.

“I didn’t say I didn’t have any training. Just no training in this. I don’t know exactly what you can do beyond make bad demon-related decisions, but you had weeks to do research. You’ve got to know about the ghosts.”

“Might. What about them?”

“My parents research them. Fight them, sometimes. It’s a whole thing. Demons weren’t any harder to deal with.”

“I sold my soul to archdemons.”

“Yeah, they kind of sucked, to be honest.” Fenton bit his lower lip. “Look, I know you don’t trust me. I wouldn’t trust me, but what I did to get your contracts wasn’t anything anyone couldn’t do. Most of them didn’t even want them anymore. The first batch I bought off of a random dude on Ebay. One of them paid me to take the contract, because they hated the doll you wrote it on so much. A lot of the others just wanted me to give you problems, which I think I’ve succeeded at, actually.”

Constantine had forgotten about the doll, actually. “And the archdemons? I know for a fact they’ve been looking forward to torturing me forever, so I doubt they’d just hand the contracts over in exchange for ‘giving me problems.’”

“Oh, yeah. For those guys, I just robbed them. There were also a few people I just beat up.”

“Demons aren’t people, they’re demons.”

“Sure they’re people. They’re just evil people. But they used to be angels or something, right?”

“... No,” said Constantine.

“Okay, well.” Fenton shrugged again. “They still are thinking beings, right? So, they’re people.”

Constantine honestly didn’t know where to go from that.

"Fine," he said instead. "You aren't going to tell me how you got the contracts or what you are. Is it too much to hope you'll deign to tell me why you did this?"

"I'm a teenager, why do we do anything?" Fenton sipped at his hot chocolate. "Mostly, I thought it'd be funny."

"Excuse me?"

"I thought it would be funny. I mean, Dad bought the first one, because he thought it'd help with his ghost research, but it didn't, so he let me have it. I asked Johnny about it, and he told me about your contracts, so I–"

"Who's Johnny?" interrupted Constantine. "Some demon friend of yours?"

He did have a strategy, here, sort of. Most ultra powerful magical beings had a limit to how much annoyance or disrespect they'd tolerate, even when disguising themselves. Constantine had a knack for finding those limits.

Also, just possibly, the hapless teenager act was throwing him off. It was remarkably believable.

"No, he's dead, to begin with, not–"

"Oh, so, you took advice on dealing with demons from someone who turned up dead right after telling you about me. That sounds brilliant."

"He's a ghost. He's been dead since at least the nineties, and I doubt you had anything to do with it. Johnny died in the eighties. I think.”

“A ghost told you about me?”

“Yeah. I don’t know what wizards or magicians like you can do or sense, but if you looked up anything about Amity Park at all, you should have seen there are a lot of ghosts here. It’s not just tourist trap stuff. That’s… actually one of the other things I wanted to talk to you about, if I managed to get enough of your contracts to get you to come.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, not all ghosts are nice. I meant it when I said your demons sucked. That’s compared to the ghosts. And sometimes to the people who come to hunt the ghosts.” Fenton drummed his fingers on the table, nervous. “It’s a toss up which group causes more damage. The Guys in White are especially awful. It would be nice if the Justice League took a look into them?” His voice took on a hopeful lilt.

“You bought my soul to tip off the League about… Guys in White.”

“They’re with the government. Presumably. No one knows what they’re really called. And they chase people around screaming about lots and lots of painful experiments. Direct quotes.”

“You know the League has a tip line.”

“Tried it.” Fenton took a huge gulp of hot chocolate.

“I don’t believe you,”

“If you hang out here for very long, you and your friends will be able to see the ghosts for yourself.”

Constantine could already feel the ghosts. Or at least the pervasive, overwhelming sense of death permeating this city. He didn’t doubt that something requiring Justice League Dark attention was going on here. Beyond just whatever was going on with Fenton himself.

But his attention was taken by two other points.

One, what he didn’t believe was that Fenton did all this for only some combination of kicks and giggles and wanting Justice League attention. Contacts with ghosts or not, burglarizing archdemons wasn’t something anyone sane blew off as nothing.

Two, Fenton had said friends. He’d understand if he’d made Zatanna, but the plural implied that he’d spotted Batman, too.

He didn’t let himself react. “No one rips off archdemons to call in a tip. Or just for fun.”

Fenton looked guilty, a blush creeping across his cheeks. “I didn’t want to bring it up, it didn’t seem appropriate anymore. And the other thing isn’t… relevant.”

“Why don’t you let me decide what’s relevant?” asked Constantine, despite how all his senses were screaming wrong wrong wrong at him. “This is my soul we’re talking about, after all.”

“I know, I know,” said Fenton. “But you didn’t exactly…” He trailed off. “The other thing was that some of my friends thought you need an intervention. We also wanted to see your face when we… intervened. Yeah, we thought it’d look kind of like that.” Fenton pointed at him.

Constantine slapped away the hand. He was almost convinced Fenton was… Well. Not normal, but maybe not homicidal, or particularly interested in enslaving Constantine or torturing him for all time. A step up from some of the other things he’d sold his soul to in the past. Possibly.

(The whole ‘teenager’ thing was definitely an entry in the negative column, though. As well as the whole humiliation and mockery angle.)

“What else?” he demanded.

Fenton’s face twisted with embarrassment and jealousy. “You get to go up to the Watchtower, don’t you?” he asked. “You get to go to space.”

“So?”

“So, I want to go to space. I was, um. I was going to… ask you to take me up there. Just to look.”

Infiltrating the Watchtower was a much more obvious motive, but… Constantine remembered the space camp ID.

“I mean, I’m never going to get up there with my grades. Fighting demons for it seemed… feasible.” He shrugged, then started to slump. “I was going to give them back, you know. Your contracts. I didn’t want to keep them. Or your soul.” He pushed himself up. “Anyway. None of that matters, now. We've got a problem to solve.”

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Well, as I explained in my letter, the contracts sort of… exploded."

"No, back up, what do you mean it doesn't matter?"

"Well, if this doesn't make you stop selling your soul, I don’t know what will, the Justice League knows about Amity now, I'm not going to make you take me to the Watchtower when I can't trade your soul back to you, and the funny boat sailed at about the same time my friend told me this might be permanent."

"Is this friend also dead?" drawled Constantine.

"No, he's more in the never alive category."

Which possibly explained some of the spirit magic Zatanna detected on the letter.

"He thinks it's because some of your contracts said after death instead of when you're dead, so, because there weren't any competing claims, they all came due at once. Since there were so many of them…"

"Repetition makes magic stronger, yeah, yeah," said Constantine. "I read the letter."

"I was hoping you'd have some solutions. No offense, but I don't want to own you. You're, like, an entire person."

Constantine wouldn't have been offended if Fenton hadn't prefixed his statement with no offense.

“You should have thought about that before buying up my soul.”

“I was going to give it back. No strings.”

“Except for a trip to the Watchtower.”

“If you really didn’t want to, I wouldn’t have made you,” said Fenton.

Somehow, Constantine believed him. Which was crazy. He’d have to check in with Zatanna to make sure he wasn’t being enchanted somehow. Charm person should not be a real thing magicians could do, and yet…

“Look, do you want me to swear it on the Styx or is there something else I can do to convince you I’m telling the truth?” asked Fenton. “The ghosts seem to like the Styx, anyway.” He sighed. “Tell me you have something that can fix this. I don’t know what kind of side effects there are for owning a person’s soul. It’s not like this happens all the time.”

Hell if Constantine knew. The only way he knew to get out of contracts like this was loopholes exploited before they were collected on. “I’m… going to have to do some research.”

“Well,” said Fenton, “let me give you my phone number.” He slid a piece of paper across the table. “You can call me if you figure anything out. In the meantime, if you’re staying in town long, you should look into the ghost thing. Talk to my parents, even. Maybe don’t mention all this, though.”

“Why not?”

“I love my parents, but they must have skipped out on the day they teach scientists that just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. Anyway, I’ve got to go.” He started to shove things into a purple backpack he’d pulled into his lap from under the table.

“What? Why?” As far as Constantine was concerned, they’d only just started to scratch the surface of the problem.

“Me and my friends have tickets to a movie.” He hooked his thumb over his shoulder at Manson and Foley, who, apparently, were not trying to blend in or be subtle. “You did miss the first few meeting times.”

“Your impression?” asked Zatanna, later, sliding into the booth after Fenton and his friends were thoroughly gone.

“He’s… surprisingly believable. Claims he ‘doesn’t have any training’ in magic, though, which sounds like crap, unless his parents are much more legit than what they look like on paper.”

Zatanna crossed her arms and drummed her fingers on her elbow. “He wasn’t lying. Not that any of my spells could detect.”

Constantine huffed. “That doesn’t seem possible.”

“He doesn’t seem like he could take on archdemons, but with help from ghosts or spirits? We don’t know who’s backing him.”

“God,” said Constantine, “that’s not something I was thinking of.”

“Because you were fixated on the demon theory.”

“But if he’s being backed by someone powerful, why wouldn’t they buy up my contracts themself? That doesn’t make sense.”

“I’m not saying that his… patron, for lack of a better word, put him up to it. Just that he might be getting extra support.”

A waitress came up to them, smiling cheerily. “Hello, there, sorry for the delay. Have you decided what you’re getting?”

“The hot chocolate looked good,” said Zatanna.

“Knock yourself out,” said Constantine, standing. “I’m going to see what Fenton’s parents are like.”

“John Constantine?” repeated Jack Fenton, inquisitively. “Ha! That’s the same name that was on that fake demon contract thing I got on Ebay! What a wild coincidence, huh?”

“You could have mentioned the portal to the astral plane in your basement,” hissed Constantine into the phone. A tiny voice in the back of his head warned him that he shouldn’t take that tone with someone who owned him, but he ignored it handily.

“Would you have believed me if I told you?” asked Fenton, genuinely curious.

Constantine wouldn’t have, but it was the principle of the thing.

“Also, what did you call it? I’ve never heard anyone call it that.”

Batman’s deep voice rumbled through the communicator. “What did you learn?”

“I learned this place is a nightmare and a half. There’s a portal to the astral plane in that kid’s basement, did you know?”

“I ran into a ghost while Constantine was talking to the Fentons,” said Zatanna, leaning sideways while keeping her eyes on the road. “It was much more powerful than any other ghost I’ve ever seen.”

“That is not good news considering what I have learned about the so-called Guys in White.”

“Have you found anything?” asked Fenton. Wherever he was, his reception was crap. His voice crackled with enough static that he might as well be calling from the early nineteen-twenties.

“No,” said Constantine. It had gotten him excused from the Justice Club meetings, which meant that the failure was almost worth the headache the idea of his soul being owned by a teenager caused him.

“I didn’t find anything either.”

“Then why did you call?”

“Uh,” said Fenton. “I’m really grateful you guys got the GIW out of Amity, you know that, right? And that you guys put someone on watch here for bigger threats?”

“Yeah,” said Constantine, slowly. “Sure.” It had been mostly Batman managing that side of things, as Constantine was banned from decisions regarding Amity Park, but if Fenton was going to give Constantine credit, who was he to deny it?

“So, um. That was really great of you.”

Constantine was not liking where this was going. But, apparently, this was his life, now. Getting tips and awkwardly phrased requests from… God. The creepy necromancer brat was sort of his warlock patron.

… Curse his knowledge of Dungeons and Dragons. It was definitely a detriment to his profession as a real mage, and everything he learned about it was against his will and usually the Flash’s fault.

“What is it, Fenton?”

“Have you ever heard of the Showenhowers?”

#dc/dp #dcxdp #fic #my fic

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