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We crouched atop the third tower of the monument, since its back faced the city we'd been able to swing a rope to the tower and get to our spot by climbing across. The Towers were a very good defensive spot.
Roger gulped and nodded, holding the sniper rifle shakily in his paws. This would probably be the first time he'd kill anyone, and if he fainted on the first sight of blood I wouldn't be surprised. It'd be a hindrance if that happened, of course, but there wouldn't be time to wake the alien in the midst of fighting. I'd be on my own for a few minutes in that case. It wouldn't make much of a difference in the fighting, but it would be somewhat annoying to me. Hopefully Roger wasn't that faint-prone.
I glanced quickly over the edge of the tower, careful no one would see our hiding place until it was too late. Even a demon needed to plan out an attack. I was unwilling to test and see if demons were mortal or not at that moment.
Mentally, I tallied up our arsenal. We would have to be careful if we wanted to take out the entire platoon. There were more people down there then I had initially expected, and their Voices were tromping across my tired mind in iron cleats. I was approaching the point where I was read to lie down and let the Voices march over me and crush me down, but I still had a job to do.
"We'll wait an hour for the troops to finish lining up," I instructed the Roger. "Then it's your job to get a bomb right in their midst. That should take out about five people."
Roger stammered when he spoke. If the albino had any pigment, it probably would have left him by now. "Wh-what then?"
I motioned with my shoulder to the repeater. It was old, rusted and turned on its stand only after I'd ripped it off and re-fastened it a few times. At this point I doubted even a Myche could fix the damn thing, but at least it fired. "There'll be a lot of smoke at that point. I'll open fire on them while they're running around."
"How can you be sure you won't hit any of us?" by "us" I knew the Roger wasn't including me. He meant strictly his species. It seemed everyone had an exclusive club that the only way in was to be born as one of the species. Considering demons weren't really a species, I had no "club" to belong to. I didn't mind that, in fact I somewhat enjoyed keeping to myself. Living apart from society meant I had to abide by none of its restrictions.
The Roger continued to look at me with a frightened expression, as if he expected me to turn and shoot him. It didn't matter how much I tried to help out, I knew, the demon in me was what others saw. It made them afraid.
But whatever explanation I offered -the Voices telling me who down there was ally and who was enemy, my eyes shifting to seek out heat sources in the dark like a lizard thanks to the testing that was done on me…- it wouldn't make a difference to Roger. No demon ever befriended someone innocent, just like no viper ever befriended a mongoose. There was no trust there. I closed my eyes and tried to chase the screams out of my mind again, but there wasn't any result.
"I just know where they are," I told the alien. "Just believe in that."
