Chapter Eight

Eddie was awake. There was not much he could do with most of his body in plaster. The injuries were not as bad as his mother has said. He had not broken almost every bone in his body. He had broken most of his right side ribs, his right arm, as well as getting a fracture in his skull. Plus, his right side leg, the femur and tibia were broken. The foot was actually unharmed. His left leg was in considerable pain though. The impact had twisted it and had been placed back into the hip socket by the paramedic in the ambulance. The nurse Jane was giving him a sponge bath. He told her about the demons. She just smiled at him and told him that she often has nightmares like that too. He looked down at his stomach where the demons had cut him open. It seemed quite normal and in tact now. Not even a scar. He knew the reason was that the demons were not attacking his earthly body, they were attacking his spiritual one. Spirits heal different to the physical though. When he returned to the Nacropolis, he would be the same as he had always been. Fully intact and able to do battle again. He needed something more to take the demons on though. The problem, was he wasn't sure how to handle the demons when they came to him in the physical world. What would have happened if they had of cut him open when they came in the room earlier? Would they attack the nurse or the doctor? What about his parents? Were they safe? Most of all, what were they looking for? What did he have? Was it something Slim had left behind? After all, he had seen the demons carry Slim away. Maybe part of Slim's soul was still sleeping in the Narcropolis. Was it possible they only got part of Slim? Was there still a chance that Slim could be saved if he could find that part of Slim's soul and return it? Maybe the voice could tell him. Jane lifted the bedsheets up and started to wash his lower regions. Eddie was partly embarrassed and partly aroused. He became more embarrassed when he became more aroused than he had hoped for. He blushed and Nurse Jane just smiled at him. She had had that sort of thing happen before. She was just grateful it was not an old wrinkly man this time. They would normally come out with some disgusting sexual comment which made her want to hurl her lunch. 'Your friend Jim was here earlier, but you were asleep.' 'Oh,' Eddie replied. He would very much have liked to talk to Jim. Maybe Jim would believe him about the demons. All the grown ups just seemed to put it down to dreams and nightmares. 'His arms are still in plaster,' Jane said. 'You should see him, he looks like a robot. Like this.' Jane waved her arms around as though they were in plaster. Eddie laughed at her, as she pulled some funny faces as she did it and walked like a toy robot. 'What time is it?' Eddie asked. His Tag watch was sitting on the bedside table, but from his vantage point, the face was not able to be seen. Jane moved the watch so he could see the face. 'Oh, ten,' said Eddie. 'Yes, ten in the morning. Your mother is normally in by now to visit you. You know, she never left your side the entire time you were unconscious?' 'Yes, I know.' 'Well, that's the end of your bath. I'm glad you at least enjoyed it today.' She did not mean to make it sound like that. It just came out, and Eddie blushed a bright red. She was about to apologise, but Eddie was also smiling a very wide smile. She smiled back and wiggled her eye-brows up and down. This made Eddie laugh. She helped to get the hospital gown back on him. 'Now,' she said as she left the room. 'You be good and stop trying to pick up us young impressionable nurses.' Eddie turned red once more and smiled. He liked nurse Jane. He looked over at his Tag watch. At least now he could tell the time. He fell asleep. His mother came and went while he slept, as she didn't want to wake him. He needed his sleep to mend. Eddie awoke, his TAG watch glowed silver in the moonlight. It was three in the morning. Eddie turned his head. At the end of his bed stood the first demon. Eddie wet himself. 'We need to talk, little human!' 'I don't know what you are looking for!' His flushed face began to get some colour back. The initial shock of seeing the demon was wearing off a bit. Still, there was a part of his mind that felt that now he was awake, this being could harm him. 'Were you just at the Nacropolis?' 'I don't remember!' Eddie was not lying. He honestly could not remember where he had just been. His last memory was getting the bed bath from Nurse Jane. 'You LIE!' The demon pulled out his long sharp knife. It glistened silver as he rotated it in his hand. As Eddie watched, the second demon descended through the roof. A third one he had never seen before came through the doorway, and a fourth through the wall next to the window. The second demon came close to Eddies face, saying, 'I would do as he says little one. You know he isn't afraid to use that knife!' Eddie could see his teeth close up. They were metallic and a glint reflected off it as he talked. He smiled a grimace at Eddie. It was menacing, but it also made Eddie aware that any pain the demon was going to inflict on him, was going to be done with the utmost pleasure. 'I'd like to help,' said Eddie. 'If you tell me what you are after, I can help you find it.' 'We want your soul,' the first demon said. 'Why can't we find your soul? Surely it is inside you somewhere. Where did you hide it? Is it in the Nacropolis?' 'My soul?' Eddie was more terrified than when the demons had first appeared. Maybe that was why Slim had died and he had not. Maybe he was supposed to have died, but his soul had somehow escaped. Somehow it had made it to the Nacropolis, and that was why he kept visiting it when he slept. He was being reunited with his soul in sleep. Awake, his soul was not in his body, so he had somehow avoided death. These demons wanted to take his soul. They wanted to take it so that he could die. The second demon floated back towards the roof. It pulled a large knife out of its pocket similar to the one the first one carried. The third demon was standing with a large axe, while the last had a long blade attached on the end of a stick called a Naginata. The one with the axe raised it above his head. Eddie lay terrified that it was going to be brought down upon him. The axe stay at the top of the arc. It wasn't moving. Eddie breathed a sigh of relief, and just as he finished releasing it, the demon let the axe fall. Eddie jolted and his arm cast broke at the elbow. The axe fell upon his neck.