“A fetish club?”

“In a manner of speaking. It’s where Humans and demons can hook up without scorn, or the possibility of being killed or eaten … in a bad way.”

“So how does hitting this place help us?”

“Did you notice Fujimori and his Belial friend seemed to know what we were doing?”

“Yeah. Weren‘t they scrying?”

She gave him a slightly startled look, as if she was surprised he even knew the word, not only what the fuck it meant. “No. If we’re lucky, we’ll catch one of Otasuki’s men in the joint - they’re Kiji demons who love Human tail - and get him to tell us where Otasuki is.”

“Who is Otasuki?”

“A powerful demon, a Raiju, who has a gift for second sight. If anyone will know the sword’s location, it’s it.”

“So why doesn’t it tell him?”

She uttered a breathless laugh. “Otasuki is a sort of hostile witness. From what I understand, it was bound to Fujimori in a ritual, and now it’s stuck working for him. Still doesn’t like it, though. It only cooperates to a certain degree, and, from what I’ve heard, Fujimori has tortured it to reveal the sword location, but so far nothing.”

He considered that carefully, sure there were several things wrong with the story, and not sure where to begin poking holes in it. “Okay, first of all, why would this Raiju tell us a single fucking thing?”

She looked at him and smiled, and in the darkness, both her black painted lips and ebony eyes seemed to recede into the shadows. But he could still see the white of her teeth. “Because we will offer to free it from Fujimori in exchange.”

Now he knew this wasn’t right. “You couldn’t do that before?”

“Not without back up, no.”

“What if it’s not interested? What if it wants the sword for itself?”

“That won’t be a problem. The problem will be in convincing us to let us find it. The reason it won’t tell Fujimori where it is is because it doesn’t think he should have it - or that anyone should have it. It thinks it’s best left alone.”

Logan shrugged, and glanced out the window, figuring it had a point. But that didn’t keep him from being determined to get it.

It was very late, and much of Tokyo had gone dark, officially closing shop for the night. Oh, Electric Town was still a glow on the horizon, like an urban forest fire, but much of the genuine Human parts had shut down for the evening. But if he knew demons, this was their version of happy hour.

Indeed it was - he could see the cyanotic glow of Akki-Netsuai’s lights before he even realized it was the club they were looking for. It was an old tin roofed warehouse that anchored a seedy block near the old docks, a place so run down looking that the crime rate was probably low due to the fact that even criminals didn’t bother to come to a place this sad anymore. Akki-Netsuai was about the only building that looked like it had any signs of life at all, and even it looked like a rusting hulk vomited up on land in the wake of the last tsunami.

Once she parked, Yasha pulled a spiked dog collar, seemingly out of nowhere, and snapped it on. “Okay, this is where the acting comes in.”

“I’ll never pass as a demon, even with this hair.”

“I know, that’s not what I’m asking. What I need you to do is this - pretend you’re a demon fucker.”

“Pardon me?” He decided not to mention he had, but he wasn’t a demon fucker, not as he understood them. He did prefer Humans as a rule - no offense to Helga.

“I’ve never been in there, but Fujimori undoubtedly has men in there who might recognize me, in spite of the guise. I need you to act like you’re in my thrall. Can you handle that?”

“In your thrall?” He scowled at the thought. “You mean you want me to pretend I’m your slave?”

“Love slave, yes.”

He rubbed his eyes. “Let’s go to plan B.”

“There is no plan B. If you go in there and don’t obvious “belong” to me, you will be swarmed by demons who think you’re free meat.”

“I thought no one got eaten in a bad way.”

“No, but you will have to fight off all sorts of vampires and other demons while we try and plan strategy. Think that’s going to work?”

Sadly, that was a point. “And what of Otasuki’s men?”

“You’ve never seen a Kiji demon before?” She paused, and thought of way to explain it to him. With her black lips and short brown wig, she looked frighteningly young, like a teenager trying to look tough and slutty for her friends. “Ever seen an Ed Wood film?”

He looked at her in disbelief. Was this a lead in to a joke, or had things gotten so bad this was somehow a relevant point? “Yeah. What, do Kiji demons have an angora fetish and a penchant for cross-dressing?”

“No, they look quite a bit like Tor Johnson, an actor he used a lot.”

This was another fact he had to mull over. The name almost sounded familiar … “The big bald ugly guy who couldn’t speak English?”

“You got it. Although he could speak it, just badly.”

He continued to stare at her. “You’re a bad movie aficionado, aren’t you?”

“It’s hard to be a vampire and not be,” she claimed, although the logic of that eluded him. She had to be kidding.

But before he could accuse her of shitting him, she got out of the van, and he was forced to get out as well. How did one play a vampire’s love slave? He was tempted to ask her, but was afraid of her answer, so he decided to just play it as if he was incredibly stoned.

As soon as they were in sight of the bright blue neon marquee of the club, Yasha took one of his arms and leaned against him, hiding her face in the side of his neck. “Remember, I’m your super hot, forbidden demon lover.”

“I hate you.”

“Pretend it’s lust.”

A huge demon in a platinum colored and impeccably tailored Italian suit seemed to melt from the anoxic shadows of the warehouse as they approached the door. It was a type of demon he’d never seen before: seven feet tall, as thick as a linebacker, with what looked like curving ram’s horns crowning its bald gray pate. Yasha must not have ever seen him before, because she raised her head, and asked, in a slightly giddy “little girl” voice, “How’s the blood tonight?”

The bouncer scrutinized them both with his tennis ball sized yellow eyes, but they must have passed inspection, because he stood aside and said, “Fresh. Gotta busload of tourists in.”

Did he even want to know what that meant?

“Sweet,” she replied, with a slight giggle.

As soon as the door opened and they went inside, he was assaulted by things that had now become familiar to him: the smell of too many demons (now commingled with Humans) in packed into a small, hot space, although the warehouse seemed larger inside than out (the Way Station was known for that curious distortion of physical space too - it put him instantly on alert); the sound of music, loud and pounding, although this was a curious cacophony - it sounded like a DJ somewhere was trying to merge Rammstein with Shonen Knife. And to his surprise, the lights were relatively bright - at least in spots - and mostly white and red. But far back, on the top of the rear wall, a movie projector was spooling scenes of the Evil Dead movies, more or less in time with the riotous, schizophrenic music. “What’s with that?” He asked, nodding his head towards the movie clips. Currently, a puppet deer head was laughing maniacally.

“Demons love horror movies - they‘re hilarious,” she whispered, hiding her face in the side of his neck again. “Especially the Evil Dead films. Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi are safe from attacks for all time, you know.”

“I’m sure they’re relieved.”

“But I hope the guys who made The Omen are in the witness protection program; everyone thinks that’s dreadfully dull, and they all deserve to die.”

He thought the demons might have some film critics on their side, but didn’t say it.

Most of the Humans in the bar looked like Goths or sado-masochists, which would fit the profile. The club was dominated by a huge dance floor, and Logan couldn’t believe people were attempting to dance to music that essentially had two different tempos, neither of which lent itself to easy movement. They were mostly Asians - both Humans and vampires (and the majority of the demons smelled like vamps) alike - but there were some Brazilians, some mixed races, and a few whites, so he didn’t stand out as much as he could have. It also seemed the majority of the Humans here were men, which somehow also tracked.

The bar, off to the left, was a translucent, curved piece of acrylic; the tables were opaque acrylic and bright plastic. No wood, no metals of any kind (beyond the tin walls), and he supposed the owner was trying to be kind to his clientele. Accidental deaths would probably cut into their reputation.

He got a lot of leering, hungry looks from vampires - both male and female - but he didn’t read anything familiar in any of their eyes. He searched the crowd for Kiji demons, but the crowd was so dense, and of so many varying sizes and lightning conditions, he couldn’t immediately tell. A long, lean demon who looked not unlike an uncooked sausage (poor guy), wearing a strange, tube shaped t-shirt that read “Don’t hit on me - I’m staff”, came up to them and said, “We’re having a special tonight - a two for one on sweet Bloody Marys and tequila sunrises.”

“I just wanna beer,” he said. “You can get her a Bloody Mary, though.”

“Very good sir. What kind of beer?”

“Tsingtao,” he said, naming the first Asian beer he could think of (okay, it was Chinese, not Japanese, but from the neon signs, they obviously had it here.)

Sausage Boy gave them a strange nod that was sort of more like a high bow (as far as Logan could tell, he had no actual neck), and then wandered off, slithering through the crowd towards the bar. As they found a blue plastic table at the edge of the dance floor, he asked her quietly, “What’s a sweet Bloody Mary?”

“Blood and vodka,” she replied, pulling out a red plastic chair.

As he sank down into his own seat, he realized she wasn’t joking. Well, duh - of course a demon bar would have a Bloody Mary with actual blood in it.

She casually glanced around, pretending to look up at the Evil Dead montage while scanning the crowd, and he knew something was wrong when her shoulders stiffened. “What is it?” He asked, rubbing the back of his neck as a poor cover for glancing over his shoulder. Even though the way he was seated put most of the demons behind him, he had an excellent, clear view of the entrance. He couldn’t help it; it seemed to be against his nature to sit with his back to any door.

“Some of Fujimori’s muscle,” she said quietly. “I recognize them.”

“They’re coming this way, aren’t they?”

“You’re good at guessing, aren’t you?” She replied, and for some reason she got up. “They haven’t seen me yet.” She then pushed him back and straddled him, sitting down on his lap and coming face to face with him. “What the fuck - ” he exclaimed, more annoyed than anything else.

“Pretend you’re enjoying it,” she said, kissing him.

His first impulse was to shove her away - he really never wanted a vampire sticking her tongue down his throat - but as he heard deep Ressik voices (even over the discordant music), he realized this was just part of hiding her face, as well as doing something out of character.

He pretended to be into it, sliding his hands down her back and pulling her tightly against him (well, she did tell him to act like he was enjoying it), and listened carefully as they walked past. She slid her hands beneath his shirt, almost pulling it up as she moved her hands to his back, and her cold skin felt curiously good against his skin. If the Ressiks gave them more than a cursory glance, he never felt it.

He opened a single eye warily, and watched the group - there were three, in similar charcoal colored suits with dark shirts and pastel hued ties - leave, laughing over something. He gave it a minute, just to make sure they were really gone, before he grabbed her shoulders and pushed her away. “They’ve gone,” he told her, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

She gave him a sly look before getting up and returning to her chair. “Right, you’re disgusted,” she said. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you copped a feel.”

“I didn’t,” he claimed, then added, “Just a small one.”

“Yeah, sure.” She scanned the crowd, shaking her head.

“This from the woman who was grinding her pelvis against me.”

“I was not,” she snapped. He stared at her, and she stared back, refusing to give an inch. “I was just trying to get comfortable. You might as well have a metal exoskeleton; I felt like I was sitting on a train track.”

“That could be a compliment,” he replied, grinning at his own joke. No, it didn’t make a lot of sense, but it sounded good.

“Men,” she said, with a scowl of disgust. She then sat up a little taller, and said, “There’s one. He’s going up the stairs.”

He turned around to look, not bothering to be subtle. He didn’t even see any stairs before. But he did see them eventually, after peering into the darkness for some time. The lights had been positioned around them so they were a sort of optical illusion, a deeper blackness in the shadows. It was a narrow flight that hugged the wall, and he could see a glimpse of a meaty arm and a bald head disappearing into a small metal door at the top of the stairs.

Now he knew this place had been mystically tweaked, because there was no way this place had been large enough on the outside for more rooms, and certainly it had no upper stories. “What the fuck’s up there?”

“Well, the use of the word fuck is correct,” she said, getting up. She grabbed his hand and all but pulled him out of his chair, and started dragging him through the crowd. So that was the brothel adjunct? Lovely. He could have gone his entire life without seeing a demon brothel.

He tried to glance around inconspicuously as Yasha led him through the demon-Human throng, but most were moshing to some weird combination of Nine Inch Nails and fast tempo-ed drum and bass electronica, and never even glanced in their direction, even when they shoved past them. He smelled lots of alcohol and drugs among the sweat, and many of the drugs were unfamiliar.

As soon as Yasha opened the door and went inside, he pulled his hand out of hers, and reeled back slightly from a new smell - it was sickly sweet, and yet had an undertone of warm soil, like garden dirt in full sun. “What the hell is that?” He asked, shaking his head and sneezing.

“Wenwori,” she said, and when he gave her an evil look, she finally explained, “A rare incense. It’s supposed to be an aphrodisiac for both demons and Humans.”

He rolled his eyes. Why did people - Human or otherwise - think they needed aphrodisiacs? Maybe the problem was they weren’t attracted to their partner - had that ever occurred to anyone? “It stinks.”

“That is a drawback,” she agreed, looking around.

They were in a narrow corridor, dimly lit with reddish light alone, and it was lined on both sides by unmarked, whitewashed metal doors. A close up look revealed a small blue flower, like a violet, in the center of some the doors. Logan figured, from sight and smell and noise, that those were the occupied rooms.

“What does a Kiji smell like?” He wondered, parsing the scents beneath wenwori smoke. The good thing about vampires was their very acute sense of smell.

She considered that a moment, wrinkling her nose at the harsh miasma of odors. “Kind of like burned hay on top of pickles.”

“I got ‘em,” he told her, venturing down the hall, following the scent trail. It was like following a single line of static in a test pattern, but he could do it if he focused.

There was a narrow red carpet that muffled their footsteps, good for sneaking up on the demon, although it was threadbare and stained with spilled drinks and - most revoltingly - various body fluids. It wasn’t an upscale brothel, that was for damn sure.

“I’m impressed you can follow it,” she admitted reluctantly. “I’m finding it hard to concentrate with all this stink.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty bad.” He was starting to feel a little dizzy, with a tiny ache just starting to bloom in the center of his forehead, just behind his eyes. The only music they could hear in here was the deep, frenetic throb of the bass line, and it seemed to mimic the pulsing pain in his head. God, they needed an air conditioner or something; he was starting to sweat, making his Ressik t-shirt stick to his skin like glue. And wet Ressik didn’t smell too good.

Finally, he saw his target at the end of an L bend in the corridor. “Second to last room on the right,” he told her. “He went in there.”

He saw her stare at him out of the corner of his eye. “You’re really a bloodhound, aren’t you? Just like a vampire.”

“Stop saying that,” he growled. “I’m nothing’ like you cr - ” But his insult was cut short by a high pitched, female scream - eminating directly from the second to last room on the right.

“Oh fuck,“ he grumbled, breaking into a run. “Hero time.”

He didn’t look back to see if Yasha followed him, but he really didn’t care as he threw himself bodily into the door, breaking it down as easily as if it was made of balsa wood.