The Adventure of the Masked Biker, the Scrapyard Automaton, and the Mysterious Dark Moon Alternative Rock Type Beat
The rain in this city doesn’t wash the grime away; it just makes the spiritual pressure heavier.
I stood on the fire escape, watching the alley below. Down there, amidst the overturned trash cans and the flickering neon of a ramen shop sign, She was fighting. A flurry of golden energy and a chain of light whipped through the air. She was fast—faster than most humans—but the lower-class apparition she was tangling with was slippery.
I raised my right hand, focusing my Rei (spirit energy) into my index finger. I wasn't the star of the show; I was the cleanup crew. The support.
Bang.
A condensed shot of spirit energy left my finger, clipping the demon's knee. It stumbled, screeching. She didn't hesitate. With a shout of "Crescent Beam!", she disintegrated the beast into purple dust.
She looked up at me and gave a thumbs up. I didn't smile back. Something felt wrong. The air tasted metallic, like chewing on aluminum foil.
The Arcade Glitch
We met up ten minutes later at the Game Center Crown. It was our unofficial HQ. The place was empty this late, save for the hum of cooling fans and the attract modes of fifty cabinets.
"That was too easy," she said, wiping soot off her cheek. "I barely broke a sweat."
"That's what worries me," I muttered, leaning against a row of racing games. "The Spirit World radar has been quiet. Too quiet. Koenma hasn't sent a mission briefing in a week."
Suddenly, the lights in the arcade flickered. A high-pitched, digital screech tore through the room.
I spun around. It was the vintage cabinet in the corner. The Sailor V game.
Usually, it just sat there collecting dust, a relic of the 90s. But now, the screen was strobing violent red. The pixelated sprite of Sailor V wasn't jumping or fighting; she was frozen, glitching out, her face contorted into a mask of panic.
> SYSTEM ALERT
> SPIRIT BARRIER: CRITICAL
> LUBRICATION REQUIRED
"Is... is the game haunted?" she asked, stepping back.
I stepped closer. The coin slot was vibrating. "Worse. It's a communication line. Koenma uses analog tech to bypass modern surveillance, but this isn't Koenma."
The screen flashed again, giant block letters scrolling rapidly:
> THE GEARS OF HELL ARE GRINDING.
> THE GATEWAY IS RUSTED SHUT.
> IF IT JAMS, THE BARRIER BREAKS.
> I NEED OIL. LOTS OF OIL.
The Industrial Crisis
"Oil?" I read the screen, baffled. "Like... olive oil?"
> NO, YOU IDIOT. MOTOR OIL. INDUSTRIAL GRADE. 10W-40 OR HEAVIER. NOW.
The cabinet began to smoke. The smell of burning plastic and ozone filled the arcade.
"The gateway between the Spirit World and the Human World," I realized, the horror sinking in. "It's not a metaphorical door. In this sector... it's a literal machine. And it’s seizing up."
If that machine seized, the barrier would shatter. We wouldn't just be dealing with low-level alley demons. We’d be dealing with S-Class threats.
"Stay here and guard the cabinet!" I shouted, sprinting toward the door. "If anything crawls out of that coin slot, blast it!"
I ran out into the rainy street, scanning frantically. I needed an auto shop, a gas station, anything. I spotted a 24-hour garage two blocks down. I didn't have time to be polite. I kicked the door open, flashed my badge (the fake police one, not the Spirit Detective one), and grabbed two five-gallon drums of synthetic motor oil.
"Emergency requisition!" I yelled at the terrified mechanic, tossing a wad of cash on the counter that I certainly couldn't afford to lose.
The Lubrication of Hell
I hauled the drums back to the arcade, my lungs burning. When I burst through the doors, the Sailor V game was shaking so violently it was rattling against the floorboards. Black sludge—ectoplasm mixed with rust—was oozing from the joystick port.
She was blasting the sludge with beams of light, keeping it from forming into shapes. "Hurry! It's trying to build a body!"
"Pop the control panel!" I ordered.
She ripped the plastic dashboard off the machine with her enhanced strength. Beneath the wires and circuit boards, there was something that shouldn't exist in our reality: a swirling vortex of grinding, ethereal gears, glowing with a sickly green light. They were screaming, metal-on-spirit-metal.
I uncapped the first drum and poured.
Glug. Glug. Glug.
The golden oil hit the spectral gears. Hissing steam erupted, smelling of sulfur and gasoline. The screaming of the metal pitched down, turning into a low groan.
"More!" the pixelated Sailor V on the screen flashed.
I poured the second drum. The gears spun faster, smoother. The black sludge receded, sucked back into the vortex. The red light on the screen faded to a calm, steady blue.
> LUBRICATION COMPLETE.
> BARRIER STABILIZED.
> GAME OVER.
The screen went black, then rebooted to the standard high-score list.
The Aftermath
I collapsed onto the carpet, covered in sweat and synthetic oil. She sat on a stool nearby, looking at her gloves.
"So," she said, breaking the silence. "We just saved the world by changing the oil on a demon portal inside an arcade game."
"Yeah," I sighed, pulling a pack of cigarettes out of my pocket, only to find them crushed and soaked. I tossed them into a bin.
I looked at the Sailor V game, then at the empty oil drums, and finally at the ceiling.
"This job is ridiculous," I muttered, wiping grease off my forehead. "I'm fighting rust demons and taking orders from 8-bit sprites."
I thought about the legendary detective who came before me. The guy who fought in the Dark Tournament, the guy who challenged the rulers of the Demon World. He didn't have to deal with arcade maintenance.
"If only Yusuke Urameshi was still around," I whispered to the empty room. "He would have just Spirit Gunned the machine and called it a day."
Soundbites from Dragon Ball, Sailor Moon, Biker Mice, Adventures in Odyssey, Yu Yu Hakusho, Card Captors & Gundam Wing With Samples from Oliver Anthony, Blackfoot, Cream, Zeppelin, DJ Pain 1, Bad Religion
https://audiomack.com/dj-new-new-dre/song/6943e63d3675e
Comments
Post a Comment