I stared up at the demon queen in confusion, still trying to wrap my head around the fact that she could actually talk. This was much like finding out that the neighbor’s dog can talk, something which goes against everything I knew about the species.

“Humansss,” the demon queen said, moving around and staring at us intently. The expression on her face made me think of a cat who was playing with a mouse…or in this case, a snake who was playing with mice.

“You…you can talk,” Nicole blurted out.

“Yesss,” the demon queen responded. “But none talked back…until now. Until you humansss.”

I looked to Rebecca and Nicole, seeing that they were both as confused about this situation as I was. We were supposed to hunt down demons and kill them, not talk to them. The fact that this one was talking instead of attacking left us all uncertain of the situation.

Then the demon queen lowered her human part towards us and sniffed the air. She looked at the two soldiers in biohazard gear, then she looked at me and my sisters. The demon scowled and pulled back a little.

“You sssmell the sssame,” the demon said, sounding surprised. “I know you…” She let out a strange hiss before stating, “Rebecca…”

“What?” Rebecca gasped in shock. Then she quickly demanded, “How do you know who I am?”

“I wasss human once,” the demon queen answered, turning her full attention to Rebecca. “I wasss…long ago.”

“You…you remember being human?” I asked in surprise, though I was beginning to wonder when I’d stop being surprised. I should just assume that none of the normal rules apply to this demon.

The demon queen let out her odd hiss again before stating, “Humansss are sssoft… Humansss are weak… Humansss are…tasty.” Her tone had been filled with contempt and hostility, and now she was looking at us with a hungry expression.

“But you used to be one,” Rebecca reminded her suspiciously. “Who are you? Who WERE you?”

For a moment, the demon just swayed back and forth with a look of concentration on her face, as though she was having to work hard to find the answer. Then she finally hissed, “I wasss called Yavich…”

“Martin Yavich?” Rebecca demanded with an expression of both shock and anger. “You were Martin Yavich?”

“Yesss,” the demon queen responded, seeming pleased, perhaps because she’d actually been able remember that much.

I just stared at the demon queen, feeling a knot in my stomach. This wasn’t just a demon…she was the very first demon. This was the very person who had created the demon strain in the first place. And when I saw the expression of hatred on Rebecca’s face, I also remembered that this was also the same demon who’d killed her mother.

Without warning, the demon queen suddenly lashed out with her tail, sweeping it across the cavern floor and right into us. Rebecca and I jumped over the tail, but Nicole and the soldiers were caught and flung against the wall. However, Nicole was immediately on her feet again, though she had to run and dodge as the tail came at her again.

“Kill her,” Rebecca screamed out, opening fire though massive coils came up and acted as a shield to keep her from being able to hit the demon’s more human parts.

The demon queen shot out towards one of the soldiers, then struck with her clawed hands. But to my surprise, she didn’t tear his throat out but merely slashed his leg and then pulled back. A second later, she launched herself at the other soldier, similarly slashing at his arm and then backing off.

“Holy shit,” I blurted out, realizing that she wasn’t trying to kill the soldiers. She’d intentionally infected them instead. I’d never heard of a demon doing something like that, but then again, she was unlike any demon I’d ever heard of.

“Do not fight humansss,” the queen announced. “You are sssmall and weak…”

“You were an asshole as a man,” Rebecca yelled at her. “Now you’re just a bigger pain in the ass.”

I ran to the injured soldiers, asking, “Are you all right?” But of course, I knew that they weren’t. The demon had punctured their protective suits and injured them at the same time. It was an absolute certainty that they were infected.

“Right as rain,” the one with the injured leg responded, though his voice was shaking badly.

A quick glance revealed that their injuries wouldn’t be life threatening, though they’d definitely need treatment. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to patch them up at the moment and wouldn’t be able to until we dealt with the demon queen.

“Keep pressure on your wounds,” I told them. “I’ll get you fixed up as soon as we deal with that bitch.”

“I don’t think there’s much you can do about this,” the other soldier said quietly.

I turned my attention back to the demon queen, was still using her scaled coils to protect her humanoid parts. Her scales were armored and very tough, but they weren’t impenetrable as she had several bleeding holes.

“I need a bigger gun,” Nicole called out in frustration. “The demons keep getting bigger and tougher but our weapons have been staying the same.”

“We’ll deal with that when we get back to base,” Rebecca responded grimly. “For now, just kill that damn thing…”

“You don’t need to tell me twice,” Nicole told her with a snarl. “You’re not the only one with a score to settle against this one.”

The demon queen let out a strange hissing roar, then lashed out with her tail again, catching Rebecca and Nicole and pressing them back against the cavern wall. Several coils were pushed towards them, creating a virtual wall of armored snake flesh.

A moment later, two more demons entered the cavern from an opening on the other side, probably called by the queen’s roar. Fortunately, they were both much smaller and looked more like the kind of demons we dealt with normally. One of them was tall and humanoid but covered with thick hair so that he resembled a sasquatch or wookie. The other one was somewhat humanoid in shape, but with a body that was covered with chitinous armor so that he looked almost like an insect.

The two new demons started coming towards me and the soldiers, but the demon queen hissed at them. “No… Thessse are mine.” She reached down to one of the piles of eggs, grabbing one of the eggs with each of her hands and handing them to the two demons. “Ssspread my childrensss. Keep them sssafe…”

For a moment, I just stood there, feeling stunned again by this demon and how she was able to control the other demons. Then I snarled and took aim, shooting the hairy demon in the shoulder and knocking him back. He dropped both the eggs he’d been holding and they hit the ground with a splat. The queen shrieked at that, obviously furious that I’d destroyed her eggs. So with a grin, I opened fire on the nearest pile of eggs.

“My eggsss,” she hissed furiously, letting out another shriek and then diving for me.

I dove to the side and ran across the cavern, alternately shooting the demon queen and her eggs. Rebecca and Nicole were no longer trapped in the corner by the queen and followed my lead. Even the two injured soldiers opened fire, though they were focusing on the two smaller demons. In seconds, the smaller demons were both dead, but the queen was still very much alive and completely pissed off.

“Let’s get out of here,” Rebecca called out. “I don’t want to be in here if this place collapses from our fighting…”

“It didn’t collapse when Hell Town was blown up,” Nicole responded wryly. “I think it can stand up to a little fighting.”

In spite of that, we began leaving the cavern. I grabbed the soldier with the injured leg and offered him support as we went back down the tunnel we’d come here through. Nicole took point in case more demons arrive from that direction while Rebecca trailed behind, shooting back towards the demon queen to keep her from catching us from behind. Still, I could hear her coming after us down the tunnel, making me wish that I’d grabbed another grenade or two from Dani.

When we reached the entrance we’d come through, Rebecca yelled out to Dani, “We’ve got incoming… We found the demon queen and she’s on our tail.”

“Are you guys okay?” Julie asked, looking at the injured soldiers.

“Just peachy,” one of the soldiers spat out bitterly.

“Get this,” Nicole exclaimed. “The demon queen is Doctor Yavich.”

Dani gave her a look of disbelief. “You’re shitting me…”

Nicole grinned in response and added, “It looks like you and Monica aren’t the only ones the harkon virus gave a sex change to.”

“We have located the demon queen and are in engagement,” Rebecca called out over the radio. “And for advisement, she’s also patient zero for the demon strain.”

A moment later, there was hissing sound from the hole, right before the demon queen burst out of it. All I could think of for a brief moment was that it must have been a tight fit. Then I caught myself and opened fire, as did everyone else including Julie.

“My childrensss,” the queen shrieked. “You will die humansss.”

“Did she just talk?” Dani blurted out in surprise.

“Shut up and shoot,” Rebecca ordered.

The demon threw her human part forward and slashed at Rebecca with her clawed hands. My sister dove to the side, though she wasn’t fast enough to avoid the attack completely. Claws tore along her armor but didn’t get through. At the same time, the massive tail swung around, hitting Nicole and sending her flying back with a scream.

At this point, the demon queen was lashing out and fighting more like a rabid animal than an intelligent being. She was behaving much like any other demon, making me wonder how much her remaining human side was actually in control and how much was just demon instinct.

“My squad is on the way,” Mike’s voice came over the radio. “We’ll be there as soon as possible.”

“Well, hurry your ass up,” Dani responded.

I rushed to Nicole’s side, seeing that she was still conscious, though she was wincing in pain. “I think I cracked my ribs on that one,” she told me as she tried sitting up.

“Not much I can do for that at the moment,” I told her with a grimace. “Let me pull you back for now…”

“Just give my gun and I’ll be fine,” she responded with a wince, gesturing to where she’d dropped her weapon when she’d been hit.

The demon queen tried making a lunge towards Dani, but even with her broken leg she was able to jump to the side, shooting back at the demon queen. She hit the demon in her armored coil, making two large holes. Then one of her shots caught the demon in her human torso, creating a large hole there as well. The demon queen tried making one more lunch but instead fell face first into the ground. Her tail slapped around and caught one of the soldiers, sending him flying with a sickening crunch. Then the tail fell to the ground as well.

“She’s dead,” Julie exclaimed in amazement, having put several holes in the demon queen herself, though she had stood back as far as she could.

I nodded and rushed to the soldier who had already been injured in the arm and infected. But as I bent down to check his vitals, I shook my head and sadly announced, “So is he.”

The reinforcements arrived less than a minute later and Mike immediately stopped to stare at the now dead demon queen. Gene, who was part of that that squad and who was currently wearing one of the bulky biohazard outfits came towards me.

“Are you okay?” Gene asked me, looking worried.

“I’m fine,” I told him quietly. “Him…not so much.” I gestured to the dead soldier.

“Damn,” Gene gasped as he looked at the dead soldier. “Nick…”

I winced at that, suddenly feeling guilty that I hadn’t even bothered to learn the man’s name. I’d seen too many people die since I started fighting demons, and I hadn’t even been on this job all that long. I looked to my sisters, realizing how many more they must have watched die over the years.

Captain Brooks arrived a few minutes later, also wearing one of the biohazard suits, which protected from infection but made it more difficult to fight. “So this is the demon queen,” he said as he looked over the body. “Are you certain?”

“Positive,” Rebecca answered. “We found about a hundred eggs down in her nest.”

“And you’re sure this is patient zero?” Captain Brooks asked.

“Yeah, this is…was Martin Yavich,” Rebecca agreed, glaring at the dead demon. “She told me so herself.”

Captain Brooks just gave her a look that indicated that he thought she was joking. Then he shook his head and began to slowly walk away.

Just then, our surviving backup soldier yelled, “She’s moving…”

I looked back at the demon queen and saw she was indeed moving, though it was no more than a slight movement of her arm and the very end of her tail. Still, it was enough to confirm that in spite of her severe injuries, she was still very much alive. Dani and Rebecca both immediately took aim to rectify that situation.

“STOP,” Captain Brooks ordered.

“We need to kill her before she recovers,” Dani responded coldly.

“We can’t do that,” Captain Brooks said with a look of distaste. “I just got orders from on high that they want us to bring in patient zero as intact as possible.”

I stared at Captain Brooks, knowing that keeping the demon queen alive was a VERY bad idea. From the grim look on his face, he agreed with me completely, but he had been given his orders.

“We are SO going to regret this,” Julie muttered from a short distance away while I nodded in full agreement.