The Evil Spirit

How do you talk a desperate man down? I had no experience. All I could do was try to approach from what he needed.

I stopped five metres away and ventured: "Friend — are you in some kind of trouble?"

He snapped his gaze up, watching me with immediate suspicion. The hand inside the black bag tightened, already in position to pull out the knife.

The menace made me step back. "F-friend, I don't mean you any harm. It looks like you're in a difficult spot. If it's money, I have some savings — I can lend you what you need right now."

He could lunge at any second. I got straight to the point.

"My mother is dead. What good is money?" He bit out the words through clenched teeth. "Because I couldn't pay the hospital. My father won't forgive me! My sister won't forgive me! The whole family — the whole village will look down on me. All because of people like you in the city. You live in houses built with our blood and sweat, then stiff us on our wages. How is it so easy for you to live well while we work from dawn to dusk and keep getting poorer?"

His voice climbed as he spoke, ending in a roar. The bystanders around him shot him looks of contempt. Those looks seemed to be the last thing holding him in check — and they pushed him over the edge. He erupted, pulled the knife from the bag, grabbed a nearby passerby, and started stabbing.

"Don't do this — you're young—" I was still trying to intervene. But before I finished the sentence, I became the second victim. The knife was fast. A sharp pain tore through my throat, then difficulty breathing, consciousness dimming, the screaming around me growing distant. Darkness and silence closed over me again.

When the light came back, Manager Sun was already standing in front of me. "Last two days! If you're not done tonight, don't come home!"

I was back in the office. The screen read: 45:40:37. Even less time left.

Instinctively I touched my throat. The pain hadn't fully faded.

"You son of a—" I cursed under my breath.

"You — are you cursing me?" Manager Sun's face changed colour.

I wasn't cursing her — though it wouldn't have been wrong if I had. No time to explain. I got up, pulled the drawer open, took out the half-bottle of water, and walked out.

"You're leaving?" Manager Sun called after me.

I turned around. She was looking at me with an expression combining bewilderment and fury. I walked back to her and reached into the pocket of her trousers, pulled out her car keys.

The whole sequence seemed to completely baffle her. When I had the keys in my hand and was halfway out the door, she finally found her voice and shouted after me: "What do you need my keys for? Get back here."

I didn't stop. I ran to the car park, got into her SUV, and drove to the commercial district.

The timing was perfect — the man had just drawn the knife and started. I floored the accelerator and hit him straight on. He flew several metres, slammed into a wall, and bounced to the ground. I tried to brake but came in too late and drove nose-first into a lamp post at the roadside. The speed wasn't high enough to deploy the airbags, but the impact made my vision explode with stars, ears ringing. I sat recovering for a moment, then pushed the door open and climbed out. The front of the car was badly crumpled — it wasn't going anywhere. Onlookers kept their distance, watching from afar. The man I had hit was on the ground a few metres away. He had no idea where his knife had landed. Both hands on the ground, trying to get up — but I knew there was no chance: both legs were bent the wrong way.

When he saw me, his eyes flooded with terror. He curled his body back instinctively, kept shouting: "Don't come near me! Don't come near me!" What was he afraid of from me? I had no weapon — only the half-bottle. I walked over and held the water out in front of him.

When he saw the water, his struggling stopped abruptly. The terror in his eyes flickered and a flash of dark purple moved through his pupils, leaving them empty and blank. He slowly extended his hand and closed it around the bottle. He stared at the water inside for a few seconds — then seemed to briefly recover himself and showed terror again, and then one of his hands, as though it were no longer under his control, forced the bottle violently to his lips. He seemed to know what was coming for him; with his last reserves of strength he screamed his final words at me: "You filthy beggar — you'll get what's coming to you!"

Filthy beggar? He saw me as a beggar?

Before I could make sense of it, the water was in his mouth and going down.

A few fat cockroaches scurried past my feet. His pupils had turned completely purple-black. I felt no guilt. It wasn't this half-bottle that made him an evil spirit — he already was one. Worse than any evil spirit, if anything.

"I did what you asked. Can I go back to my normal life now?"

The evil spirit gave a single nod, and in that indeterminate genderless voice said: "What I needed from you is done. Now go deal with what you need to deal with."

What I needed to deal with? Just as I stood there not knowing what that meant, a familiar sound started up — my phone ringtone. But I remembered switching the phone off when the spam came in.

"Go deal with what you need to deal with." The evil spirit in front of me repeated this, then reached into a pocket and took out their phone — it was their ringtone. They answered and pressed speakerphone. Through the speaker came a high-pitched woman's voice: "Think you can run and I can't find you? Get back here this instant!" That voice — it was the finance department's Manager Sun. How was that possible.

The Manager Sun on the phone continued: "Think you can just leave without finishing your work? You think you can get away? Let me tell you — last two days! If you're not done, don't come home!"

The last sentence changed register. It no longer sounded like a voice on a phone — it sounded like a voice directly in front of me. The scene shifted rapidly: I was sitting in the office, Manager Sun's furious face in front of me. The wall clock was at 2:10. I had come back again. I yanked the desk drawer open to check: the half-bottle of water was gone. I looked up at the countdown in the lower-right corner of the screen, ticking rapidly. The current reading: 44:36:22. Another hour-plus had been eaten.