The Sunlight Slayings by Kevin Emerson

the other side. Turning, he saw that Dean was passing through a rippling energy barrier. He looked blurry for a moment before emerging.
    â€œWhat was that?” Dean asked.
    â€œDead detector,” said Oliver. “To keep out any living creatures.”
    â€œSo how did Emalie get through that?”
    Oliver just shrugged.
    The passage was dark and dank, only now the sounds of voices, machinery, and drums were much louder, washing over them in chaotic swells. Oliver’s nose was overwhelmed by pungent odors of warmth, death, and oil and gas fumes.
    They walked another minute in darkness, and then emerged from the tunnel into a narrow alley. There was no ceiling, just darkness. Rickety shops were clustered together on both sides, leaning over the path. Some of the shops were just stands; others had windows lit by neon signs in Skrit and other pictorial languages Oliver didn’t know.
    Billows of steam and smoke washed over the crowd. Above the shops, wooden ladders zigzagged back and forth along precarious bamboo scaffolding that climbed up into the darkness. Some of the ladders led to ledges, some to other stores high up, and some to recesses that were merely dark, gaping suggestions.
    There were masses of creatures clogging the alley, hanging over counters and out of stalls, and lurking in the scaffolding above. Each one seemed hunched or huddled to hide its appearance, sometimes with a hood. Oliver smelled zombies and vampires, and other things unfamiliar, likely true demons who were taking form briefly in the borderland.
    The shop owners in the Yomi were Merchynts. They were known as omni-realm demons, meaning they existed simultaneously in multiple worlds. Since it was built in a borderland, this Yomi would also exist in the other nearby worlds, and so each Merchynt would be operating his business in all the worlds at once, appearing different in each.
    The only light in the Yomi was from fire: Open metal troughs like gutters had been cobbled together from the roof of one shop to the next, holding channels of continuous flame. Oliver’s nose was overwhelmed by the scent of petroleum, being pumped from deep in the earth by those laboring machines. Sometimes the gutters were spaced by a metal bowl, which pooled the petroleum and allowed for a brighter light, but for most of the business being conducted in the Yomi, light was not especially welcome.
    â€œThis place is intense,” Dean said nervously, sounding like his old living self.
    â€œLet’s just stay together and move fast.” Oliver started ahead, jostling among the secretive figures, keeping his head low among the grunts and hisses. Strange lights glowed in the shops, from signs, from crystal objects, from within the hands of hooded Merchynts. There were displays that looked ordinary at first, like a rack of skinned animals the size of cats—but cats didn’t have six legs or only a single eye.
    The crowd pressed close around and above them. Oliver had trouble focusing and keeping track of direction. Suddenly they found themselves in a gap in the crowd. Glancing about, Oliver saw that everyone had moved into the shadows of the shops. Oliver wondered why—
    Until the entire world went black.
    It was as if reality had momentarily cut out. The fires were extinguished, the noise of machinery gone—afterward, Oliver couldn’t remember if he’d been able to see or sense anything in that single moment—and then they suddenly found themselves standing straight out sideways. The Yomi had turned itself, and now the floor had become the wall. They weren’t falling, though. Their feet were rooted to the floor as if “up” and “down” were sideways now, too. A faint red light lit the Yomi.
    â€œWhat just—” Dean began, but he was drowned out by the deafening blast of an air horn. There was an incredible roaring and grinding of machinery. The ground stayed sideways where it was, but now all