Desolace Omnibus Edition

by Lucian Barnes

  None of them dared to say a word. The brooding look upon Edward's face reminded Katie of a massive storm cloud waiting to burst. Once the bags were refilled with meats, cheeses, and breads, he handed them to Jack before turning toward the northernmost corner of the castle where the stables were. Sighing, Katie and the others trailed behind. Why can't he just be content with riding the metallic beasts? Nevermind the fact I enjoy having his arms around me when he rides with me, or that he's less moody when we're close, she thought.

  Knowing the others, especially Katie, were frustrated by his obsessive need for a flesh and blood mount of his own, Edward ignored the heavy sighs drifting up from behind him.

  After a brief conversation with the stable master, he led a gorgeous, young chestnut stallion with a flowing black mane outside to where the others waited for him. Jack handed over the saddlebag to Edward, which he quickly secured in place behind his saddle.

  "I hope you plan on being a little kinder to this one," Katie stated, finally finding the nerve to speak her mind.

  A glare of annoyance flickered briefly in Edward's eyes, then disappeared as if it had never been there. "I don't think we will have to push ourselves so hard now that we have an idea of what we may be up against, so the horse should fare just fine," he replied, doing his best to keep the sarcasm from his tone.

  "I'm sorry, Edward. I didn't mean for my words to sound so ... condescending. I guess I just don't understand what you have against riding with me on one of the mechanical horses. They cover ground more rapidly and we don't have to be concerned about them getting tired."

  "Though I've ridden with you on one for a short time, I still don't trust them. Besides, it is always nice to have an animal among us who can sense danger much easier than humans."

  "Hello? Isn't that what I'm for?" Brian asked, looking offended and hurt by Edward's comment.

  "Technically, you sense the presence of evil. As far as I know you don't have an early warning system for naturally occurring threats, like wild animals or other people whose intentions may be hostile," Katie answered, hoping to diffuse the situation before it started to get out of control.

  "Well, crap! Now I feel like an idiot for opening my mouth." Brian hung his head in shame for a few seconds. "I apologize for being rude, Edward."

  "It is better that we air any grievances we may have so we can move on as harmoniously as possible. We have no idea what we may be up against and we cannot afford to show our enemies a weakness they could exploit," Edward stated in a tone meant to rally everyone together. A quick survey of their faces told him that his message had been well received.

  "Does this mean the petty bickering is going to finally stop?" Jack inquired, grinning.

  "I think it means that no matter what we may feel on a personal level, we keep it to ourselves so our enemies can't divide us," Katie responded, looking to Edward for conformation.

  "Exactly! If we stand united, nothing will prevent us from emerging victorious. Now, let's get everyone saddled up and headed out. If the Gods smile upon us our mission will surely succeed," Edward shouted, raising a fist into the air to emphasize his point.

  Chapter 29

  A clacking sound could clearly be heard in the silence, which permeated the dead town. The formless one who had assumed command of the others sat up and looked toward the rails leading up to the edge of the city. It was a noise the demon was familiar with, signifying a fresh delivery of corpses to the dumping ground.

  Sensing the movement nearby, one of the infested cyborgs, leaning against the side of a dilapidated house, turned its head to regard the leader. "How long do we have to wait here for George to show his face? It sure doesn't seem like he's coming back," the cyborg complained.

  The railcar screeched to a stop a short distance away. "What are you sniveling about?" the Black Knight roared.

  Turning toward the sound of his voice, the minion quivered with fear as he realized his master was standing on the platform of the open railcar, which was piled high with fresh bodies. Scrambling to his knees, he quickly bowed to the Black Knight. "Humblest apologies, My Lord."

  "Get off your knees you worthless piece of shit! Come unload these corpses ... and make sure you scatter them through town."

  Quickly, the minion scampered to the rails, cowering as he approached, fearful his master was luring him within striking distance to kill him. When the blow didn't fall, he hefted a corpse onto each shoulder and began to distribute them throughout the alleyways in town.

  "Which one of you dared to stand up to me when you failed your last mission?" the Black Knight demanded, searching the area with narrowed eyes and waiting to see if the same minion would step forward.

  After a moment's hesitation, the leader cautiously raised his hand. "That would be me, My Lord."

  The Black Knight stepped down from the platform and approached the formless one. "It's good to see you still have your balls." He grinned wickedly. "You will be in charge to lead my army north to Elysia. Destroy any who oppose you, including that worm, George, should you happen to cross his path. When you get to Elysia I want the city leveled! Understood?"

  "Yes, My Lord." He bowed.

  "Then gather the others and go. Now!" The Black Knight turned back to the railcar as the leader began to issue orders to the others. The platform was now empty and the whining minion was rushing to join the rest of the formless ones. "Where do you think you're going?" The Black Knight reached out and snagged the coward by the neck before he could get away.

  "But ... but you said," he began, his voice not much more than a gurgle with his master's skeletal claw tightly gripped his throat.

  "I know what I said," he hissed, his long, jagged teeth gnashing inches from the minion's face. "That mission was for the others. I have other things in mind for you," the Black Knight growled, throwing the coward to the ground and pinning him there with a clawed foot.

  "What would you have me do, My Lord?" the formless one inquired in a raspy voice.

  "You will stay here, play dead, and keep the corpses company," he spat. "If George returns, you will kill him!"

  "What if—" the minion began to ask.

  "If he comes back and you fail ... it will be you who dies!"

  Chapter 30

  The last two days had been hell for George. Several times he had found himself wishing he'd chosen another individual to possess. The body he now inhabited was a far cry from being completely unusable, but it grew tired too quickly, causing him to stop more frequently than he liked. However, there was at least one aspect of the possession he rather enjoyed: the woman seemed to be highly in tune with nature. Oftentimes when he stopped to rest, small woodland creatures would approach, even to the point of allowing her to pet them, which George used to his advantage.

  If he had a caring soul, which obviously he didn't, he wouldn't use the woman in such a manner. It was really a shame George hadn't thought to bring one of her small handheld mirrors along for the journey. Forcing her to hold it up so she could watch herself, snapping the neck of a rabbit or squirrel then tearing her teeth into its flesh, the blood drizzling down her chin as she ate the raw meat as if she were eating corn on the cob, was truly a morbid delight.

  It was nearly dark when George began to hear a familiar sound. Tossing the carcass of his dinner aside, he scrambled for the cover of a large willow a few feet away and ducked behind its enormous trunk. After peeking around the tree a couple of times, he saw what was making the noise.

  Apparently the group of travelers he had seen when he'd been much further north, somewhere near Outpost 13 if his memory was correct, were following him. When George gazed upon their leader, riding in front of the others on a dark colored horse, a twinge of emotion revealed itself. Not from him, but the body he was inside of. "I get the impression you know this man," he muttered, forcing the words into the woman's mind and causing her entire body to break out in goose bumps, confirming his suspicion. "How do you know him?" Shaking her head violently, she did e
verything she could to suppress the thought so George wouldn't obtain the information he wanted.

  Prying into her mind wasn't as difficult as he expected. Clamping a hand over her mouth in case she somehow managed to blurt out a warning, his words hissed venomously in her mind. "Ah, so he's your son. Well, let us follow them for a bit to see what they're up to, shall we?"

  Silently he waited for the procession to go by, a pang of longing and regret washing over him as he watched not one, but two mechanical horses trailing behind the lead animal. Sons of bitches! One of those should be mine! His eyes narrowed in anger as he thought back to his former life and how easily he'd been duped. I will get my revenge, you can be sure of that!

  Chapter 31

  As dusk approached on their second full day away from Elysia, Brian pushed the pommel of his mount forward a bit more to speed it up enough to draw even with Edward.

  "I'm feeling something," he whispered.

  Edward held up a hand, indicating the group should stop. "What kind of something?" he inquired, turning to face Brian.

  "The kind which hits when I'm in the presence of evil," he replied quietly, nervously glancing to his left.

  "Is it coming from over there?" Edward pointed in the direction Brian was looking.

  "I think so."

  "I see nothing except trees," he stated doubtfully. "Are you sure you're not just imagining things? After all, trees can't be evil, can they?"

  Sighing, he turned back to face Edward and gave him a raised eyebrow look that said, you can't be serious.

  After squinting into the trees and still seeing nothing, he nudged the horse to get it moving again. A few moments passed before he reined the horse to a stop once more, not hearing the heavy footfalls of the mechanical beasts. "Are you guys coming?" he called over his shoulder.

  "Why won't he listen to me?" Brian turned his head to face Katie who had pulled up beside him.

  "About what?"

  "I can feel something evil lurking in the woods nearby, stronger than a pack of zombies, but it seems to be a single entity," he replied in a conspiratorial whisper, nodding his head in the direction he perceived the threat to be emanating from. "He wouldn't take my warning seriously, instead he cracked a joke about evil trees."

  "Not exactly what I call sticking together in the face of adversity," Katie stated glumly.

  "What should we do?"

  "For now I would say we indulge him. Later on, when something happens, you can tell him you told him so," she replied, offering a thin, but hardly consoling smile.

  Chapter 32

  Returning, not to his lair but to the Factory instead, the Black Knight was pleased to see that production of his army seemed to be back on schedule with the addition of his minions to the work force. From the corner of his eye he saw the supervisor quickly making his way over to where he stood.

  "My Lord," the man said, bowing briefly. "Thank you for sending more workers to me. They are much more efficient than any of the humans I've watched over."

  "Don't get too excited, little man." The Black Knight grinned. "I will be taking them back to my sanctuary as soon as I can find replacements for you."

  "As you wish." The supervisor bowed again and started to move away.

  "Wait!"

  "Yes, My Lord?"

  "Where are the humans who were here when I sent my minions to help out?"

  "I've sent them on to Cemetery Hill, My Lord. They were extremely unproductive and rebellious after your helpers arrived, and refused to work alongside them. I couldn't have them disrupting production," the supervisor replied, hoping he'd made the right choice. Rubbing his throat he recalled the last time he had made the Black Knight angry and he wasn't aiming for a repeat performance.

  A few tense moments passed while the supervisor waited for a response from the Black Knight. Without a word, his black cloak swirled as he turned his back on the man and glided with demonic swiftness up the tunnel toward Cemetery Hill.

  ***

  Arriving a short time later, the Black Knight entered the expansive chamber. Row upon row of slaves, their feet chained to rings set in the floor, were stretched over the crude wooden crosses which dotted the landscape from one side of the room to the other. With all of the recent troubles, many of these lay barren, waiting silently with outstretched wooden arms for their next victim. Most, if not all, of the slaves still clinging to life here were likely captured at one time by the same man who plagued the Black Knight now.

  Even from beyond his grave George continued to defy him at every turn. I need to regain the upper hand with that insolent bastard. But how? Tapping a skeletal finger against his chin thoughtfully, a new idea came to him. "Why didn't I think of this before?" he muttered wickedly to the unconscious forms in front of him.

  Spreading his arms wide as if he were a priest delivering a benediction to conclude a church service, a large portal opened up before him like a black hole in outer space. Grinning, he stepped through to the other side, and floated into a heavily forested area on the outskirts of Misty Hollows, Ohio ... in 1988!

  ***

  As the Black Knight entered a version of Earth's past, his army of cyborgs and reanimated corpses marched relentlessly toward Elysia. They were rapidly approaching George unknowingly, not that they cared. Their focus lay to the north and what remained of the greatest city upon Desolace.

  The days and nights blurred together as their mission objective loomed just out of reach. Within the next two or three days they would be bringing Elysia to its knees, leaving nothing but a smoldering memory of what once was.

  Chapter 33

  Having just entered another large clearing as the sun departed from the sky, Edward decided to keep pushing forward despite the fact that Amber was absent. One of Desolace's two moons had already begun to rise in the east, giving them ample light to continue their journey.

  Riding side by side near Katie, Brian voiced his doubts. "I don't like this," he whispered to her.

  "Me, either," she agreed. "I wish he would stop for a while and wait for Amber. It almost seems like he's getting impatient and rushing things again."

  "That isn't exactly what I meant," he confessed. "I'm getting mixed signals from my senses."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I am almost certain that what I felt a while back in the woods ... is still following us. Patiently biding its time and watching, but now I also feel a larger presence before us and it appears to be heading straight for our position."

  "Can you tell what it is?" Katie asked nervously.

  "No. I just know it's a much greater threat than whatever is stalking us from behind."

  "We have to tell Edward," she insisted. "We can't let him blindly lead us right into whatever it is that you're sensing." Not waiting for Brian to agree or disagree, Katie pushed her pommel forward and quickly caught up to Edward, who turned his head toward her as she pulled up beside him.

  "Is something wrong?" he asked, his face unreadable in the near darkness.

  "Brian said he could feel something heading straight for us," she whispered urgently. "And he says the feeling he's getting from it is stronger than the one he had before when we were trying to avoid a massive horde of zombies!" That seemed to get his attention ... finally.

  He pulled on the reins, bringing his horse to a stop. "I don't see anything nearby," he calmly stated, squinting into the darkness ahead.

  Katie looked for anything to give validity to Brian's warning. Peering into the distance she could see a good sized area which seemed darker than everything else around it, but she couldn't tell what, if anything, it was. As Brian pulled up alongside them, Katie could just barely make out his eyes, which were beginning to cloud over and make him look like he was possessed. "Um ... Edward?" She reached over and tugged on his cloak, pointing toward Brian.

  "Maybe there is something to his warning," Edward surmised, noting the change in his breathing and the overcast glaze of his eyes. Turning to look into the distance, he con
tinued to see nothing unusual.

  "Oh, shit! Here we go," Katie announced, seeing Brian casually dismount the mechanical horse and wander a short distance away, falling to his knees and acting much like he did back at her childhood home. "I think the proverbial shit is about to hit the fan!"

  With Brian no longer atop the mechanical horse, Jack inched forward into the saddle, inadvertently bumping the pommel and causing the beast to lurch sideways. Losing his balance, he made a last ditch effort to cling to the saddle. Jack's clothing snagged on the pommel and jerked it to the side as he fell to the ground. The metallic creature skittered in that direction, stomping on one of Jack's legs as the cloth ripped free, leaving the monstrosity standing on top of him. "Help! Somebody get this thing off of me," he screamed in agonized helplessness.

  Glancing quickly in that direction, Katie saw Brian raising his arms into the air, preparing himself for the ritual to come as if he hadn't heard Jack's plea. Hopping down from her mount, she rapidly ascended into the saddle of the beast crushing Jack with its considerable weight, thrusting the pommel to one side long enough to get the creature off him.

  Jumping down again, she rushed over to help Jack. As she knelt down beside him, Katie caught movement from the corner of her eye and looked to see what it was. Was it her imagination, or was that dark blob closer than it was a minute ago? "Edward," she called out, nervously pointing toward the approaching mass.

  Looking in the direction she indicated, Edward began to notice shapes emerging from the shadowy area. "It can't be! We closed the portal!" Fearing the zombies of future Earth had somehow found another way to his world, he quickly summoned his most reliable spell and thrust his palms forward. A blaze of bright blue light flashed outward in a tight cone, freezing everything it touched in place.