Dan the Barbarian

by Hondo Jinx

  Dan nodded. How much time had they lost, then?

  He had fled the library, hidden in the bushes, gotten cuffed and stuffed, and sat there feeling sorry for himself for a couple of minutes… maybe fifteen minutes, all in?

  An eternity.

  What had Dr. Lynch done in those fifteen minutes?

  With no opposition, had she moved forward with the sacrifices?

  Stop worrying, he told himself. Worrying is worse than worthless. Now is the time to plan.

  “So what do we do when we get there?” he asked.

  “There’s only one way to stop her now,” Zeke said. “I have to pull her out of that reality and transport her to the high planes, where her magic won’t be so strong.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t want to fight that crazy bitch in the Between,” Zeke said. “I need to open a gate directly to a high plane, with just a sliver of Between, so I can lasso her and pull her through.”

  “Will it work?”

  Zeke cackled, that familiar less-than-sane glimmer returning to his eyes. “We’ll see.”

  “And what do I do?”

  “Buy me time to open the gate. But don’t be an imbecile and rush her again, okay? Unless you enjoyed having your heart ripped out.”

  “No,” Dan said. “That sucked.”

  “Well, then,” Zeke said, and shuffled his feet in the gray non-space, shadowboxing with his scrawny arms, “you had better stick and move, sonny. Hit and run. Do just enough to keep her busy.”

  “Won’t she blast me with one of her spells?”

  Zeke shook his head. “I’m creating an anti-magic shell around you. It’ll have a ten-foot radius. No magic in, no magic out. Just keep your distance and do not let her inside, or her spells will work. All right… we’re here, kid. Time to cast that Wish spell and bring you back. You ready to rock and roll?”

  60

  Too Stupid to Die

  Dan opened his eyes and saw darkness spreading across the sky. He lay upon the stage, where he’d fallen.

  There was no pain, no weakness. In fact, he felt stronger than ever.

  54 hit points now, he thought. Let them be enough, Crom.

  Dan sat up and grabbed the snapped half-sword that had once been his friend and mentor.

  Undead acolytes crowded the stage, swaying back and forth and groaning a wordless chant.

  “And with this sacrifice,” Dr. Lynch’s voice boomed from the loudspeakers, “I summon thee, Darkness.”

  Dan couldn’t see the necromancer through the wall of undead acolytes, but her scrawny arms rose into view, as if reaching toward the darkness.

  Reaching up toward the darkness with a gift.

  A sacrifice.

  A bloody heart…

  “No!” Dan shouted, scrambling to his feet. “Holly!”

  The undead parted as if shoved aside by invisible hands, and Dr. Lynch glared at Dan from the other end of the stage. She stood beside the first altar, which was now a gory nightmare, topped as it was in the steaming remains of the naked, silver-haired elf.

  Holly lay atop the second altar, closer to Dan. “Dan! You’re alive!”

  Broadus lay atop the third altar, closer still. “Here!” he shouted to Dan.

  “Annoying little gnat,” Dr. Lynch said. “What are you, too stupid to die?”

  Dr. Lynch pointed in his direction. A trident of purple lightning leapt from her gnarled finger and exploded ten feet from Dan, shattering into a thousand spidery lightning bolts that sizzled over and around him, dissipating along the invisible dome that Zeke had cast around him.

  “How cute,” Dr. Lynch said. “An anti-magic shell.”

  Dan glanced over his shoulder. Come on, Zeke! Hurry!

  “Acolytes,” the Mother of Darkness called to her undead children, “kill the barbarian.”

  “Shit,” Dan said, ripping the crappy goblin sword from his belt.

  Groaning a collective battle cry, the acolytes shambled toward him across the stage.

  Behind them, Dr. Lynch raised her bloody hands once more to the sky. “Come forth, darkness! I birth thee into this world! Come forth, fill this place, come!”

  The gate to the Plane of Ever-Shade vomited darkness, further dimming the day. Icy wind swirled over the stage. Dan’s cloak fluttered behind him, and windblown grit made him squint.

  With a subpar short sword in one hand and a broken two-handed sword in the other, he rushed forward. He had to free Holly before Dr. Lynch sacrificed her!

  “Barbarian,” Broadus called weakly as Dan hurried past the Legionnaire’s altar. “Here.”

  “I’ll come back for you,” Dan called, rushing past. He wished that he had the time to free Broadus. He could certainly use the Legionnaire’s help, but there wasn’t time, and if he couldn’t save Holly, he didn’t care about saving the universe.

  As he drew back his swords, a line of light appeared in the air behind Dr. Lynch. Against the gathering gloom, the bright line looked like someone cutting through dark steel with a blowtorch.

  Occupied as she was with the gory remains of the silver-haired sacrifice, Dr. Lynch didn’t notice.

  Then the acolytes were on Dan, groaning, grabbing, and gouging. They hammered him with overhand strikes and tried to bite his hands, his arms, his face.

  Dan slid into a barbaric rage, fighting in the way of his people, leaping in and out, using his whole body, chopping with both swords, landing elbow strikes and head-butts and blasting one acolyte with a powerful kick that pitched the hooded zombie into the air and bowled over several would-be attackers.

  Dan broke free of clutching hands, rolled with punches, and dodged biting teeth. With every mighty swing, his swords severed hands and arms and heads or sliced bellies open, spilling cold guts onto the stage.

  And through it all, he battled forward, pushing across the stage, inching his way toward Holly while Broadus called weakly to him from behind and Dr. Lynch, beyond the wall of risen dead, coaxed forth eternal darkness.

  But severing hands and arms did little good, regardless of the tremendous hit point damage these forms of trauma obviously delivered. The animated corpses pressed on, down a hand or an arm but completely undaunted, beating at him with stumps and snapping at him like vicious dogs.

  Dan leapt back.

  Think, you stupid barbarian. Think!

  These were special zombies, animated by a high-level necromancer. The only thing that seemed to stop them was cutting off their heads.

  But you don’t have time to decapitate all of them.

  Behind them, Lynch waved the bloody heart overhead with a flourish. “Mother has more for you, darkness,” she shrieked. “More sacrifices.”

  Behind her, the bright line was beginning to widen from top to bottom, spreading like a slowly opening, fiery eye.

  Still focusing on the problem at hand, Dan thought, You don’t need to kill all of these assholes. You just need to get past them, rescue Holly, and buy time for Zeke.

  The zombies lumbered mindlessly forward. An ogre staggered at the front, stumping toward him on its severed ankle.

  They’re relentless, but they’re clumsy, Dan thought. Even the ones with both feet. Knock them over. Use them against each other.

  “Barbarian,” Broadus called again. “Here. Take—”

  But Dan launched into the air and nailed the ogre with a flying side kick, smashing his boot straight into the hulking zombie’s bloodstained chest.

  In life, the ogre would have absorbed the shot and kept coming, but Dan’s gamble paid off, and the undead giant toppled backward, flattening several acolytes.

  Dan landed on his feet and sprung forward. Using the fallen ogre as a bridge, he charged ahead, running up the massive body. He stomped down on the ugly face and vaulted into the air, his strength, dexterity, and determination launching him in a high arch over the wall of groaning acolytes.

  He tucked forward as he flew, bringing his head down and twisting into a mid-air flip. His boots arched ove
rhead then dropped, and he stomped down on both feet, sticking a landing on the stage beyond the zombies.

  Standing over the bloody sacrifice, Dr. Lynch showed him her terrible grin.

  A hand closed on his shoulder.

  Dan shrugged the paw and spun, dipping under the zombie’s arm and bringing the goblin sword around in an uppercut that drove the blade up through the jaw and out through the top of the skull. The zombie toppled backward, ripping the jammed sword from Dan’s hand.

  Slow as they were, most of the zombies hadn’t managed to turn in his direction yet. He made the most of this advantage, changing tactics again, hacking at their necks, chopping off head after head, piling their corpses in a battlement of ruined flesh before him.

  The other zombies stumbled forward clumsily.

  They were easy targets as they wobbled, tripping over the fallen dead, and Dan worked with cold efficiency, resisting the powerful urge to slide again into a red rage and instead striking with short, calculated chops, taking heads and dropping corpses.

  Soon, the zombies were dead or down, flailing beneath their toppled comrades.

  Gasping for breath and bleeding from a dozen scratches and bites, Dan cursed the remaining zombies.

  He had to get to Holly!

  Wild with desperation, he spun…

  And froze in place, paralyzed by the icy hand that closed around his throat.

  61

  The Last Gasp

  Dr. Lynch had swept in behind him while he was battling the undead.

  Now she had him.

  Dan could still think, could still hear, could still see, but his muscles had turned to stone beneath her paralyzing grip.

  “So stupid,” Dr. Lynch said, spitting the word stupid, spraying his frozen face with a foul and choking mist of decay. “What made you think that it would work this time?” She split the air with a terrible cackle.

  Meanwhile, behind her, the bright eye had opened further, and Dan could see a vague shape forming at the center, like an emerging iris coming to the surface.

  “No, Dan, no!” Holly screamed.

  Dr. Lynch’s red eyes burned brightly, and a cruel smile came onto her face. “Oh… is it love, then? Sweet, stupid love?”

  The necromancer threw back her shrunken head in a peal of terrible laughter.

  “Well, your little sweetheart is special, that’s for sure,” Dr. Lynch said. “How I loathe grey elves, and none of them are as loathsome as grey elf druids, with their dusty libraries and conceited neutrality. The protectors of field and forest, defenders of balance, too smug for good or evil, order or chaos. The keepers of knowledge. Such proud and ignorant fools!”

  As Dr. Lynch ranted, her ice cold fingers tightened on Dan’s throat, choking off his air.

  “I had instructed my bumbling acolytes to bring me your sweet sacrifice before this event, but they failed, of course. You can imagine how pleased I was when you fools and the Legion of the Lame actually brought her to me!”

  Dr. Lynch threw back her head with another cackle.

  Broadus’s voice carried to Dan then, barely audible over the howling wind and Lynch’s terrible laugher.

  “Blade,” Broadus called. “Blade of Light.”

  Dan wanted to scream, to cry, to smash his own face. How had he been so stupid?

  In his fury, he had forgotten about the Blade of Light, the magical weapon specially crafted to destroy necromancers.

  Ever since Dan had returned to this life, Broadus had been calling to him, trying to arm him with the one weapon that could’ve given him a chance against Dr. Lynch.

  But Dan had ignored the Legionnaire, charged ahead, and stumbled straight into Dr. Lynch’s diabolical trap.

  Now it was too late.

  “Your sweet grey elf will make the perfect sacrifice,” Dr. Lynch said. “All of that balance and neutrality and longevity and especially the grey elves’ hallowed tradition of keeping the past alive, of fading not into oblivion but stretching out into their ‘great conversation’ with the generations before and after them. Such utter nonsense! And now, I will cut out her heart and lift it up to the darkness, and your precious little elf will help me destroy balance and light, erase the past and the future, and usher in the age of oblivion and eternal darkness!”

  The day darkened with her crazed soliloquy, and the wind blew harder and colder.

  Come on, Zeke! Dan thought, but the bright gate had yet to open, and Dan, Holly, and the whole world had mere seconds left.

  Lynch lifted him from his feet, smiling terribly, her eyes glowing like pits of hellfire. “I was going to save her for last,” Dr. Lynch said, “but for you, my stupid barbarian, I will make an exception. I will carry you to her and let you watch as I rip out her pretty heart.”

  Inwardly, Dan raged with desperate, impotent bloodlust.

  “Stupid children!” Dr. Lynch hissed. “You will suffer for challenging the Mother of Darkness!”

  Turning with Dan and carrying him toward the black altar, where Holly lay squirming against her restraints, Dr. Lynch threw back her head with one more triumphant cackle…

  Which cut off abruptly, as a dark shape rushed past Dan, growling. Its black muzzle snapped shut, sinking into Dr. Lynch’s throat as it passed, and the head yanked, tearing.

  The beast landed and wheeled with amazing speed and dexterity, spitting a mass of ruined gray flesh to the stage.

  It was a wolf.

  A huge wolf with chestnut fur and green eyes as bright as liquid emeralds, familiar eyes that turned for a split second to Dan, sad and soulful, piercing him with revelation.

  Nadia?

  The wolf leapt again, sailing at Dr. Lynch, who dropped Dan and lashed out with superhuman speed, slapping the wolf with a powerful backhand that batted the beast away like a puppy. The wolf hit the stage, slid several feet, and lay in an unmoving heap.

  Dan gasped for air.

  That wolf… its eyes… Nadia… How?

  But he couldn’t just stand there, thinking. He had to hurry, had to—

  Dr. Lynch appeared before him, grinning terribly. She worked her jaws, meaning to mock and threaten him, but her torn and ruined throat only wheezed malevolently.

  Then Dr. Lynch smiled and pointed past Dan toward Holly, conveying her plans perfectly without a single word. She would force him to watch her sacrifice his love.

  But then a lasso of silver light fell over the necromancer’s head and tightened around her neck.

  Dr. Lynch’s red eyes swelled with surprise.

  Dan glanced over his shoulder.

  A circle of light now burned against the gathering darkness like a window into summer. Zeke crouched in the opening, pulling hard on the rope, trying to drag Dr. Lynch into the high plane where he could hopefully overpower her.

  Dr. Lynch’s mouth opened in a silent scream, and her red eyes glared up at Zeke with burning hatred. Her hands closed around the silver rope, trying to pull Zeke out of that plane and into this one.

  Zeke hauled back on the line, dragging Dr. Lynch several scraping inches nearer to the bright gate.

  Dan sprinted across the stage. Not toward Holly but toward Broadus.

  “Beneath me,” the Legionnaire gasped, clearly fighting against unconsciousness. “Small of my back.”

  Dan lifted Broadus as much as he could with one hand and searched for the knife with the other.

  Glancing across the stage, he watched in terror as Dr. Lynch released the silver rope and shot a line of terrible black energy into the bright gate.

  Zeke screamed as the black corruption struck his chest but held tight to the silver rope, yanking the necromancer toward him.

  Dan’s hand closed around the handle of a knife. He pulled it free. A dagger of shining fire burned in his fist.

  The Blade of Light!

  He charged.

  Zeke tugged weakly. The black corruption wound around him like a constrictor snake, and as Dan watched, his friend began to wither beneath the mortifying coils.
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  No longer sliding forward, Dr. Lynch raised her bloody hands triumphantly overhead.

  And that is how she was standing when Dan slammed the Blade of Light between her shoulders, driving it into her with all his might, sinking the fiery dagger to the hilt in her undead flesh.

  A flash of blinding light exploded in Dan’s hand, forcing him to release the blade and stagger backwards, shielding his eyes.

  Then the flash died away.

  The handle of the buried dagger glowed brightly now, tendrils of light stretching out and away, spreading across the necromancer’s form, wrapping her in a bright web as she raged and writhed.

  Dr. Lynch’s flesh was peeling away and smoking. Her robes caught fire as the light enveloped her. Then she started zipping across the stage again, dragged by the silver rope.

  Looking up, Dan saw Zeke, as withered and wasted as a mummy, hauling hard on the rope.

  Lynch’s burning form lifted into the air. Then she zipped up and way, flew past Zeke, and disappeared into the bright gate.

  Zeke tipped his hat toward Dan.

  Then the gate slammed shut.

  Zeke and Dr. Lynch were gone.

  The icy wind whooshed away to join the retreating darkness, carrying with it the evil green fog that had turned the spectators into butchers. A second later, only a dark spot remained in the sky. Then that, too, popped out of existence.

  The bright day returned. The stadium cried and wept and shouted, survivors coming to their senses and waking to an unfathomable nightmare.

  Dan raced across the stage.

  Not to Holly, whom he would free momentarily.

  But to his other love, Nadia, who lay naked upon the stage, still as a corpse.

  62

  Aftermath

  Several days later…

  “Enough,” Holly gasped. “No more, you insatiable barbarian!”

  Dan rolled off of her and stood beside the bed, smiling down at her gorgeous, naked body and beautiful face. “Just trying to get in a little fun before we visit your family.”