by N. P. Martin
“You sound stressed,” I said.
“It’s chaos here. Brentwood has put the city on lockdown and people are going crazy trying to get out. Plus the President is breathing down his neck, demanding that he find a solution to what’s happening. The National Guard are here as well to try and maintain order in the city. You find out anything yet?”
“Eh, no, not yet.” I hated lying to her, but I knew how she would react if I told her the truth. She would only gather a small army and rush to back me up, getting everybody killed in the process.
“What about that demon?”
“Nothing, I’m afraid.”
"Goddamn it. The portal is getting bigger. We have to close it, Creed, or…"
“I know, or we’re all doomed. You don’t have to tell me.”
“Sorry, it’s just…”
“Scary shit?”
"I don't scare easily, but this..."
“You’d be mad not to be afraid,” I said, wishing I could be there to see her, to hold her, one final time.
"What are we going to do, Creed?" She sounded like a little girl, and I closed my eyes for a second, trying not to let my emotions get to me. I had to stay strong, for her and everyone else.
“I’m about to look into something that might put an end to this whole thing. I’ll have to see.”
“What?” she asked hopefully.
“If it pans out, you’ll know. If it doesn’t—” I paused for a second. “If it doesn’t, you’ll also know.”
“You know where he is, don’t you?”
“I—”
“Creed, you have to tell me so we can help you. You can’t fucking do this alone.”
“I have to go. I love you, Leona. More than you’ll ever know.”
“Creed—”
I pressed the button to end the call and then turned off the phone completely, tossing it away onto the sofa, my chest heaving with the swell of emotion that had rose in me. Screwing my eyes shut, I stood for a moment and took a few deep breaths, doing my best to refocus on what I had to do. My eyes opened again when I felt Blaez push his head against my leg. Crouching down, I smoothed the fur around his head and hugged him to me for a minute as he made small sympathetic mewling noises. “Looks like its just you and me now, Blaez.”
I stood up, straightened my trench coat and placed a hand on top of Blaez’s head in preparation for teleporting us to Mr Black's location. "Alright," I said. "Let's go get this bastard, Blaez."
Blaze barked loudly in response, and then we were gone.
50
The Lair Of Mr. Black
THE DEMON WASN’T lying when he said that Mr Black had been right under my nose all along. My father (I had to stop calling him that) was using an old, abandoned factory building as his base, which was just a few blocks from where I lived. I teleported Blaez and I to the expanse of waste ground on which the factory stood. Up above, in the unnaturally dark sky, a massive hole had opened up, looking like a huge tornado as it swirled around, seeming to swallow up the sky as it sucked everything into itself.
With horror, I watched a gigantic black tentacle extend its way out of the center of the maelstrom, dropping down like a giant, eyeless worm. Then there was a massive roaring sound which came out of the portal, a sound that chilled me to the bone and made me feel insignificantly small and afraid like a child happening upon an angry giant. It was the sound of coming doom, the sound of Rloth’s approach. And contained within that roar was the promise of unimaginable power that would soon be unleashed. A form of darkness so deep and all-consuming that no one who witnessed it ever lived to tell about it. Rloth was a being of pure destruction, spawned in a place that no mortal mind could ever fully conceive of without going utterly mad in the process.
Mad like Mr Black.
"Dear God," I said, staring up into the churning black sky. Even Blaez whimpered when he heard Rloth’s unearthly roar.
Suddenly my mission to stop all this from happening seemed utterly pointless. In the face of such monumentally insane odds, I felt like sitting on the nearest pile of bricks and waiting for the world to end along with everyone else. I couldn’t conceive of anything stopping that thing from coming through to this world, not even if I managed to stop Mr Black first.
And as if to emphasize that doomed in the pit of my stomach, Rloth bellowed again, the petrifying sound echoing around me, seeming to rattle my very bones. As the roar went on longer this time, it froze me to the spot and all I could do was gaze up in horror at that gargantuan black tentacle slithering further out of the portal. The thing was mesmerizing in its size and otherworldly darkness. I had seen plenty of things in my lifetime that made me freeze with fear or sick with horror, but this thing above me from another dimension was beyond comprehension, and thus it scrambled my brain just looking at it. God knows what everyone else was thinking as they saw it.
Speaking of everyone else, I had no doubt the city was in a state of terror as electrical energy got discharged from the portal and arced across the sky in thick reddish forks, striking some of the taller buildings in the city, exploding bricks and shattering glass, at the same time seeming to knock out most of the power in the city, bringing on a total blackout just to add to the devastation. And while this was happening, a constant chorus of screaming could be heard as the city’s inhabitants no doubt ran around in a blind panic, probably thinking they were all going to die. Which they would, if I didn’t manage to stop Mr Black.
It was only Blaez barking beside me that pulled me out of my trance-like state. The Garra Wolf was standing just in front of me, looking towards the old factory in the center of the waste ground. When I followed Blaez’s line of sight, I saw a dark form that seemed to be hovering over the top of the factory. And as I looked harder, I saw the form wasn’t hovering, but growing from within the factory itself. A huge, black mass on which stood a tall figure that could have been the silhouette of a demon with horns pointing out the side of its head. Only I knew it wasn’t a demon, but Mr Black. He had transformed himself, become the physical representation of the darkness that lay within his soul.
That bastard is the cause of everything, I thought, as anger began rose in me. Even if there was no stopping Rloth, I could still try to put an end to Mr Black once and for all.
What did I have to lose anyhow?
Nothing at that point.
Placing a hand on Blaez’s head, I teleported us both inside the lair of Mr Black.
51
Grasping Hands
THE INSIDE OF the factory was warm and humid, sickening in its suffocating atmosphere, which was entirely down to the pitch black substance that covered every wall and ceiling like thick tar. The stinking, glistening residue of Mr Black's dark magick, the same residue that covered Hans Belger's tower at the The Devil's Playground. The continually undulating, shifting substance also gave off a stink that was stomach churning in its intensity. As soon as I entered the broken front doors of the old factory, the stench from inside seemed to jump straight down my throat to make a grab for my guts, churning them up until I had no choice but to vomit onto the floor.
“Jesus Christ,” I said, choking, fighting every instinct I had not to turn and run back outside. It was like entering the asshole of some foul creature, and a place you would only go into if you had no choice, which I didn’t have. Beside me, Blaez sneezed once. That was the height of his reaction (well, what do you expect from an animal that laps the blood of corpses off the floor?).
As much as I wanted to flee that place of pure evil, I forced myself to cross what was once the reception area of the factory and start walking down a corridor that I hoped would take me to where Mr Black was. It was difficult even to see where I was going thanks to the light-sucking black magick residue on the walls and ceiling. Luckily Blaez was walking just in front of me though, his head and body now veined with red fire that gave off enough light to just about see by. I had never been so glad to have him with me as we walked together into the heart of darkn
ess, the possibility of death for the both us seeming more and more likely the closer we got to Mr Black.
Every now and again, a mighty roar would sound from outside as Rloth continued to announce his presence and coming destruction, the roar shaking the very foundations of the old factory. If it wasn’t for the black glue-like residue covering all the walls, the factory would have likely collapsed under the sheer reverberating force of Rloth’s guttural roar.
With Blaez lighting the way, I continued to edge my way further down the corridor. Or at least I did until the wall in front of me stretched as if a head was pushing it out from the inside like a face pushing against black vinyl. I stared at the face as it turned towards me, it’s mouth opening to issue a tortured moaning sound like it was trapped in the worst place imaginable and knew it was never escaping (a bit how I felt at that moment as well). Then another face stretched out of the opposite wall, along with a hand that tried to grab me. In seconds, there were faces pushing out everywhere, hands grasping at me, making it impossible to move any further.
What the hell are these things?
And then I realized. They were the souls of the people murdered by Mr Black. Scores of them all around me, their desperate cries and moans coming from all directions. Before I knew it, I was being held tight by numerous pairs of hands stretching from the walls and ceiling. Fingers dug into me, clawed at my face, caused me to cry out in panic.
Blaez was in front of me, snapping his jaws at any hands that tried to grab him, the hands to retracting into the wall again with a painful groan. Any hands that did manage to touch him got immediately burned, which again caused the appendages to snap back away from him. Then the Garra Wolf rushed forward and started biting at the arms and hands that had a hold of me, but there were too many for him to deal with, and each one that he bit was replaced a second later by a different pair of hands. When I felt one of those hands clamp over my face, covering my mouth and nose, I knew I had to do something before I was suffocated. Focusing on my magick, I pulled back on it like an archer pulling on a bow, and then I let it go, releasing a blast of blue energy that not only cleared away all the hands that were grabbing me, but which also sent Blaez skidding back across the floor as well. The Garra Wolf recovered quickly, though, and I urgently beckoned him to hurry as I rushed down the corridor before any more grasping souls could get a hold of me.
When we finally got to the end of the corridor, we turned up another hallway that looked like it might lead to the center of the factory, but the hallway was already criss-crossed with scores of arms and hands and wailing heads. There was no way I would make it down there, not without getting stuck again. It would take a long blast of magick to cut back all those limbs. But I was reluctant to use any more magick than I already had because I knew I would need every ounce of it when I confronted Mr Black.
Thankfully, Blaez lived up to his name and moved in front of me as he cranked up the length and intensity of the flames spurting out of the red veins on his body until he was completely covered by scorching fire. I stayed as close as I could to the Garra Wolf as it moved up the long corridor, burning back the limbs and faces that stretched out of the walls, the souls wailing as they got burnt by Blaez’s supernatural fire.
Minutes later, Blaez burst through a set of double doors, and we crashed through into a massive open space that had mangled machinery pushed against all the walls as if they had been swept away by a powerful force.
Which they had been of course, and that powerful force was in the middle of the room raised up high on what looked like a mass of black tentacles or tangled tree roots that moved along the floor at the will of the person they were elevating.
Mr Black.
Or at least it used to be because the figure standing atop that undulating black mass didn't look like any version of Mr Black that I had yet seen. The evil bastard had now triumphantly transformed into a demon-like figure that was as black as his magick excretion, with two long, twisting horns on his demon head. There was barely even a recognizable face there anymore, just two glowing green eyes set against a faceless black mask. He seemed also to have acquired a trident from somewhere, just to complete the whole demonic look. There was no doubt the bastard was intimidating, raised so high off the ground, the roof above him blown apart to reveal the swirling portal in the sky above and the ever lengthening black tentacle belonging to Rloth, the Eater Of Worlds.
When he spotted me standing there, Mr Black moved forward on the black mass of tentacles beneath him, spreading his arms out as if in greeting. “August,” he bellowed above the noise of the maelstrom outside and the continued, deafening roar of Rloth. “You have come to witness the end. Welcome!” The voice of the black demon was deep and guttural, but I still heard my father’s voice in there. It was still him underneath everything.
To say I was afraid would have been an understatement. The coming of Rloth was terrifying enough, but having to face Mr Black in his new demonic form was a pants-wetting prospect, especially when he spoke with my father's brutal authority that somehow only made me feel like a child again who was completely dominated by his father's will. It was only Blaez's loud barking that shook me out of my fearful state.
Don’t let him intimidate you! I thought. He’s nothing more than a bully, always has been!
Which was true, but that didn’t make him any less scary. Or dangerous.
"Stop this!" I shouted to Mr Black, the seeming confidence in my own voice giving me strength. "Or I will!”
Mr Black laughed, a sound that seemed to echo all the way from my childhood, making me feel small and insignificant. “Oh, August,” he said, aiming his trident at me. “When will you ever learn that your father knows best?”
He blasted me with dark red energy then, which shot out of the tip of his trident and hit me hard in the chest, lifting me off my feet and slamming me off the wall behind. And as I lay there groaning, I could only think of one thing:
This shit is going to hurt.
52
Dark Magick Rising
AS I PICKED myself up off the ground, holding my chest because I was hardly able to breathe, Demon Mr Black came scuttling towards me on his viscous mass of darkness, that self-satisfied laugh coming again from his mouth. “You are weak, August,” he said. “I thought I made you stronger than that. Obviously, I was wrong.”
Anger rose in me, and I straightened up. “The only thing you made me was miserable, you old bastard,” I shot back. “You made all of us miserable. We all hated you, even Mother.”
A growl issued from him and he jabbed his trident at me again. “I gave you power! All of you! You would be nothing now without me!”
“And we are nothing, thanks to you!” I strode forward, rage beginning to trample down whatever fear I felt before. “They’re all dead!”
His burning red eyes glared at me. "Don't worry, August. You will be joining them soon." He laughed as he looked up towards the sky just as Rloth gave another rumbling roar, which sounded much closer now, vibrating the very ground I stood on. "Everyone will!"
Blaez stood a few feet from me, his whole body a mass of flame as he growled at the demon. As I conjured a swirling ball of blue energy in my right hand, Blaez turned his head towards me, and I nodded at him. Then, as Mr Black stood staring up in awe at his master breaking through the sky, I fired the ball of energy at him, catching him off-guard and just below the chest, knocking him back a few feet and not much more. At the same time, though, Blaez fired himself up even hotter and then sprinted right at the twisting mass of tentacles underneath Mr Black. And while the demon glared at me, preparing to retaliate with his trident, Blaez bolted right into the black, ectoplasmic mass, burning right through it like acid through metal, causing Mr Black to cry out in shock and what sounded encouragingly like pain.
As Blaez continued to bore his way through the black mass, Mr Black let out a cry of angry frustration and suddenly raised his entire self, black mass and all, up off the floor by several feet, then
floated backwards at speed, exposing the still blazing Garra Wolf. The demon then directed his magick through the trident to trap Blaez on the spot and raise the Garra Wolf up into the air, Blaez’s legs and body bucking like mad to break free from the invisible hold on him.
To try and save Blaez, I fired another blast of magick at Mr Black, but he merely held out his free hand and stopped the blue sphere of energy in midair before launching it back at me. As the blast sphere was made up off my own magick, I was able to catch it in my hand without much trouble, intending to fire it straight back.
But Mr Black was a step ahead as he suddenly swung his trident in my direction, and the next thing I knew, a massive fireball in the form of Blaez was hurtling towards me, moving so fast that I barely had time to get an energy shield up to protect myself. The howling Garra Wolf slammed right into me, knocking me down onto the floor, his flames scalding my face and neck. I screamed in pain and managed to push Blaez off me, my demon skin trench coat thankfully absorbing most of the wolf's fierce heat.
It was then that I saw the trident come screaming through the air like a deadly missile before the fork piercing Blaez's body right through and pinned him to the ground. Blaez howled in pain as sparks and flames flew up around him, so much so that there was no way I could get near him to even try and pull out the trident. Blaez was stuck there to the floor, blood that was orange like lava seeping out of him as he gradually stopped moving and finally lay still.
"No!" I screamed, turning in a rage to glare at Demon Mr Black, who had now detached himself from the ectoplasmic mass he was previously moving around on. He came striding towards me, dark, leather-like clothing covering his even darker form, his eyes seeming to burn ever fiercer as he fixed me in his sights. Clearly, he was done with messing around.
