Hellbound

by Matt Turner

  Amaury seized Vera and bodily threw her into the chasm that led back down into the depths of the fortress—the last thing she saw was a glimpse of his and Simon’s tight, despairing faces, and then the thunder of the angel’s words, just before the entire afterlife was engulfed in the unending light:

  “YOUR GOD.”

  42

  Seth pounded across the waves to the opposite shore, his flaming sword leaving a trail of steam that burst from the water behind him. It was all John could do to keep up; even as he raised up a veritable forest of branches and vines from the river of blood to carry him across, the heaven-man widened the gap. Fifteen-foot waves, brought up by the thrashing army that stormed into the river, crashed toward the pair, forcing John to use a handful of vines to yank himself safely up above the surface. Seth did not pause. Instead, he brought his arms before his face in a protective gesture and simply smashed through wall after wall of blood.

  As the rockets and artillery shrieked through the empty skies overhead, John felt the Phlegethon deepen beneath them. With every step, the cold that radiated up from the bark and leaves and trunks grew, until at last it seemed that nothing but a bottomless, lightless chasm yawned beneath them. A cruel chill crept down his back when he finally realized that the only thing that stood between his tiny, insignificant form and the empty void of Eternity were a few vines and scraps of bark.

  Unbidden, his eyes flickered downward into the blood-tinged depths. Beneath the waves, he caught a glimpse of what looked to be a shadow uncurling itself. What is— And then he saw that the trail of watery footprints Seth was leaving on the surface would lead the heaven-man directly over it.

  “Seth!” John shouted. “Below!”

  The river exploded upward as the first monster tore itself free from the depths. John caught a glimpse of a naked, pale thing, swollen from a century of drowning, hurl itself from the plume of a wave toward Seth, its rotting jaws opened as wide as a shark. Seth’s blade passed through it like a hot knife through butter, seamlessly splitting the bloater from mouth to groin. The two halves neatly hurtled to either side of the heaven-man and harmlessly splashed into the river behind him.

  “Were you really worried about that?” Seth laughed. “It’s…oh no.”

  Fill it, the enemy commander had shouted.

  And, as John grimly surveyed the shadow that swept just underneath Seth’s feet, it seemed that Cain’s army had done exactly that. Not even the deepest river in Hell could stand against the Master’s power. They’re endless.

  For a mile in each direction, the Phlegethon suddenly turned from a river to a swamp, as the sheer mountain of bodies that had been poured into it finally crested over the top. For a brief instant, Seth stared in disbelief as the water beneath his feet drained away. Three feet, two feet, one foot… An endless plain of twisted bodies and frames, many warped and crippled by the sheer pressure of their comrades, burst out from the water, leaving nothing for either man to stand on.

  They’re the ground, John thought in disbelief. He whipped down two vines and wrenched himself up into the air just as a hundred arms violently tried to claw and tear him apart. They’re literally the ground. “Seth!” he bellowed, already reaching out to the heaven-man with a dozen branches. “I’ve got you!”

  “Save it!” Seth laughed. “Focus on yourself, Tree-man!” He whipped his blade around him like a scythe, neatly severing the limbs that reached up toward him from the sea of humanity. The ground beneath him shuddered and hissed as the flames from his sword spread, setting flesh and bone alight.

  But John could see that the warrior had brought himself only a brief second of reprieve; already hundreds—no, thousands—of the damned were tearing themselves free of the still-growing hill of bodies. Most of them seemed to have nothing other than teeth and fists, but there were so many—

  “Fuck this,” John growled. The vines around him whipped back and then forward, neatly snapping themselves in half as they hurled him through the air. He felt the wind rustle the leaves on his shoulders and couldn’t resist letting out a whoop of excitement as his body gracefully cork-screwed through the air. Just as he had hoped, a cluster of vines burrowed out from the hill of bodies, gently caught him, and placed him next to Seth.

  “Impressive.” Seth smiled. “Seems you Horsemen are full of tricks.”

  John cracked his knuckles as the bark in his arms and legs tightened and spread out to encase most of his body. “Let me show you a few more, Heaven-man.”

  A vine tore out from his fingertips, wrapped around the throat of one of the bloaters, and suddenly wrenched the screaming thing back toward him. John cocked his fist back, took a deep satisfaction in the thick bark-armor that coated his knuckles, and smashed his arm forward just as the bloater whipped into his fist. He did not even feel the thing’s skull break under his knuckles, was barely even aware that he had struck it—one instant it was there, and the next, there was nothing but a stain of blood on his hand and a few scraps of pulp at his feet.

  And then the army of the damned swallowed them up. Thousands of them swarmed forward, crushing one another in their desperation to inflict their misery on someone else for once. It was impossible to tell what they were: men, women, bloaters, demons, or something else entirely—for their faces and cries and even bodies seemed to blend together, nourished and twisted together in a mindless cacophony of pain and rage and hate.

  “COME,” John shouted. He smashed his palms together—a storm of sharpened branches exploded from his body like stakes, peppering the ground, crowd, and even the sky with dozens of foot-long branches that tore the enemy to shreds. Blood and bodies crashed to the ground, swallowed up as thousands thrashed forward to take the place of every one he had managed to bring down.

  “AND,” Seth echoed. He danced through the chaos like a blur, crashing, igniting, and disemboweling dozens at a time. Fire from his blade tore through the unending mob, baking skin and bone from the heat, but their sheer numbers quenched the flames. He managed to carve out a small circle around John, but the crowd pushed in deeper—they were growing taller too, as layer after layer came out of the ground, darkening the skies above them. Within seconds, they weren’t fighting on a plain; they were fighting in the bottom of a well.

  “DIE!” John screamed. With all his might, he focused himself on the greatest vegetation he had ever grown. At the edge of their tiny clearing, a wall of thorns and brambles reached for the dark skies, growing so forcefully and fiercely that for a few seconds it tore their enemies apart with the force of propeller blades. He tried to focus more on the top to shove the mountain of bodies back, prevent them from simply cresting over the makeshift wall and just burying them under their weight. But it was too much; their numbers were just too overpowering—and then Seth sank his blade into the wall of brambles, instantly igniting the entire structure. John instinctively sensed what he was doing and stretched the vines out through the horde as far as he could. He could feel the flames whoosh down them, sending a thousand lines of cleansing fire into the chaotic ranks of their numberless enemies. As one, the horde recoiled. The pinprick of light above them briefly widened.

  A single man, eyes red with blood and rage, squirmed free of the burning wall and rushed at John, clawed hands outstretched. John whipped out with one of his vines, neatly puncturing a hole in the enemy’s chest—and still he came forward, wriggling on the edge of the vine like a madman. Seth strode forward, his sword ready to cleave the man in half, but John shook his head no.

  “Fight,” he shouted, and twitched his fingers together. The man’s toothbrush mustache turned a bright red as twigs and thorns tore out of every orifice in his body. John left him there, looking more like a hedge statue than a human being, as he wordlessly grabbed Seth’s wrist. Seth nodded in understanding, and a blast of air engulfed John as the heaven-man hurled him upward with unbelievable strength. On every side, the well of bodies clawed at him. In return, he smashed them with his fists, breaking off thorns in their bodi
es that exploded outward into trees and bushes and briars, entire forests that reached through the unending horde, with roots that tore through flesh like dirt to consume human blood like water.

  “Like!” At last he crested the top of the hill. For a moment, he was able to see that most of the Phlegethon was entirely filled up; the only thing that stood between the walls of the First Blockade and the unending horde was a thin stretch of river. But the numberless hordes were no longer focused on that prize; from every direction they rushed to destroy the two interlopers who had dared to defy the will of their Master. Below him, the hole that he had emerged from began to collapse inward, crushed by the sheer weight of bodies—and then it briefly re-emerged as Seth tore his way up, hacking and slashing like a madman. The enemy collapsed and burned like ragdolls in the wake of his passage, and just as John’s trajectory began to bring him back toward the screaming ground, Seth caught up with him.

  Let’s do this. John nodded. He interlaced his fingers, and from the tips of his feet a massive trunk began to grow—already, he could tell that this tree would be even greater than the one he had used in his fight against Legion. There were only a few seconds before they were swallowed up again, but this time he had no fear. I am a Horseman. Seth touched the edge of his sword to the growing trunk, igniting it in an unnatural glow. John welcomed the flames as they rushed upward, burning, yet not consuming. In the skies above, a great beam pierced down from the heavens, casting out great crackles of lightning and power. It felt right, as though it were some heavenly sign. A Horseman of—

  “HELL!” John and Seth bellowed with one voice. The trunk of the tree crashed down into the mob, crushing thousands to a pulp with its weight. It reached outward with hundreds of roots and thorn-covered branches, each coated in heavenly flame.

  The havoc and hell that they unleashed in those precious thirty seconds before Babylon’s world-ending beam struck was nigh-unfathomable. An army tens of millions strong briefly hesitated—that fact alone made Eve, still watching from her throne, feel a reluctant sort of admiration for the two fools. It would seem that Seth carries my blood after all.

  Her throne gave a little shudder as one of the bodies that built it began to cough violently. Eve wrinkled her nose in disgust. “Tear out your lungs,” she snapped.

  “Y-yes, Grandmother,” Lamech meekly whispered.

  Eve paid no attention to the ripping, gasping moans from beneath her. The poisonous gas that the elderly Horseman had shot over at her had been an irritation, yes—it had cost her precious minutes to ensure that her weak bodyguards were immune to such annoyances—but the Horsemen had made one crucial mistake in their pathetic resistance.

  In the end, the war for Creation would not be won by an army of slaves, no matter how numerous they were. No, my son. She flicked her eyes up to the sky. ELIE’s beam still coursed downward, but the danger it posed had passed, for a new player had joined the fray. High above, the Beast let out a hellish cry, and against the smoke and fire that flickered into the sky, a single silhouette could be seen grimly standing atop the monster. Even at this distance, she recognized the brooding form of her firstborn.

  This war belongs to the gods.

  43

  Simon had never given a shit about the gods of the pagans—he had, in fact, once taken great satisfaction in tossing his father’s precious Iliad upon the funeral pyre of the abusive old drunk—but even he could appreciate the doom that the steel angel had hurled down at them. Great crackles of lightning split from it in every direction, slicing blinding lacerations through the dark sky. A single bolt tore ahead of the main beam, erupting a volcano of fire from the ocean of bodies. The thunderbolt of Zeus, he realized. Without thinking, he violently seized Amaury and threw him to the ground, throwing his body on top of his son’s. The roar of Babylon’s crackling beam intensified to an unbearable thunder that made the ground tremble.

  I earned this doom, Simon thought as he raised his head. The sheer brilliance of the light made his eyes water. I won’t look away.

  And then, against the backdrop of blinding light, a shadow shot down from the sky, with such speed and might that it was little more than a blur. A plume of dust rose up from where it exploded with the broken pavements of the fortress’s courtyard, briefly hiding. Hidden behind the cloud that bathed the silhouette, Simon caught a glimpse of cold yellow eyes and the flicker of the lightning’s majesty reflected off cold steel. Even as utter oblivion crashed down on them like a wave, he felt a shudder pass through him as the golden orbs locked with his own. He saw nothing there but frozen fury…and strangely, a sense of disappointment that was somehow even worse.

  The golden eyes turned away from him to coolly regard the godlike finger of wrath that tore down from the heavens. As the smoke around the man dissipated, Simon saw the muscles on his bare chest tighten like cords. From the dust that still lingered at his feet, he raised up his weapon—a hellish scythe, covered in wicked barbs and jagged teeth, nearly as long as a man was tall. The glimmering reflections in the weapon’s cruel blade were little more than shadows and whispers, but they made even Simon shudder. There was a Hell even more cruel than the one he was damned to; he was absolutely certain of that now. And that man—that monster—he’s its maker. He suddenly welcomed their imminent destruction; if nothing else, it would be the end of that thing—

  In a single fluid motion, so swift it was nearly impossible to trace, the stranger viciously slashed his scythe up at the sky. The edge of Babylon’s beam crashed into the edge of the blade, producing a thunderclap that kicked up a mountain of sand and made the very walls of the First Blockade tremble. For an instant, the man gritted his teeth and stood his ground against the machine’s fury, tearing pulses of lightning and energy in every direction—and then the beam died away, and the stranger neatly spun about as his scythe vibrated and crackled. His mane of dark hair swept across his face, obscuring everything but the tight smile of satisfaction on his narrow lips.

  “Now,” the stranger announced. He swung the scythe around his shoulders, bringing the tip of its serrated blade an inch from the ground. For an instant, it seemed that there would be peace—and then the gargantuan horde of raw power the hellish weapon had consumed erupted from it in an all-consuming eruption of energy.

  Simon desperately scrabbled at the ground, nearly hurled back by the whirlwind, as the entire back half of the fortress’s wall became nothing more than vapor, split a million different ways by the vast pulse of power that traveled one mile, five miles, ten miles, into the Burning Desert, carving up a canyon that stretched down to the bedrock of Hell, and still it kept going, until at last on the distant horizon it erupted with a fire that turned sand into glass. And still it grew, until half of the horizon was entrenched in a hellstorm that made the Kingdom’s Hellfire seem to be a pathetic children’s toy.

  We’re nothing, Simon realized in horror as he stared at the distant flames—some so massive that they stretched miles into the sky. All of the trials the Horsemen had faced, the odds that they had overcome…they meant nothing. There had never been any speck of hope, never any sort of chance for them at all. What can we possibly do against that?

  “Oh God,” Amaury whispered. “It’s him.”

  Cain, the Firstborn of Mankind, the First Murderer, the rightful ruler of Damnation, and the second-most powerful being in Hell, cracked his neck to the side, letting out a harsh pop that echoed across the sudden stillness of the battlefield. No one—man, devil, or the abominations in between—dared to so much as twitch as the Master raised his eyes to survey his domain.

  “Now,” he softly repeated. “Do I have your attention?”

  “Wha…” Simon had to cough from the sudden dryness in his throat. “What do you want?” he whispered.

  “Nothing.” The dark hollows that contained Cain’s eyes told a very different story. “But before I rip it from the cosmos, I’ll take back my property, my child.”

  In the speed of a blink, the Master was on top of
them. Simon screamed as a bare foot crashed into his ribs, shattering them like twigs as he flew a dozen meters and crashed against the fortress’s wall. Far away, those few who remained of Salome’s soldiers screamed as the edge of the Master’s horde surged onto the beach in their thousands to scale the shattered walls. But most of all, Amaury screamed as the edge of the scythe tore across his wrists, leaving only a pair of bloody stumps in their wake.

  “The final Seal,” Cain whispered. He kicked the sobbing man away, stabbed the tip of the scythe into what had been Amaury’s right palm and raised the ugly Mark upon it up toward his lips. “It will be so good to be whole again.”

  There is no hope, Simon thought as the tears poured from his eyes. No hope at all.

  Of course, there never had been.

  44

  Babylon could scarcely believe the signals its optical units were transmitting to its central processors. One of the mightiest weapons in its arsenal, capable of reducing an entire city to a slag of molten steel, had been simply swatted from the air and deflected. It had never dreamed that Cain had such defensive capabilities, but as it scanned the battlefield below, it rapidly reached a conclusion.

  The scythe. It’s a Relic. One of those infuriating, demon-built weapons of the First Rebellion. The Master must have been patiently waiting to use it for millennia. Although Babylon had no doubt that it could easily counter the clumsy weapon, this raised questions about what other tricks the human may be hiding.