The Nyte Patrol

by Alex P. Berg

  The minotaur grunted as it leapt. Its muscles rippled as the axe swung forward, light from an unknown point source gleaming off its edge. Lightning erupted from Larry’s fingers, arcing across the gap into the weapon’s tip. The air crackled. Tendrils of pure energy played over the axe head, shooting into the minotaur’s arm. The beast roared as hair fried and fat popped, but the bolts didn’t stop the attack’s momentum.

  The massive axe blade slammed into Larry’s side. I screamed, expecting his top half to go flying in a shower of blood and entrails. Instead I heard a dull thump like that of a sledgehammer hitting a tire, and Larry flew back some twenty or thirty feet, rolling through the dirt and gravel as he landed.

  The minotaur planted its fore leg and brought the axe around in a heaving back swing. The thing travelled in slow motion toward me. Snippets of thought zipped through my mind. Had Larry cast a protective spell over me, too? Would the force knock me into the lava? If not, would I retain consciousness long enough as my severed torso soared through the air to yell the foul-mouthed pile of curses at Larry that he so richly deserved, and why in God’s name did my final moments have to be spent staring at a minotaur’s swinging junk?

  Fate never put my theories to the test. Dawn appeared out of nowhere, her blades whistling in a tornado of steel. An ear splitting clang filled the air as her swords met the meat of the minotaur’s axe. Sparks showered the pair of them. Dawn staggered under the strength of the blow, an awe-inspiring feat given that a similar swing had sent the much heavier Larry flying halfway to San Antonio.

  Dawn moved at the same speed as her blades, spinning, twirling, dodging, weaving, a vortex of death with hardened razors for hands. Her swords found the minotaur’s chest, thighs, and back, causing glistening red wounds to blossom across him like bluebonnets. Her katana dug deep into his ribs, her wakizashi hamstrung the back of his knee, and with a flying leap reminiscent of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Dawn cut deep gouges across the beast’s biceps.

  None of it mattered. With an angry bellow, the creature slammed a fist into Dawn’s ribcage. This time she did go flying, past Larry who’d stumbled to his feet and was rushing back into the fray. He put his hands together as if in prayer, but his face was set with determination. When he pulled the edges of his fingers apart, a bright yellow glow erupted from the middle. He screamed in a not terribly frightening manner as a torrent of flame shot from his palms toward the hulking beast.

  The minotaur crouched as the onslaught arrived, shielding himself from the worst of it with the broad side of his axe. When the fire dissipated, he stood and stretched, his fur smoking, his skin steaming. He bared his inhuman yellow teeth and bellowed. The cavern shook, and the pillar of rock underneath us rumbled.

  Larry spun his arms in wide arcs, the space between them having grown dark and foreboding. He shot us an angry glance. “A little help would be nice, Tank.”

  “Sorry, I’m not supposed to shoot anything.”

  “Jesus Christ, are you kidding me?” I said. “Shoot! Shoot it to death!”

  I’ll give him credit, Tank took his orders seriously. In one smooth motion, he unzipped his duffel bag, reached inside, and pulled the Desert Eagle .50 Action Express. He tossed the bag into the air as if it were filled with foam packing peanuts, and before it hit the ground, he’d squared his shoulders and fired a full seven rounds into the minotaur’s left eye.

  The beast wobbled, took one step, and collapsed face first into the dirt.

  18

  Tank ejected the empty magazine, stepped to the discarded duffel bag, knelt beside it as he put a fresh magazine in, slipped the Desert Eagle into the bag, and looped it over his shoulder as he stood. That’s when he noticed me staring at him. “What?”

  I tried to form a full sentence, but all that came out was, “Holy shit.”

  He tilted his head at me. “Sometimes the old methods work best. Sometimes they don’t.”

  Larry walked up, brushing the dirt from his coat. “Hey, I would’ve dealt with him. Eventually.”

  Tank shook his head and rolled his eyes, a move I was intimately familiar with.

  I lowered my voice. “Larry…” I tipped my head toward Tank.

  Thankfully he got the hint. “Oh. Right.” He cleared his throat. “Ah… regardless of whether or not I had him under control, good job, Tank. That was some nice shooting.”

  Tank’s made eye contact with Larry, and his face lost some of its tension. “Thanks.”

  Dawn joined us, cool as a cucumber as she slipped her swords back into their sheaths. “Well? What are we waiting for?”

  “Yeah,” said Bill, his eyes wide and his voice shaky. “Let’s snag that book and get the hell out of here before another minotaur decides to make us his love slaves.”

  “I don’t think that’s what he was after, Bill,” said Larry.

  “Maybe, maybe not,” said Bill. “But I’m the only one here who’s undead. No small wonder you don’t care what happens to your corpse after you die.”

  “Eww,” I said. “Gross.”

  “Exactly,” said Bill.

  “The point is, he’s dead,” said Larry. “Unless one of you has been practicing necromancy behind my back, this is a conversation we don’t need to have.”

  With Larry leading the way, we approached the stone structure. From afar, it hadn’t looked like much, but I soon realized that was more of a statement on the size of the cavern than the pyramid. By the time I set foot to the steps at the base, I’d realized the ascent up the side would make the stair workouts our softball team sometimes did at Darrell K. Royal Stadium seem like a warmup.

  At least we took them slow. Larry’s physique suggested he couldn’t handle them at an accelerated pace, but the look on the wizard’s face made me think there was something beyond the physical act of exercise that was bothering him.

  I sidled up next to him. “Something up?”

  He blinked at me. “What do you mean?”

  “You’ve got this glazed look to you, and you’ve been staring at your feet for the last hundred steps. You afraid to see how many are left?”

  Bill smiled at me from the baby carrier. “Sometimes it’s good not to have legs, know what I mean?”

  Larry ignored him. “I’m not studying the steps. I’m studying the symbols over them.”

  “Symbols?”

  I followed his finger. They were faint, as if they’d been carved into the rock millennia ago and worn away by sun and rain or whatever weathering mechanisms there might be in an underground cavern such as this one. Circular carvings with images embedded in the middle, depictions of demons or warriors or hairy anteaters—it was hard to tell which.

  “Right,” I said. “Symbols. Are they a warning?”

  “Could be,” said Larry. “I’m not an expert on ancient Mesoamerican symbology. But I’ll tell you what I do know. Those symbols are magical in nature.”

  “I’m guessing you can feel the magical energies?”

  “Smell them, actually.”

  I wrinkled my nose. “You can smell magic?”

  “Yeah,” said Larry. “And that look you’re giving me is a good representation of what these symbols smell like. A mixture of decaying flesh and a Wall Street stock trader’s cologne. It’s the scent of pure evil.”

  “Are we talking about the symbols or that minotaur?”

  “That was his real smell,” said Larry. “I’m speaking about magical aromas. Trust me, compared to these carvings, that minotaur smelled like a rose. What I’m saying is, keep your eyes peeled.”

  I was pleased with myself for not panting when we finally crested the pyramid’s summit, something Larry couldn’t claim. As he caught his breath and Dawn and Tank closed the gap behind us, I stared off the edge into the sprawling cavern and rivers of lava beyond. I didn’t have to be a vulcanologist or a student of ancient Greek literature to enjoy it, though it did strike me as odd that such a thing could exist under a city with zero tectonic activity such as Austin. Then agai
n, I’d seen so many crazy things over the past thirty hours that I’d started to lose my ability to be shocked.

  The vista of the pyramid’s plaza-like top wasn’t anything to speak of, but it drew Larry’s attention regardless. He straightened, his shortness of breath forgotten as he stared at the stone pedestal at the center.

  “That’s it,” he said. “That’s where we’ll find it. The Librum de Virtute.”

  “Yeah?” I said. “How does it smell?”

  Larry snorted. “Joke all you like, but it smells freaking amazing. Like chocolate and sex and crisp hundred dollar bills.”

  Larry headed toward it a brisk walk, a look of determination upon his face. I ran after him and grabbed him by the arm. “Whoa. Slow down.”

  Larry scowled. “What? Why?”

  “You said it yourself. To keep our eyes peeled. This feels like a trap.”

  Larry snorted. “A trap? Give me a break. All I have to do is walk over there, grab it, and—”

  “Not so fast!” called a strong, masculine voice.

  I turned at the sound. A man crested another of the pyramid’s sides, a tall, handsome guy in his early twenties with luscious, russet colored hair, muscles that bulged from underneath a too-tight cotton shirt, and dreamy green eyes. A golden sword handle gleamed over his shoulder. He smiled as he approached us, and I felt my knees weaken.

  “O'Neill?” said Larry. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Same thing as you,” he called out. “I’m after the Librum.”

  I turned to Dawn, who’d joined me at my side. “O'Neill?”

  She smiled at me. “Smitten? I don’t blame you. That’s Angus O'Neill, renowned druid and sword fighter extraordinaire. He’s almost as good with that cleaver as I am with mine. Lucky for me I’ve got two. Looks pretty damn good considering he’s pushing two thousand, huh?”

  I squinted. “Pushing two thousand what?”

  “Years, Lexie. But don’t worry. It doesn’t slow him down in the sack one bit.”

  Angus overheard and shot Dawn a smile along with a set of finger guns.

  “Are you saying you and him…?” I sighed. “Of course.”

  “Hey, it’s a reunion,” said Larry. “Great. Too bad it’s going to end poorly. Sorry, Angus, but you can’t have the book. We have a wealthy financier who’s paying us big bucks to retrieve it for him.”

  “So?” said Angus. “I need it to defend myself from the McGreggor clan. I think personal safety trumps a cash grab any day.”

  “The McGreggors?” Larry blew a raspberry. “Those guys are a bunch of chumps. I could take them with one hand tied behind my back and a—”

  “Hold it right there you lot!”

  We all turned to the far side of the pyramid, where a pair of mismatched individuals were approaching. One of them was an enormous gump, maybe six and a half feet tall, with a shaved head, a chin beard, and as much muscle as fat on his oversized frame. The other was a petite CEO type, a woman with an upturned nose, wearing fashionable glasses and with her hair pulled into a tight ponytail. Both of them wore flak jackets, black pants, and combat boots and had roughly the contents of Tank’s duffel bag strapped to their bodies.

  “Who the hell are they?” I asked.

  “Ugh…” Larry rolled his eyes. “That’s Otis Zachary Pacheco and Jane Fettercross, owners and operators of the black ops monster hunting conglomerate, BSI.”

  “BSI?”

  “Brute Squad Incorporated,” said Otis as he came to a stop near us. “And I hate to burst all your bubbles, but the book on that pedestal is officially ours.”

  “Officially yours?” said Angus. “Bollocks to that.”

  “Yeah,” said Larry. “What kind of crap is this?”

  “The best kind,” said Otis. “The official kind. Jane? Care to show them?”

  Jane reached under her bulletproof jacket and pulled out an envelope, which she handed to Larry with a smirk. “That’s the official correspondence from the FBI giving us sole right of possession to that tome.”

  Larry ripped the letter open and began perusing the contents while Angus looked over his shoulder. Even knowing Angus was a dog of the loosest morals, I couldn’t help but feel my heart flutter with him nearby.

  Larry slapped the page. “This is bullshit of the highest order. This document is so vague as to be worthless. Any lawyer worth his salt could poke a hundred holes in it. Not to mention you mistakenly assume any of us care about the law.”

  “I know I certainly don’t,” called a sultry new voice to our right.

  We all groaned and turned to face the new entrant.

  “Charity Peterson?” said Larry. “Oh, you’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

  A tan woman in a black tube top and a cropped jean jacket stood there, one hand on her hip as she struck a sassy pose. Rose tattoos covered both her forearms. She also sported a tattoo of claw marks across her ridiculously chiseled abs and another of skulls across her collarbone that dipped dangerously into her cleavage. I felt inadequate just looking at her.

  “Seriously,” I said to Dawn. “Does every woman in this line of work look like you two? Because it’s starting to piss me off.”

  Dawn bit her lip as she trailed her gaze over the new arrival. “Not all of them. Charity is particularly tasty. She’s so mysterious and cool and sexy…”

  “Keep it in your pants, Dawn,” said Larry. “You too, Angus. And what could possibly bring an airplane mechanic slash ghost spirit shifter such as you here, I wonder?”

  Charity’s voice flowed like honey wine. “I’m here for the book, of course.”

  “I know!” yelled Larry. “I was being sarcastic. Christ! We’re all here for the book.”

  “And you’re all going to walk away disappointed,” said Otis. “Because we’re the only ones with the legal standing to retrieve it.”

  “Legal standing, schmegal standing,” said Larry. “We got here first. Not to mention I called dibs under my breath the instant I saw Angus. It’s ours.”

  “Why should any of that matter?” said Angus. “This is clearly an issue of seniority. I’m the oldest, therefore I should get the book. Not to mention I’m the handsomest.”

  “And I’m the strongest,” said Otis. “Who gives a crap?”

  “Precisely nobody,” said Larry. “Not to mention Tank is clearly the strongest, but it’s not a competition. The point is—”

  The ground started to shake and a high pitched screech filled the air, like that of a tanker ship rubbing against an iceberg. We all turned toward the pedestal. Perched upon the top stood Charity, the Librum de Virtute clutched in her hands.

  She smiled and winced. “Sorry. I thought I could steal it while you were arguing.”

  The screech intensified, as did the rumbling. The cavern ceiling wobbled back and forth, the stalactites swaying precariously. They didn’t crack and fall though, perhaps because it wasn’t the ceiling moving at all. It was the pyramid that couldn’t stop dancing.

  The ear-piercing wail of stone on stone reached a fever pitch. I jammed my fingers into my ears to shut out the roar. After a few seconds, the painful sound receded, the rumbling of the earth slowed, and given that a giant stone sphere hadn’t dropped from overhead and begun rolling in our direction, I thought maybe, just maybe, we’d gotten off scot-free.

  I still hadn’t learned a damn thing, apparently.

  As the screech faded, a new sound filled the air, more of a whisper crossed with a moan. I couldn’t quite locate where it came from. Then I saw it. A shadowy blur, climbing over the side of the pyramid. It paused a few feet from the edge. It was a wolflike thing, with black matted fur, a long eyeless head, and feet that resembled an eagle’s. It stood on its back talons, uncoiled to twice its height, and cut loose with a raptor’s cry.

  “Well that’s a relief,” said Charity. “After all that rumbling, I was sure we’d have to deal with something far worse than a homeless man’s griffin.”

  From all around us, oth
er creatures echoed the cry. Three more climbed over the edge. Then five from another side. Another seven clambered over before the dam broke. A teeming horde of black poured over the edge and sprinted toward us.

  Larry babbled at light speed. “What do you say everyone? Let bygones be bygones? Good. Now ATTAAACKKK!”

  I’d never seen so many people move so fluidly. Larry darted toward the creatures. Beams of white hot light burst from his hands, cutting through them as if they were made of smoke. Dawn and Angus dove toward them with swords flashing, the latter’s growing is size as he swung it until it reached almost seven feet in length. Tank roared and pulled two assault rifles from his bag, cutting loose with a hail of gunfire. Jane lobbed incendiary grenades with one hand while firing rounds from a Walther P99 with the other. Otis barreled into the nearest bunch of hell creatures, an Atchisson Assault Shotgun with a thirty-two round drum barking from his hands. I lost track of Charity until a six foot hyena with markings suspiciously similar to her tattoos dove into the fray, ripping and tearing into the black furry attackers with savage teeth. Bill’s fevered scream pierced the roar of action, and I couldn’t tell if he was scared out of his mind or having the time of his life. Maybe both.

  Through it all, I stood in the center, my feet rooted to the ground and my mouth open. I’d seen similar scenes play out in The Lord of the Rings or while playing Skyrim, but never in person.

  Larry’s light beams vaporized another dozen nightmare creatures. “Lexie, now’s the time to show us what you’ve got.”

  “What I’ve got?” My voice sounded high-pitched in my ears. “Whatever I bring to the table, this is decidedly not it. I don’t even have a weapon!”

  “What about the mace?”

  “I left that in my letter jacket, not to mention I don’t think it would help.”

  A beast disappeared in a cloud of smoke. “You know I told you to arm yourself.”

  “Is this really the time for this conversation?”

  Larry blasted a leaping nightmare while Dawn speared one approaching him from behind. “How are you with a flintlock?”