by Tim Marquitz
Spurred on by the increasing winds, I did my best to put a little more oomph in my step. I’d made it about ten feet before my sleep-deprived brain processed what I had seen.
My heart stilled in my chest, and I stopped, looking straight up at the mass of white clouds that hung low and thick right above me. Purple lightning cavorted in the sky, its flickering tongues licking at the clouds that encased it. Like a cornered cat, my eyes flitted back and forth trying to find an area of clear sky.
There wasn’t any.
The winds slowed and died away as the overpowering stench of death began to fill the air with choking bitterness. The clouds started to lighten, the storm illuminating the sky with an eerie glimmer.
My eyes alighted on the mausoleum, the only shelter in the area close enough to reach. Terror lit fire to my feet and they flew across the grassy field of graves, the bag flapping behind me, the manacles clinking together and slapping my back. I closed the distance fast, my breath whistling in my lungs. As I swung around the far edge of the building, I spied a flashing light a couple of gardens away. Screeching to a stop, my heels digging into the asphalt, I looked out across the cemetery to see Marvin. Flashlight in hand, he stood there casting its beam along the ground, looking for something. Oblivious to the storm, he made no effort to flee.
I looked up at the sky again to see the first flutters of the deadly snow drifting down. The mausoleum just ten easy feet from where I stood, a quick dash away, the voices in my head screamed for me to go inside. That is, all but one.
My mother.
“You better be proud, woman.” The things us mama’s boys do. Certain I was gonna die playing hero, I beat feet toward Marvin. Caught up in his own world, he didn’t notice me until I was huffing and puffing right in front of him.
He shrieked and curled up in a ball as soon as I reached him.
“Damn it, Marvin, get the Hell up!”
He whimpered, muttering something about God and forgiveness, spewing out a list of sins that was impressive. It sounded like a perverse prayer, rattled off in hyper speed.
No time to talk sense into him or congratulate him on a life well-lived, I looped my arm around his and tried to pull him to his feet. No friend of gravity, all three hundred and fifty pounds of him resisted.
“Get up!” I screamed again, damn near yanking his arm out of socket.
He got to his feet only to save his arm. Wide eyed with terror, he just stood there staring, his body rigid in defiance. A quick glance up told me we were fixing to die. The snow was thickening as it fell, ominous in its approach.
No chance of making it back to the mausoleum, not that it would protect us anyway, I surveyed the garden for something to hide under. There was nothing. My heart sank and joined my balls, which were hiding deep inside my ass. Not ready to die, I looked around one last desperate time and noticed a sheet of plywood on the ground just a few feet from us. Suddenly remembering why a board would be there in the middle of the garden, I sunk my hand into the flab of Marvin’s arm and dragged him along behind me.
There, I lifted the plywood up and breathed a relieved sigh as I saw the open grave beneath it. No time to worry about kindness, I shoved Marvin into the hole, tossed my luggage in, then jumped in after. Marvin landed with a pained grunt. Whimpers and quiet sobs followed as I straightened the board to make sure it covered the hole completely. Though I knew it wouldn’t hold up against the snow for more than a minute, it was something.
A quick look around the grave told me it wouldn’t be empty for long; the storm was running a two-for-one sale. Not interested in dying, and even less interested in dying with Marvin, I kicked my brain into high gear. There had to be a way out.
Suddenly, a light came on.
It was Marvin’s flashlight, but I had an idea too.
“Is there anyone buried on this side?” I asked the groundskeeper. Still obviously terrified, the bitter stink of urine wafting up inside the confined grave, Marvin didn’t answer.
Our lives on the line, I couldn’t wait for him to get it together. I ran my hand along the grave wall and the moist dirt crumbled beneath my fingers. It was all the encouragement I needed. Like a dog, I sunk my hands into the dirt about halfway down the wall and started digging. It gave way easily; at first.
Handfuls of dirt flew between my legs as I tore into the wall, but the further I got, the harder it became. Knotted roots ran through the dirt, the tangled mess compressed together by time. The wall came away in solid chunks, each inch giving way slower and slower.
Above us, I could hear the snow sizzling against the board, a quiet creak accompanying it as it settled thick overtop. Desperation setting in, I channeled every ounce of energy I had into my hands, willing my magic into being.
Nothing happened.
Continuing to dig, I pushed harder, wishing I had time to ingest another vial of Lucifer’s blood. Too late for that, I scoured the depths of my will and scrounged for every ounce of power I could find. At last, a dull flicker of energy came to life at my fingers.
I nearly soiled myself in relief.
Aided by the wispy strength of my magic, my fingers tore through the wall like a bulldozer. Dirt fell away in massive clumps, crumbling into a pile around my boots. Marvin scrambled to avoid being buried, getting to his feet in a sudden rush of activity.
“Touch that board and I’ll kill you, Marvin,” I told him without even looking. I heard him thump down behind me, his sobs beginning anew.
There was a sharp crack that sounded above us, just as my hand smacked against the solid wall of a concrete liner. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a white flake flutter down into the grave; our grave.
Our time was up.
“No!” a voice in my head screamed. More afraid than I’d ever been, I couldn’t imagine being eaten away piece by piece, the fall devouring me until I existed no longer. Driven by my terror, I snatched up Black’s stiff arm and swung it at the wall of the liner.
It crashed into it with a resounding thud, knocking a fist-sized chunk of old concrete off and splitting the liner to its lid. Marvin screeched behind me and began to thrash about, but I didn’t look back. I knew what happened when the smell of seared flesh stung my nose, so I put everything I had left into the next swing. With a solid boom that rang my ears, the arm shattered the liner wall, its rebar reinforcement sagging under the weight of the concrete.
Safety but a second away, the smell of old death rushing out to assail my nose, I dropped the arm and grabbed onto the rebar frame. Pulling with all my weight and strength, remnants of my magic fluttering at my hands, the frame buckled with a loud squeal and collapsed at my feet. The liner’s decayed occupant glared at me through cavernous sockets.
No time for the dead, I spun and grabbed Marvin just as another couple of flakes ate through the plywood and fluttered down. One struck my arm, but I ignored it as I hauled Marvin bodily into the liner. He squealed like a stuck pig when he saw the body, but he didn’t resist. He’d gotten it at last.
Barely able to fit him in alongside the corpse, I pushed until Marvin was packed in tight, and then crawled in right beside him. I reached out and grabbed my stuff and pulled it close to my chest just as the board gave way above.
A poof of white fell into the hole, disintegrating everything it touched, the light of Marvin’s flashlight extinguished permanently. My breath froze in my lungs as the silent flakes fell less than a foot from my face. I didn’t dare move for fear of rolling out, my position tenuous at best. I didn’t even want to risk breathing, but I could only hold my breath for so long.
Several minutes crept by and the snow continued to fall. I could see the ground on the far side of the grave being devoured by inches and I knew the earth above us was experiencing the same. I could only hope we were deep enough.
Far from religious, for what I imagine are obvious reasons, I said a quiet thanks to no one in particular that the snow fell straight down. Under its assault, the bottom of the grave just outside our hide
y hole sank deeper and deeper. Uncomfortably wedged in as I was, I hoped the storm wouldn’t last so long that it reached the water table. It’d really suck to survive the storm only to drown as the water filled the void.
Fortunately, that wasn’t case. After an excruciating fifteen minutes, every tentative breath feeling like the last, the storm slowed, and then crept to an end. The snow disappeared as though it had never been. Darkness returned to chase away the preternatural light. I waited a few minutes before I thought about moving, just to be sure.
When I finally found the courage, I crawled out of the liner and tumbled into the now deeper grave. It was close to three feet lower than it had been before the storm. The walls on both sides had been chewed down about that much as well.
My stomach lurched as I examined the earth above our sanctuary. There was maybe an inch or two of ground left over the concrete liner that had rested above our heads. Had the storm lasted another five minutes, it would have killed us where we lay. Cold sweat tickled my scalp as I thought about how close we’d come to dying. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face.
Then that’s when reality sunk in. The clouds had gone on for as far as I could see, in every direction. Nestled in the middle of town, the cemetery was surrounded by houses. As lucky as I had gotten, only because I knew what the storm could do, there would be thousands of people who didn’t make it. My exhilaration died with the thought of their end.
Trying not to vomit, I tugged Marvin out of the liner before helping him out of the grave. I gathered my stuff and climbed out behind him, my eyes not believing what they saw. My first choice of hiding places, the mausoleum had vanished, no trace of it left. Had I gone with my initial instincts, there’d be nothing left of me either.
The maintenance garage across the road was missing as well, in fact, so was the road. The ground level lowered by several feet, there was nothing but darkened dirt. There were no trees, no grass, no anything, just a blackened crater in place of what used to be the cemetery. Under the gentle light of the moon, it looked like an alien planet, barren and hostile.
Marvin hadn’t moved since we’d climbed out of our hole. He just stood there, a puppy dog look of confusion on his round face.
No words of wisdom to help him cope, I told him the only thing I could think of. “Go home, Marvin.”
We both stood there for another few minutes, just taking it all in. What had existed but a half hour before, was now gone forever. Wiped away without mercy, it was just plain not there anymore. In its place was a vast swath of emptiness.
When the nothingness became too much to bear, we both staggered off in different directions. He headed for home, or so I imagined, and I wandered off to find a teleporter to take me back to DRAC.
It was close to a mile from the cemetery that I came to the end of the crater. At its edge, a small group of people gathered and mourned. Shellshocked faces stared at the ruin of what had been their neighborhood just the night before. Their neighbors, friends, and family who had lived there had been erased from existence. In the span of minutes, the course of their lives had been horribly altered.
Ignoring their questions and shouted pleas for answers as they saw me emerge from the crater, I pushed my way past. There was nothing I could do for them. For me to save what was left, I needed to get to Heaven.
Right then, salvation wasn’t looking so good.
Chapter Nineteen
As I neared one of DRAC’s hidden gates, ready to make my way back to where Scarlett and Katon waited, I heard the crackling static of a telepathic connection open up inside my head.
Abraham’s quiet voice drifted into my brain. “Frank. It’s Abe. Where are you?”
Never quite able to answer in my head without getting a lot of superfluous thoughts jumbled together into the transmission, I told him aloud where I was. My brain engaged a split-second after that.
He’d called himself Abe.
In all the years I’d known him, he never once referred to himself as Abe. It had always been Abraham. In fact, I was probably the only person who did call him that. My gun was in my hand before I’d even completed the thought. Something was up.
Just a few feet from the back alley door that obscured the gate, a gentle wave of energy washed over me, signaling the portal had been activated. It hadn’t been by me.
Paranoia in high gear, I aimed my gun at the door and waited. The energy subsided after a moment and a gruff voice from the other side of the door called out to me.
“I’m coming out, demon. We have the old man, so don’t try anything funny or you’ll never see him again; at least not in anything resembling one piece.” The voice finished with a rough chuckle.
My heart thudded hollow in my chest as I realized how stupid I’d been. Abraham had tried to warn me and I’d figured it out too late. It had to be about the key piece.
Cold sweat tickling my scalp, I tied the end of my pillowcase bag into a sloppy knot and delayed for time.
“Who is it?” I sang.
“No games, demon. Either let me out peacefully, so we can speak face-to-face, or we kill your mentor.”
I waited until I heard the grumbled reply start, then tossed the bag onto the nearby roof. It landed with a muffled thump and I hoped, with all my heart, the vials survived.
Timed to cover the sound, I loudly muttered my agreement. “All right, all right!” It wasn’t the best of hiding places, but with humanity hunkered down awaiting the end, I figured the piece was safe enough. It had to better than having it on me.
The door creaked open and a furry snout peeked out from behind it, its muzzle pulled back in a vicious smile. The whitish lightning bolt fur on its forehead told me it was Rampage, the same werewolf who’d been carrying Adam’s skull when the weres jumped us; Grawwl’s right-pawed flunky.
His reddish-orange eyes locked onto mine. My gun still in my hand, pointed steady at his face, his smile slid away. I knew it was a bluff, but he couldn’t be sure. It was a satisfying moment of defiance, however futile.
“Do you really want to be responsible for the old man’s death?” he asked. He didn’t say anything else. He didn’t have to. With those few words, he knew he had me by the short and curlies. The fact he used one of DRAC’s gates was more than sufficient evidence to prove he told me the truth.
As much as I wanted to ventilate his smug lupine face, it wouldn’t help Abraham. Not that I expected mercy from the bastards. Certain they would kill Abe the second they got what they wanted, I could at least delay and hope to pull something out of my ass. My putting a bullet in Rampage would guarantee Abraham’s death, and it would be on my shoulders.
Shit. I hated having a conscience.
The stare down lasted only a second longer before I gave in and lowered my gun. I was only delaying the inevitable.
He crept out from behind the door. “Smart move, demon. Now put it away so we can get going.”
A bit surprised he didn’t take it from me, I certainly wasn’t gonna complain. Though on the other hand, not disarming me meant they didn’t think I was a threat. They had to believe they held all the cards or they wouldn’t risk leaving me armed. That blew a big hole in my dreamy concept of hope.
“Take me to your leader.” My pistol stuffed into my pants, I gestured to the gate. Might as well get it over with.
Rampage chuckled and turned his back on me as he went and stood inside the gate. Nothing to do but follow, I stepped onto the pentagram right after. Uncomfortable standing so close to the werewolf, I inched back as far as I could go, making sure I faced him the whole time. Once we were both situated, the gate throttled to life and zipped us on down the line.
We appeared inside the secure entryway inside the main DRAC headquarters. My heart skipped a beat as the room came into focus. It wasn’t secure anymore.
The array of defensive wards had been scoured from the walls. Their colorful faces were marred, blackened singe marks lay overtop of each, their energies neutralized. The room smelled of su
lfur and bitter ash, the taste of it stung my tongue.
My moist eyes drifted upward toward the behemoth roof and I couldn’t help but stare. The thirty ton weight was warped and disfigured, twisted so badly it had dug into the walls around it and failed to drop.
The door leading into the main complex had been ripped free of its sunken hinges. It lay on the floor beside us. The outer edge was bent inward, the three foot thick steel mangled and crumpled like paper.
Amazed and horrified all at the same time, I couldn’t imagine the kind of power it would take to bypass the security system so casually. Despite the presence of the werewolf, there was no doubt in mind that it hadn’t been Grawwl. While powerful in a physical way, he didn’t possess the kind of mystical aptitude it took to lay waste to DRAC. I had a pretty good idea who did.
I glanced over at Rampage’s smiling face and he just chuckled, waving me down the hall. It took some willpower to get my feet moving, but I managed to follow him after a second or two.
Out in the corridor, I saw several of DRAC’s security team scattered about. They lay on the floor motionless, obviously dead, but there were no signs of trauma on any of them. No blood or bruises were visible. Their uniforms were immaculate as though they hadn’t even put up a fight. It was if they’d just dropped dead where they stood.
Seeing that made it real clear as to why Rampage hadn’t cared whether I kept my gun or not. Compared to the defense array and the firepower the security forces could bring to bear, one measly little pistol wasn’t but a drop of spit in the ocean.
It suddenly felt like I was taking my last walk, a condemned man’s final journey.
Rampage wound his way through the compound with confidence, his head held high and his arms easy at his side. The lifeless men we passed at every turn only reinforced his seeming invulnerability, a casual swagger seeping into his gait.
I thought about all the people who worked at headquarters and then pictured them all dead. My stomach churned with bile and I could feel my face growing flush, but there was nothing I could do for them. The men already gone, I needed to think about Abraham and the rest of the world. The longer this went on, the more people who were gonna die.
