Soultaker

by Duperre, Robert J. ;

  You get what you wish for.

  “Meshach, we’re going to die,” Kamini asked.

  “Probably.”

  “Not exactly what I wanted to hear. What happened to, ‘there’s not so many of them?’”

  “Hubris. False bravado. That’s all.”

  “So you didn’t mean it?”

  “I’m full of statements I don’t really mean come morning.”

  Kamini went to say something, but before she could she bent over and coughed violently into the crook of her elbow. “You okay?” Meesh asked

  She panted and spit on the ground. “Yeah. Just nauseous.”

  “Well, you better get over it soon,” Meesh said, eyeing the ever-approaching horde. “Because shit’s about to get real.”

  “What do I do?” Kamini asked.

  Meesh took a step forward, squinted. Cooper had grabbed his slender sword, and was in the middle of ordering his weary and frightened followers to lift their armaments and take shelter behind the buildings. “This is God’s day!” he shouted. “He will protect us, He will bless us, His spear will be our salvation! We must only buy Him time!” Meesh didn’t give the man’s words much weight, but gave him credit for making the most of a particularly dire situation.

  “Kamini, you got a gun?” Meesh asked.

  “A what?”

  He shook the revolver in her face. “You know… a gun. A thunder-maker, a hand cannon, that sorta thing?”

  She shook her head. “Never liked them. But my sword’s in my tent.” It looked like she was going to puke.

  “Go get it. Then join the party. Let those with guns stay in front, but be ready. If those things don’t miraculously disappear in the next few minutes, just hack away at anything with pus coming out its eyes.”

  “What about you?”

  Meesh fought off a wave of queasiness, forced a grin. “I’m gonna be a hero. Now get outta here. You got minutes before shit comes down.”

  She nodded briskly, tottered a moment, and then took off in a plodding run across the camp, stumbling from side to side as she went. “Good luck,” Meesh muttered.

  Meesh took inventory of his resources. Both his revolvers were fully loaded. Good there. He lifted his small bag off the ground and rifled through it. There were only two fully stocked cylinders left, along with his last seven rounds of silver. Not good. Fifty-five bullets, multiple thousand undead monsters. He shot a glance back toward the bunker. “You guys best get that Spear thingy working,” he whispered. “And Asaph, you better not screw us.”

  He heard Cooper’s voice rise above the din of frantic people. “Two hundred yards!” the man screamed. “Steady!”

  Meesh took a deep breath, grabbed his Eldersword from his belt. The weapon’s hum vibrated through him, bringing on the Rush. The last remaining hints of inebriation were driven away. Meesh gritted his teeth, flicked his wrist to extend the blade, and moved his feet as quickly as he could toward Cooper and his followers.

  The brigand prophet seemed sluggish as he paced between the two buildings on the periphery of the small city, his sword pointed toward the oncoming horde. “You can do it, my brothers and sisters!” he coughed out. “Let the Lord guide your hand, and we will be true!”

  Meesh glanced at the defenders’ faces as he rushed by, and he doubted that very much. Almost to a man, the remaining hundred Outriders looked queasy and terrified. Their hands shook, quite a few bent over and hacked, a few more seemed close to passing out. There were only fifteen or so with guns, and those didn’t seem to be handling the situation any better than the rest. A man with a long rifle fumbled with the bolt and accidentally fired a shot into the air, which caused some to jump and others to turn tail and run.

  Meesh winced. They’re all gonna die. You guys better hurry up.

  Cooper had finished his tirade by the time Meesh reached him. The man stared straight ahead, his skin waxy, his thin white shift soaked with sweat. The undead, led by the cloaked Morningstar, were a mere hundred yards away, stretching out along the short valley in a haggard, undulating line of death. When Meesh peered to either side he saw the rifle-bearers fan out and crouch down nervously.

  “Ready!” Cooper shouted, his voice cracking, and when he went to say more, he began coughing again.

  The riflemen shouldered their weapons. A few of them coughed as well.

  The undead drew all the closer. Meesh could hear the disgusting swish of their decomposing bodies, the clack of their chipped teeth.

  Cooper raised a trembling hand. A stream of blood trickled from his nose. “Aim!”

  Meesh considered the advancing, lifeless wall, staring hardest at the one leading them. The hooded figure walked in a sluggish yet confident manner, many strides in front of the horde. Just as Cooper’s mouth opened, Meesh grabbed him by his damp shirt, stilling his tongue.

  “Not yet,” Meesh said.

  Cooper hesitated, and Meesh realized the man’s flesh was hot. Damn hot, like he was suffering the world’s most horrific fever. Blood dribbled out his nose and over his lips. What the hell’s happening to him?

  Who cares? No time.

  “We need to attack,” Cooper said weakly. “Drive them back.”

  “Let me do something first.”

  “What?”

  Meesh grinned. “I’m gonna take the head off the snake.”

  Cooper ogled him like he didn’t understand his meaning, but Meesh didn’t care. With the dead now fifty yards away at most, he took one glance behind him in search of Kamini, couldn’t find her, and then burst into motion. He wasn’t scared in the slightest. Why should I be? I stared into the eyes of a hellbeast and didn’t even flinch. The whole of him buzzed with the Rush as he bolted headlong at the supposed Morningstar. The cloaked demon didn’t react to him; it just kept on taking stride, after stride, after purposeful stride.

  Meesh raised his revolver and fired off three quick shots at the creature. Its body jerked one way, then another, then its head snapped backward, but it didn’t stop. The thing reached straight out, gray clawed hands emerging from the cloak. Meesh drew back his revolver and swung the Eldersword out wide, without breaking stride. He danced to the side when he was near to the hooded thing and put all his weight into a one-armed, arcing swing. The blade hummed through the air. He expected the demon to attempt to defend itself, but it just kept walking in a straight line, arms outstretched.

  The Eldersword sliced through the hellish thing as if it wasn’t there at all. Its head went tumbling off its shoulders, smoke rose from the severed cloak. Meesh skidded to a halt a few feet in front of the ambling horde and spun around, beaming triumphantly. The Morningstar’s body took a few more steps and toppled over. “Take that,” Meesh said, but then cold fingers brushed against his spine and he yelped and leapt forward. A glance behind him revealed that the undead still marched, close enough now to touch.

  “Shit!”

  He’d expected them all to just fall over when he killed their master, but of course that didn’t happen. Meesh sprinted toward the severed head, holstered his pistol while on the move, and snatched the hood as he ran by. The head swung in his grip. He bolted toward Cooper, who stared back at him with wide, disbelieving eyes. The night was a muddle of stomping feet that churned the earth.

  “Now!” Meesh shouted. “Have them shoot now!”

  Cooper bellowed the order. Bloody spit left his mouth, as well as something small and white. It looked like a tooth.

  Meesh reached the line of buildings just as the Outriders let loose a volley of bullets. The gunfire sounded pathetically small against the backdrop of six thousand stomping feet. Meesh fell to his knees, dropped the severed head to the ground, and ripped through the remains of the cloak. He still had a chance. With certain types of demons, the only way to kill them was to stab them in both their eyes. If this thing was like them…

  Meesh tossed aside the last fold of fabric, and a decomposed face emerged. Even infused with the Rush, Meesh’s spirits plummeted. The dead f
ace of Mitchell Hogan, former mayor of Breighton, stared up at him. Even though he knew it wouldn’t work, Meesh plunged the tip of his blade into one beady raisin of an eye, then the other. Sure enough, nothing happened. The mass of corpses continued to move.

  “Goddammit,” he muttered, drawing his revolver again when the first of the Outriders screamed. “Abe, Shade, you better not let me die out here.”

  He charged into the fray.

  “Wake up, Abednego.”

  Abe moaned, his mind a whirlwind of confusing images. He was in a bed. On a stage. Sitting in a boat. Pushing a mop. Lying on a tile floor in a puddle of vomit. The images slowly faded away, foggy and dull once they left his mind, like old tintype photographs.

  Photographs?

  The pain returned, and he let out a scream. When he tried to move, agony pierced his every fiber. Even the blackness behind his eyelids seemed too much to bear. His breath hissed through clenched teeth.

  I’m dying. Just like his brothers before him. He thought back to the morning more than a month ago when he’d stood outside Barrendale recounting the last words of fading knights. I knew this was coming. I knew it was my turn. What will my last words be…?

  “Abednego, come now. Don’t dally.”

  Slowly, painfully, Abe opened his eyes. The brightness of the Heartcube-filled room assaulted his brain, made him cry out in agony, but he couldn’t raise his arm to shield his eyes. His every muscle was stiff, frozen—all except his heart, which thrummed out of control.

  “Ah, you’re back with us. Good.”

  The sound came from his right. Painfully, Abe forced his neck to turn and gazed out at a sideways world. His blitzer was a ruin of twisted metal beside him. Asaph sat on the floor fifteen feet away, legs crossed, the rod that had launched Abe across the room sitting in his lap. His gray eyes were alight with vigor. Asaph lifted the cylinder and waggled it, but his posture implied no malice whatsoever.

  “If you need any further proof of how special you are,” he said, “just look at you now. Still alive. Still breathing. In an hour or so, it’ll be like nothing ever happened.” He spun the tube. “Suppressors are powerful weapons. Crowd control to the extreme. The soundwaves are strong enough to knock a hole in a building! Just look at your gun. Ha! Had I hit a normal person with even half the blast I gave you, their insides would have liquefied. I can demonstrate with her if you like.”

  Asaph gestured to the side, and Abe’s eyes swished that way, staring at Erin’s unmoving body, her arms and legs splayed, a puddle of blood beneath her head. The monstrous tongue… the stinger… Fear, real, mind-numbing fear, crept up inside him.

  The Sword of God let out a frantic beep, making Abe twitch, and another lance of pain pierced him. Asaph glanced at the tall, slender machine. “Ah, I think the intake system needs to be recalibrated. I’d do it myself, but I’d rather sit here and speak with you. Erin, would you do me the honors?”

  The sound of fabric and wet flesh sliding against metal reached Abe’s ears as Erin’s corpse got onto its hands and knees, then to its feet. Her eyes were clouded, her flesh pale beyond compare. The corpse shambled toward the beeping, blinking silver contraption.

  Abe brought his gaze back to Asaph. “What… are… you…?” he rasped.

  “I am who I’ve always been. I am Asaph.”

  “L… liar.”

  “Perhaps. But there has always been a grain of truth.”

  Abe gawped at him. It felt like he was dreaming.

  Asaph sighed. “Like with everything, you have to sift through the swill.” Twenty feet away, Erin’s corpse clumsily fiddled with the inner workings of the Spear. “We have a little more than twenty minutes,” Asaph continued. “Twenty minutes to decide the course of the rest of your life. Is that enough time, Abednego? Do you think you can listen to me?”

  “Screw… you…” Abe groaned. He tried to flex his arm; it moved barely a centimeter before pain struck him again.

  “Such a disappointment,” Asaph said with a frown. “Still clinging to your ideas of righteousness, are you? Still dedicated to your precious god? It’s all a lie, you know. Every part of it. A grand deception brought about by a man whose worldview has been tainted by living far longer than he should have.” He chuckled. “And no, that man isn’t me, though I can relate.”

  Abe stared, dumbfounded.

  “The main purpose of religion, through time eternal, has always been control,” said Asaph. “The constructs are simple—the creator creates, the polar force destroys. Good versus evil, a battle waged since the beginning of the universe itself. It’s an idealistic premise, one that humanity all throughout history has clung to, but as with all ideologies, it is flawed. Good and evil have no place in the cosmos. Is a comet evil for destroying a planet? Is a star that allows life to grow divine, but becomes malevolent when it implodes on itself and swallows an entire galaxy? Existence has no concept of either: it’s simply existence. But people, with their big, imperfect brains and their need for meaning, have never accepted the straightforwardness of it all. They’ve always wanted more. And so in comes religion to fill in the gaps. Only they got it all wrong. I see that look on your face. You really should listen to what I’m saying. I’ve been around for nearly as long as humanity. I’ve seen it all.”

  “You’re… mad…” Abe spat. A tingling sensation worked its way through him, his fingers twitched. Just keep talking, he thought.

  Asaph stood up, stretched his back, and began to pace. “I’m not mad, Abednego. I don’t remember how I came to be, I don’t remember my original name—if I had a name at all back then. But I do know that I was once a living, breathing person, until I wasn’t. Dead man walking. That’s me.”

  Abe scrunched up his face. “But… your heart beats… you breathe…”

  “Not necessarily true.” Asaph stopped against the far wall, braced his hand against it, and looked up at the huge spinning fan in the ceiling. “I understand biology more than anyone. Have for millennia. I can further the illusion of life to pass for a living, breathing human. That sort of helps when you feed off the life-force of others, swallow their memories, control dead flesh. It’s a powerful feeling, that whatever had buried itself inside me could create such a force of nature, and it took centuries—and untold wars—for me to realize I was nothing but a parasite.”

  Surprisingly, Asaph looked immensely sad. Abe felt a jolt in his legs. His strength was coming back to him.

  The insane man went on: “I drifted through the annals of time, and came to realize that parasites too have their place in the world. Nature is filled with them… every living being, no matter how complex, is in their own way parasitic. Just as important to the preservation of life as air and water and a dry place to rest your head. I felt mighty, the one to save the human race. I altered perceptions with my combined knowledge; I advanced entire civilizations! I devoured beliefs and superstitions and spouted them anew. I took the name Asaph, and helped craft the most important book in human history, was able to turn a band of roving savages into a mighty nation. I even once met a man in Umm Quais and shared my ideas with him. He was a good man, though too eager and ill-fated… he took what I told him and preached it until he met an untimely end. Poor bastard.”

  Abe tried to move his left arm, the one hidden from Asaph, and succeeded. He smiled inwardly. This egotistical madman was so wrapped up in his fantasy that he was sealing his own fate. Abe had to keep him going. “What… next…?” he whispered.

  “Next? Next was just what it was. Life. Progress. I kept in the background, feeding to keep my mind and body fresh. My mind… my body.” He exhaled softly, appeared reflective. “That has been the great paradox of my entire existence. I am a byproduct of those I’ve consumed. There is no part of the original me left. My appearance has altered, as have my thoughts. I’m a composite… much like you.”

  “I’m nothing like you,” Abe muttered. Erin’s corpse finished dawdling at the Spear of God and stood up, straight and motionless.
>
  “Oh, but you are. In fact, I said I knew you, and I did. Well over a thousand years ago, when society had begun to truly bloom, I took pleasure in the finer things—the arts, poetry, music. I was known as Henry when we met. You were so talented, so beyond compare…and so I taught you to be better. Folks started thinking you’d received demonic assistance, that was how overwhelming your gift was! We talked, we played together… I recorded you… and then you were gone.” He became glum. “A part of you was the best friend I ever had, Abednego. Perhaps my only friend.”

  Abe inched his elbow closer to his body while Asaph went on in a somber tone. “But none of that matters, none of it. I told you in Danville that I appreciate the outlandish. Do you know why? Because all of existence is outlandish! Gods do exist, but they aren’t forces of good or evil. They are conscious constructs, powerful and just as callous and driven as the universe itself. And there are two that exist in this world, at this very moment. In fact, one of them is the reason humanity ended.

  “There are parcels of truth in every lie I’ve told you. The bits about the greatest of human minds creating the Heartcubes were true. But the Rising…the Rising was a preventable catastrophe. Those you call the Ancients could have stopped it, but they didn’t. All those great minds sacrificed themselves for the good of humanity. All because of Khayrat, the one your religion calls the Head of the Pentus. Oh yes, my friend, Khayrat is very real. He survives, to this day, just across the Gulf of Torrin.”

  Abe’s lips pressed into a thin line, even as his hand crept closer to his side. A ball of dread formed in his gut. No matter how absurd Asaph’s words were, all he had to do was glance at the corpse standing at attention for him to question all he took for truth.

  “The real Khayrat entered this world a hundred years before the Rising,” Asaph said. “He’s an entity from a different time and place, a different world altogether, who desires peace through enslavement, through a loss of free will, to remake creation in his image. His mere presence caused the barriers that separate this world from every other out there to weaken, just as it had long ago, when great huge beasts roamed the land. You can say one thing about humanity: many would rather die than become thoughtless puppets or have their entire planet extinguished. They would rather wipe themselves out and hope that their legacy will live on. Idealistic and beautiful, if I do say so, and a tenet I agree with wholeheartedly.” He chuckled and glanced at Erin’s wobbling corpse. “And yes, I can see how contradictory that statement is.”