49
NEW BABYLON- THE BEACH
I’d been five seconds from my daughter’s side when Ashka slit her throat.
I would have failed to reach her.
You fucking ten-time failure!
Now, I went up to Lucy, stopped, and reached out a hand. She smiled.
I met Tanya’s shocked eyes.
For once, neither of us could think of anything to say.
After a few seconds respite I surveyed the hellish situation. Loki continued to bellow his ruinous incantation. A deadly struggle, ten bodies deep, was taking place around his circle. Vampires and lycans and elves endeavored to reach him, only to be beaten back by the sheer number of demons defending him. The Gates of Hell continued to belch forth abominations. Over by the road the Trevochet’s and Devon had been rescued and saved by Belinda and a company of Delta force. Lysette was attempting to read the minds of the wounded to determine how best to heal them. Devon was trying to hear her advice above the pandemonium. Belinda was shouting and directing the assault on Loki’s circle even as she checked Johnny Trevochet’s vitals and spoke reassuringly to Devon. She was truly our leader, a shining jewel, and she was entirely focused.
Above us the skies sparked with magic. Thunder splintered our ears; lightning dazzled the air leaving a burning stench in its wake. Every now and again that rotting fish stench struck us anew and made us gag.
As the battle ebbed and flowed Jade pulled herself away from the general melee and came over to us. “Loki,” she panted. “is now summoning Gorgoth. He seems powerful enough to attempt anything he wants.”
“Eleanor said something similar about Johnny and I.” I reminded her.
It was time to go on faith and accept that Lucy could defend herself. My daughter? One of the Chosen? Her newfound abilities lifted a massive burden from my heart. I could now focus on saving the world.
I ventured as close as I dared to the chaotic struggle around Loki’s circle. Tanya and Jade walked at my side, dispatching the occasional demon that spotted us and tried its luck.
I concentrated my power, gathering it as I went, making Loki my target.
But in that ironic instant the grotesque circle that surrounded him was finally broken. I heard Loki’s chant cut short. I saw a fearless, leather-clad figure stand up to him.
And I heard Loki’s words. “Ah, Eliza. I hoped we would meet again.”
The vampire didn’t waste time, just leapt forward and sent a series of jabs and flurries at his body. And I saw now why Loki was their best, maybe the best of all of us, as he parried her every strike without losing ground, and connected solidly with quick jabs of his own.
I watched as he wore even Eliza down. The battle quieted it seemed, as we all watched. I dared not strike at him because my power wasn’t that accurate. Or maybe it was. I had honed it pretty well back home. But, the truth is, I didn’t have the confidence to risk it.
In another moment Eliza, realizing her predicament, launched a stunning volley of blows at Loki, and even the great Destroyer stumbled backwards. I watched in awe. Beside me I heard Tanya catch her breath, and that single act, coming from her, was the highest accolade I could imagine.
Then Eliza stumbled over a half-dead demon. Loki leapt upon her, fists lashing out with deadly precision. I unleashed my power strike, but nearly cried as it smashed against Loki and rolled harmlessly away.
The evil bastard was protected by a demonic shield. I saw him straighten, a triumphant grin splitting his face. And then with one hand he hauled up Eliza’s slumped body by the neck.
He cried, “It is over! Your best has perished! The summoning is complete. There is nothing you can do to stop the coming of Gorgoth – the World-Ender. You will all die!” With that Loki flung Eliza’s body aside and regarded the desperate heaving fray around him.
A blood-curdling grin twisted his face. “And now, it is my time!”
Loki leapt into the battle.
I looked away, sickened. I couldn’t see Loki anymore, but I could see Eliza’s unmoving body. Loki had exploited a millisecond of weakness by killing her in less time than it takes to speak his name.
How could we stand against something that ruthless? How could we fight alongside our loved ones and hope to compete with that?
I looked beyond the circle and its pitched battle. Belinda was guarding the Trevochet’s now, along with a phalanx of marines. Johnny Trevochet beckoned me over.
“It’s about time,” he said. “That we work together. To end all this,” he pointed at the skies.
I nodded, distracted as, at that moment, there was a whoosh like the scream of a jet engine and pillars of fire flashed among us. I cried out as the hairs on my arms were singed. I saw Lucy pull a face and hit everything with a curtain of water. Including us.
The fire died away. I wiped water from my eyes, spluttering. “What the fu-”
And then I saw Kisami, the traitor, rushing straight at Lysette Cohen. Her back was to him. She had no time. I panicked by shouting a warning when I should have launched a power strike.
Lysette spun around straight into a bolt of fire, but Giles tackled her to the ground. The bolt passed overhead, splitting the air between our two groups with a sound like a missile.
“Traitor!” I heard the cry, and other expletives go up around us. Kisami just stood there laughing, moulding fire like putty in his hands.
I caught Johnny’s eye. He nodded. I crouched so that our shoulders touched. We gathered our power and flung out a savage surge as he threw fire at us.
Our combined power overwhelmed his and sent the fire straight back at him. An expression of horror flitted across his face as he saw his clothes burst aflame. In another moment he had collapsed to the ground, smothered by the searing heat. Then, from out of nowhere, a bloated cloud formed over his body and burst in a deluge of water that doused the flames.
Johnny and I stared at each other in shock. When we turned back Kisami was struggling to his feet. Once upright he glared, face blackened and seared by flame, a shattered vessel brimful of sin.
I flinched when I heard the rifle report. Kisami spun to the left, and I saw that the back of his head was missing. A second report rang out and Kisami slumped amidst his own spraying blood, landing heavily in the sand.
There were several snipers stationed on the roofs of nearby hotels and lying prone atop the vans, all waiting to take pot shots. It had been the local Mayor’s idea, and a good one. Kisami’s mistake was presenting a target.
I met Johnny’s eyes and my whole fear of failure showed in my expression like a sickly-lit beacon.
“We will try,” Johnny touched my shoulder. “Us two. Together.”
Belinda grazed my left ear with her lips. “Make it count, sweetcakes.”
Make it count.
When we all went down to. . .
It was time. I was in Miami, at the end of the world. I had a chance to dictate the outcome of events. I looked up, studying the roiling skies. I saw a mass of noxious cloud, simmering with evil intent. Tentacles beyond count now lashed the ocean surface and the beach, as if scouring for life. I joined hands with Johnny and concentrated my gaze up into that black, unspeakable maw.
“Now!”
We flung power strikes at it. When they hit, the cloud mass shrunk inward and then snapped back. I heard a repugnant whine, something so vile I had to press my hands over my ears. I struggled to focus. Johnnny’s hand on my shoulder helped.
I mustered my reserves again. Belinda stood beside me to lend support. Then, Johnny and I unleashed a blast more powerful than I could have imagined possible, something with feral and primordial strength, and at the same time I thought mend!
Our power struck the lesser Gods and forced their emerging bodies back into whatever Hell they occupied. Tentacles swung wildly. I fell to my knees but managed to maintain my bond with Johnny as we sent yet another blast into the skies.
We made the Gods flinch. The holes in the sky that were their wombs, the b
irth-tunnel between our world and theirs, contracted almost to closing point.
I heard Lucy’s inspiring war-cry. “Slam it to ‘em, dad!”
I nodded at Johnny. “One more.”
We lifted our heads to send out a final colossal strike, but at that moment I saw a flash to my left and suddenly Jondal was among us. The Destroyer struck out with a razor-edged staff, killing two marines, and then striking at Johnny. Belinda thrust Johnny away, and our bond was lost.
Above us the lesser Gods shrieked like hordes of the damned and expanded even more. Huge tentacles slithered out of the clouds, smashing into the facades of the nearby hotels. Concrete was ripped away in destructive swathes. Glass and metal smashed and shrieked. I tried to shrug away a sudden feeling of weariness. This was Hell on earth, in all its apocalyptic anguish. Devon nodded at me and sent a rush of pure strength through my veins.
Damn Jondal! We had almost won the day there.
I turned around, looking for Johnny. Maybe we could try again. But then a horde of new demons attacked us, fresh from the gates of Hell, and it was all I could do to help keep myself, my daughter and my companions alive.
50
NEW BABYLON- THE MALL
Marian Cleaver strode forward, firing left and right, blasting Wayclearer demons until the percussion of his shotgun and the shocking cadence of his enemies’ screams blended into a single sound in his mind – the sound of Josh Walker’s dying scream. His world shattered and shattered again with an endless series of explosions – pulverized concrete, breaking glass, the tortured wrench and squeal of tearing metal.
He advanced at a steady pace, face set hard, but always keeping one eye on the progress of his colleagues.
He heard Ceriden swearing off to his left, more drama queen than vampire, but the man certainly could fight. He watched Felicia tear her way through demons and foul humans alike, not yet adopting her lycan form.
They were metres away from Mena Gaines and the mall entrance. The façade that fronted the mall had been shredded by gunfire. Blood was splashed over the walls like the work of a psychotic graffiti artist.
Cleaver saw Mena Gaines take stock of the situation. Emily Crowe inclined her head in Gaines’ direction. “It is done,” he heard Crowe say.
In that moment Gaines’ eyes locked onto his own.
“Ah, Marian. I thought my battle might be against you.”
Cleaver hesitated, looking beyond her into the mall where he saw twelve strange, robed figures. Crowe was striding towards the figures, her pace swift and purposeful. Around her the mall blazed and burned. A brand-new yellow Hummer, raised on a dais, listed onto its side with a crash as its support collapsed. Crowe fairly danced through the inferno.
He needed to hurry. What would happen if Crowe raised this mysterious Hierarchy? Moot question, really. Cheyne didn’t even know what the hell the Hierarchy was up to.
Either way, Cleaver thought, his duty was to stop Gaines and Crowe.
Delta boys dropped to one knee, took aim with their weapons, and fired a volley. Crazed bodies jerked and fell backwards, sprawling on the mall’s marble floor. The shots echoed and played havoc with the building’s acoustics, repeating again until even Cleaver ducked instinctively.
Emily Crowe was down amongst the bodies. Cleaver couldn’t tell whether she was dead or alive.
They penetrated further inside the mall, entering through the food court. Metal chairs and tables were scattered around in disarray. A row of barricaded eateries circled the court.
Cleaver saw bodies dotted here and there, some tied to the barriers that separated the food court from the restaurants, a few hung from the rafters above, others sprawling over the cushioned seating. For some, this mall truly had been Hell.
Cleaver ached with guilt. Innocents had died here, even as the cops and the feds and Aegis dithered around outside.
For a long second everyone just stood there, wiping their brows and taking stock. Cleaver even managed to return Felicia’s grim smile.
“Looks like-” he began, but a sound cut him off.
Behind him he heard Mena Gaines start to laugh, a corrupt sound that set his nerves on edge. When he turned, she was standing in the entrance way, her right foot resting atop the lifeless body of a cop, her left hand constricting the throat of another. Cleaver flinched away from the hate that glowed from her ashen eyes.
“Fight me!” she screamed at him. “Your cowardice owns you, Marian! Just like the dictators you work for!”
Cleaver leveled his shotgun. “Fuck you.”
He fired. She danced aside, and the blast missed her right cheek by a millimetre, so close he saw sparks chewing and burning her flesh in the shell’s wake.
Beside him, Felicia fell to her knees. At first he thought the lycan had given up and a searing horror gripped him, but then he saw her scrabbling for a cop’s discarded gun.
Felicia fired three successive shots at Gaines. The Destroyer danced aside and then, with supernatural speed, was close to him. Her elbow caught him across the cheek and sent him reeling. Her front kick slammed into his ribcage with crushing strength. He fell back, gasping for breath, barely avoiding her follow up.
At that moment a sight greeted his eyes that stunned him into immobility.
A tank was trundling through the mall entrance behind Gaines, grinding away plaster and concrete as it went. Its gun turret swiveled a few notches – towards the Destroyer.
Cleaver moved just in time as Gaines spun and leapt towards him, executing perfect strikes that he barely managed to evade. In one moment of do or die decision-making he let her get near him, close enough to smell her fetid breath.
“Weak,” she hissed, spittle flying from bloodless lips.
“There’s a tank behind you,” he hissed back, reveling in the fear that crossed her face.
Cleaver unloosened the cattle prod from beneath his duster and pressed it against her heart.
“I’ll always be better than you, Gaines,” he said and pressed the button.
Mena Gaines’s eyes widened into pools of agony. Cleaver shoved her body away as it shook with epileptic convulsions.
And suddenly Cleaver gave a double-take as Ken Hamilton strode past him, gleaming sword held in one hand, closely followed by Cheyne and the members of her coven.
Cheyne said, “We have wasted enough time here.”
Mena Gaines groaned at his feet. Cleaver looked down at her and felt a moment’s pity. Here was a human woman, corrupted beyond recognition or repair, writhing in agony but seeking a way to destroy him.
Cleaver hardened his heart, took out a Glock, and aimed it at her skull.
“You could…never…kill,” she spat up at him. “Not in cold…blood.”
Cleaver thought back through his life. At every turn he’d tried to nudge the wanderers back on the right path.
Was she truly beyond help?
Gaines stared up into his eyes, holding his gaze, his attention.
The cynical part of him thought why?
He heard Ceriden’s yell and jumped back, more through years of well-honed instinct than anything else, not even sure he was the object of the vampires warning.
But Mena Gaines’ dagger still sliced through his shin. If he hadn’t stepped back it would have crippled him.
Gaines squeal of glee sounded like knives grating over bone. She rose to her feet like a demonic phoenix, daggers flashing. Cleaver then saw a fantastical sight: Felicia, sprinting gracefully- wild, blonde hair streaming out behind her, arms and legs thrusting like the pistons in a V8 Camaro- suddenly dropping into a four-legged sprint without missing a beat. As she dropped, her body moulded seamlessly into a wolfs, gaining powerful hind legs and a strong, muscular back, front paws with razor-like claws and a lycan’s pronounced skull. Her cry became a snarl and then a howl of joyful bloodlust.
She struck Gaines in the chest, then used her ripping claws to gain purchase and wrap herself around the Destroyer’s hard body, scrambling around her back, an
d then reappearing with her fangs bared right at Gaines’ exposed throat.
In that explosive moment Gaines hadn’t even moved an inch. Felicia ripped out Gaines’ throat in a tearing mess of flesh and blood. The Destroyer staggered, dropped to a knee, and then collapsed with a soft sigh, unable to give vent to her dying agonies because her vocal chords had been shredded.
Felicia, still in wolf form, snarled up towards the heights of the mall.
Cheyne sighed. “The Hierarchy were not summoned then,” she said almost to herself. “I do not understand this diversion at all.” Her voice sounded hollow, defeated.
Ken rested the tip of his sword on the floor and turned to her. “You don’t sound very happy about that. Isn’t it good news?”
Cheyne scratched her nose. “Let’s be honest, the question is right in our faces- why would a demon want to ruin this world?”
“Pointless,” a member of Cheyne’s coven put in helpfully. Cleaver peered into the depths of her cowl but saw only a hint of blonde hair, blue eyes, and her platinum talisman.
“Their plan either runs deeper,” Cheyne said. “or this is the most elaborate diversion of all time.”
“So,” Ceriden regarded Cheyne with wide eyes. “What is their plan?”
“We’re missing something. And I bet my broomstick Crowe’s in on it.”
“I saw her,” Cleaver said. “Walking towards a group of robed figures.”
“Black Chapter,” Cheyne said. “They would have summoned the hierarchy.”
“Why?” Ken asked.
“Crowe was here,” Cheyne said. “Orchestrating everything. Now, that bitch has vanished.”
“There were a dozen robed figures chanting,” Cleaver told them.
“Didn’t Crowe go to Egypt, then Paris?” Ken recalled from Kinkade’s bulletins. “Didn’t she steal something from the Louvre?”
“Yes. The Louvre text,” Cheyne said, then spun towards her coven. “Look into it,” she said urgently. “We need to know everything about that text. Now.”
In the silence that followed Cleaver shook his head and surveyed the chaos around him. Oddly, he felt good. At the end of the day they had re-taken the mall.
The Chosen Trilogy Boxset Page 21
