Defiant Guardians Anthology

by Jacob Peppers

  I turned back to Deborah, my brain still in a state of confusion. I shook her more violently now. “Wake up, Deborah, they’re here!”

  The girl’s eyes blinked a bit, sending a feeling of relief through my body. What would Gauss have done to me if I'd killed his first apprentice? Could I ever have lived with myself?

  “What?” she asked, her eyelids lifting only half way. She picked up her hand and let it graze my face. “Did you… hit me?”

  “Yes, I’m so sorry, I-“

  She put a finger to my lips, then popped my cheek with her palm.

  “Good boy.”

  A sudden stink hit my nose as I helped her to her feet. From here I could see a brown grainy mush forming and oozing from the depths of the fissure. This was the forming of a hive, I just knew it! But what was to come… I wasn’t sure. You could only learn so much about demons from reading books. But why was it here? Why choose to debut yourself in the center of the society that was trying to destroy you? How did they even know how to find us?

  “They are here,” Deborah said dreamily.

  We were leaning on each other, watching our possible demise float disgustingly upward from the ground. Was this really happening? Or was I slowly entering into a concussion?

  Deborah dropped her head onto my shoulder.

  “We have to fight them. Just us two. Together.”

  “Looks like it,” I said.

  “We’ve got this,” she said.

  And there we stood, watching the fecal hive rise from hell. Neither of us was ready for what was to come. As Judge Samuel might have put it... we were in deep shit.

  16

  Thanks to the horrendous smell of the gurgling dung textured hive, Deborah was slowly coming out of her daze. She was able to stand on her own without leaning on me and she shook the hair out of her eyes. She bent and grabbed her sword with her uninjured arm.

  I was nervously spinning the haft of my polearm in my demon hand, a weird itching sensation running through my horns. It felt as though they were somehow twitching as if they could feel what was coming. Were my horns communicating with the hive? If so, what were they telling it?

  “We should warn Gauss,” Deborah said, her voice slightly slurred.

  “You should do it,” I said, “I think your shoulder might be dislocated.”

  She opened her mouth to protest, but I poked the upper part of her arm with a small amount of effort, making her badly wince.

  “Fine,” she said. “What about you? What are you going to do? You've never faced one of these before. All the Black Knights know taking on a hive alone is suicide.”

  “I don't plan on taking it on alone for long,” I said, trying to keep my cool. I breathed through my nose into my stomach and let it out of my mouth. “Not if you get going right away.”

  Deborah nodded, “Gauss has faced one of these. He'll know what to do.” She turned and started to jog away, a slight limp in her step.

  When had Gauss had a chance to fight one of these things? Come to think of it, I hardly knew anything about the mysterious man even after a year of training with him each and every day. When had the Black Knights seen action? And, if they had fought these things out in the real world, why didn't anyone else in the real world know about them?

  I turned my attention back to the shit pile sloshing and bubbling as it grew higher and higher. With each bubble that popped, a red eye was left staring at me. Small little heads pulled themselves out of the muck, screeching as they ripped the skin apart that turned out to be their mouths.

  I took a step back, trying to focus on the task at hand. What to do? How do I kill this thing? Think. Think.

  Fire!

  I looked around the training arena for the torches that encircled them.

  “Almighty be with me,” I said under my breath when I saw that the torches were not lit. And why would they be? It was mid-day, the sun was out and shining brightly. The torches only needed to be lit during night training.

  Still, I ran over to the closest torch and brought it to my nose. It smelled of burning oil, but how would I light it?

  As I placed the torch in my belt, I heard one of the exit doors creak open as Deborah made her way out of the arena. Suddenly, a thin line of goo, brown and lumpy, shot passed me. It connected with the back of Deborah's armor, the impact of which sending brown all over the armor's black. She screamed a high pitch feminine scream as she was wrenched off her feet and pulled back toward the hive.

  With quick thinking, I lifted my polearm to cut the thin slimy tentacle of shit, but I was too late. Deborah zipped past me, her eyes pleading with me. In an instant, she slammed into the hive and was quickly overcome with it as she was sucked inside.

  “No!” I cried, rushing towards it.

  Most of the demons were halfway out of the hive by now. Tiny brown hands resembling much of my own were struggling against the hardened ooze as they tried to pull themselves out. Three, however, had plopped to the ground, their thin veiny wings beating frantically at the wind. I was halfway to the hive, still with no idea of how I was going to stop it, when the three demons took flight.

  They were mindless beings, their only motive in life was to seek out the nearest living thing and rip it to shreds with their two tiny arms, each with two razor-sharp claws. They flew towards me, screaming their small heads off. Each looked to have a defect in some way, as if the hive hadn't had the time to properly manufacture them. One was missing an eye, another couldn't really open its mouth, and another had extra long genitalia that dragged the ground as it flew towards me.

  I swung my polearm out in front of me using its length to my advantage. I slapped the head clean off the demon without the mouth, then pulled my polearm back and pushed its blade directly into the throat of the one with the massive penis.

  A claw from the remaining demon slashed my cheek open and the skin flapped lazily down to my jaw. I could feel the cold breeze of the day enter my mouth and cool my hot tongue. The pain was intense but I let it fuel the turning sweep of my polearm, cutting the wings off the flying shit.

  The one-eyed demon fell to the sand, its wings landing beside it as it flapped its nubs uselessly. My attention was on it for only half a second when something hard hit my chest. I looked down to see that the hive had caught me with its tentacle. It wasted no time and pulled me off my feet just like it had done with Deborah. I turned in the air just as Gauss entered the arena, his face twisted in fear.

  With my final moment outside in the fresh air, Gauss flung something from his hand in my direction. I caught it just before being pulled into the massive glob of shit.

  The question now was, how would I use this red alchemical sphere without blowing up myself and Deborah in the process?

  17

  The smell was overpowering. The taste unimaginably bad. My nose. My mouth. My ears. My hair. All filled with the substance that was none other than demon shit.

  As I was pulled deeper into the hive, I could feel baby demons being shoved passed me on their way to wreak havoc, their small bodies encased in a warm slimy embryo sack. I tried my best to grab onto one, hoping it would pull me with it but it was no use. The sack would rip open exposing a child from hell that screamed and kicked for a few seconds before dying moments later. From my studies, I knew that the offspring of a hive such as this did not take very long to grow, however, if the growth process was interrupted in any way then there was a serious chance that a major organ in the spawning process would not have been developed yet.

  Then, a thought hit me. Why was I trying to get out in the first place? Wasn’t this the only way to kill one of these things? By destroying the core? Sure, there were specific weapons to take down a hive so one didn’t have to venture inside of it. Weapons such as ballistae with thick arrows or very long pikes, both having red alchemical spheres attached to them.

  But I only had myself. Myself and the red bomb in the palm of my hand.

  And so, with great strength, I made myself relax a
nd let the hive pull me deeper into its body. My lungs were already beginning to strain, the oxygen of the weak breath I was able to take seconds before being pulled into the shit was depleting fast. This would have to be a get in and get out mission but… how was I going to get out? No time to think about it now, I would just have to rely on my instincts.

  I expected my journey inside the hive to go on forever until the tentacle that gripped my foot let go of its excruciatingly tight grip, leaving me in the middle of nowhere. It was trying to suffocate me!

  The saltiness of the mush was not helping the pain that I was feeling from my hanging cheek meat and I tried my best to ignore it and to come up with the best plan of action. My instincts told me to follow where I thought the tentacle had retreated to, and since my options were limited and I was about to die with lungs full of fecal matter, I decided to go with that.

  Letting go of my polearm, which floated in the hive as if it were gelatin, I swam through the shit in hopes that I would soon find the core. My lungs were screaming, pleading with me to open my mouth and take in a big breath of brown hive, but of course I refused. Instead, I thought this:

  “Almighty, give me the strength to defeat this deliverer of evil, this unholy birthing apparatus. If you still find favor with me, oh great Almighty, then be with me and help me to deliver this sanctuary of this demonic presence. Allow me to be your holy weapon, your holy warrior as I smite this engine of demon creation.”

  A surge of energy rushed through me. Whether it was divine or just me feeling more confident, I swam with it. I stroked as hard as I could, keeping my eyes shut and concentrating on the goal rather than the pain in my face, but also being sure not to grip the red sphere too tightly. My lungs felt as though they were about to take over my mouth and force it open at any moment.

  And, just when all seemed lost and I was about to pass out, I toppled forward and out of the brown sludge. If there were demons in this room, then I was ill prepared to face them because I was far too busy heaving in large breaths of air with a decent amount of hive as well. Luckily, I was able to stand with my head still attached to my body.

  The room was small but tall enough that I could stand. In the center was a red throbbing fleshy ball that was pulsing at a very angry pace. I doubted it was acting this way before I fell into its quarters, interrupting its baby making process.

  Sludge tentacles appeared out of the ceiling and whipped at me immediately. Unfortunately, my cheek flap was slapped and I screamed bloody murder as I was slammed against the back wall. I ducked and dodged the best I could, my left hand grabbing at a polearm that was no longer there. I was getting whipped back and forth and no part of my body was safe from its onslaught.

  I was slapped in the face, the chest, the back, my arms, my legs, and even the tops of my feet. My brain was going into a mode of panic, trying to figure out anyway it could stop this terrible pain. And finally, I came to a decision on how I was going to end this fucking thing.

  I charged towards the red throbbing meatball, taking horrible slaps all over my body. More tentacles appeared and waited for their turn to get at me. I tried my best to cover my face but it was no use. It felt like years until I was standing in front of the core. I could feel the red alchemical sphere in my palm and it was like the hive knew what I was about to do because it was screaming at me now, actually screaming! How it was creating the sound, I had no idea.

  I grabbed the stem that was attached to the top of the core and could feel blood or whatever life source this thing used rush between my grip. Then, pulling all the power I could muster, I shoved my demon hand straight into the fleshy ball.

  I then squeezed my fist.

  18

  I pulled my face out of the sand, my ears ringing terribly. The first thing I noticed was the fire that had enveloped the training arena stands. The brown muck of the hive had splashed all over the place and was apparently pretty flammable. All the flames had to do was barely lick a piece of the terrible substance and it would instantly catch fire.

  The smell of the burning hive was intense and made you feel like you weren’t breathing in any oxygen at all. I stood, or at least I tried to. I flipped myself over which was a lot harder to do without the use of my legs. When I was finally able to look down, I couldn’t help but let out a scream.

  Both of my legs from the knee down were missing.

  I started to breathe heavily, my chest rising higher and higher. I was going into shock, I knew it. Between the constant ringing in my head and the anxiety of waiting for massive amounts of pain to come, it wouldn’t be long before the world went dark for me.

  But that wasn’t what happened.

  My demonic arm tingled a bit as it deflated into my body leaving only the skin. Useless and unmovable. My stomach gurgled as the unholy energy, or whatever it was, traveled through my body. I could feel its presence leaking through my organs leaving a chilly trail. It wasn’t long before the cold serpent split itself, now journeying through my veins and ending up at my two blasted off knees.

  Still, there was no pain.

  I barely ever felt my horns but now they were starting to prickle and even tickle me as the demon blood within me did its work. I knew what it was trying to do. The demon half of me wanted to preserve my life. Even though I wasn’t doing my job as a cambion and was helping the good people rather than helping satan’s army, the dark blood still wanted to live.

  And slowly my legs came back to me. Much like blowing up a balloon, the skin of my new legs unraveled from within me as they extended out into the world. The process was slow and even though it was hard to pull my eyes away from the unholy magic, I had to turn and look for Deborah.

  I searched the sand but didn’t see her anywhere. I checked again, this time not looking for a body but… pieces of one. I was relieved to find nothing. Only the corpses of the demons I had slain and puddles of burning hive.

  Moving my eyes to the stands surrounding the arena, I found her instantly. She was sitting up and from here I could see her head moving.

  “Thank the Almighty,” I said under my breath, but as the words left my lips pain shot from my legs and traveled all the way up my body. Apparently, my demon blood reacted poorly to me appreciating something else besides it, especially since it was the source that was reproducing legs for me.

  The pain faded leaving only aches. A sudden convulsion came over my legs which must have been my inner demon letting me know that I now had access to move them. I sat up and looked down at two pale white and hairless limbs. I wiggled my toes and, although the world was burning around me, I smiled.

  It was weird standing at first, as though I were walking on two sticks, but it didn’t take long for my brain to accept the new legs. I tried to jog towards Deborah but settled for a fast walk. She looked up at me, her face in a big grimace. Her leg, even from where I was, looked mangled. She wouldn’t be able to walk on her own. I was almost to the stairs that would take me to her when Gauss entered from one of the open hallways.

  He spotted us and was able to make it to Deborah at the exact moment I did.

  “We need to get out of here,” Gauss said, putting his shoulder underneath one of Deborah’s arms. Seeing that my demonic arm had re-inflated itself with its demon juices, I took the other arm and helped Gauss carry the wounded girl. “Something’s happening. We weren’t prepared for this.”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked, trying my best to keep up with his pace. Deborah was groaning, her face twisted in pain.

  “This wasn’t the only hive!” he cried, as something big crashed somewhere from within the Refuge.

  “But how? I thought we were safe here!”

  Gauss looked across Deborah and into my eyes. There was worry in them. “Me too.”

  We were close to entering the courtyard and I almost found myself thanking my demon blood for the constant flow of stamina it gave me, for without it I doubted I would have been able to cope with my new legs and the weight of a full armored
woman. Would the Almighty be upset if I gave thanks to the thing that was constantly saving my life? This life of mine wasn’t getting any easier. If anything, it was getting more and more bizarre. Was I completely sure I wasn’t living in a nightmare?

  Gauss shoved his hand into my chest right before we made the last turn that would have put us where it all began for me.

  “What are we doing?” I asked him. “Where are we going?”

  Gauss didn’t answer but put his hands on the cobblestone wall. He pulled back quickly, bits of smoke rising from his now blistering fingers. His face, however, showed no signs of pain. Who was he?

  “This way,” he said, backing us up about ten feet. He then pulled out a blue sphere and smashed it hard on the wall. The blue plasma inside washed over the cobble making it now possible for us to traverse through.

  Gauss stepped into the wall first and I followed. I caught a glimpse of Deborah’s face. Her eyes were closed and her mouth lulled lazily. She was completely unconscious now, the pain being too much for her. I really hoped it was only the leg that was messed up.

  Outside in the courtyard was complete hell and I mean that quite literally. Gauss wasn’t kidding about there being more hives as there were more of them than there were buildings! Hives floated in the air, some were wedged in corners, and I could even see a few mini shit piles connected to the library’s pillars where they were spitting out demons the size of rats.

  Humans, orcs, elves, goblins, and dwarves of the Refuge all fought as best they could against the flying, walking, and crawling monsters. None of us had expected this onslaught and this was apparent by the gory scene that was now entering my vision.

  The sight was depressing. I’d never seen anything so horrible in my life and all I wanted to do was curl up in a ball and cry. So many were dead that I could practically smell their bodies from where I stood. The entrance to the courtyard we’d almost walked through had been blocked by a burning wagon filled with freshly forged red alchemical spheres. This was the reason why Gauss had stopped us. How had he known? And when would that wagon of spheres go up in flames? There were enough explosives in there to take out the entire city!