“Oh.” Kevin sucked in a breath as he realized what kind of yōkai they were facing. “You’re a bakeneko.”
“A bakeneko?” Kağan’s voice had become a purr-like growl. “Is that what you think I am? Some pathetic little house cat? Do not insult me, meow. I am a kasha, a messenger of hell, a creature who serves directly under the Shinigami himself. I deliver souls to the Sanzu River and have enough power to burn anything within my path to ash, meow!”
“And yet you still say ‘meow’,” Iris could not help but point out.
“Don’t antagonize the giant cat monster, Iris,” Kevin muttered, right before all hell broke loose.
***
The battle started when Kağan sent fire blasting at Kevin and Iris. Large gouts of barrel-shaped, cylindrical discharges of hellfire surged toward them, a purple flame that howled with the ferocity of a thousand damned souls. Sweat broke out on Kevin’s skin even though it was still far away.
Guns now holstered, Kevin was forced to split apart from Iris in order to avoid being consumed. Kevin and Iris ran in opposite directions, the cylinder of flames barreling past them, setting everything near it ablaze. So hot was this fire that even things it didn’t touch lit up like bonfires with fuel dumped over them. The grass was set ablaze. Bushes and shrubs caught fire. A tree several feet from the flames burst into a raging conflagration as the raging purple hellfire burned past it, continuing on for several feet before striking a fence and detonating with explosive force.
“Void Art: Void Fire.”
Two tiny flames darker than the night sky erupted into existence, hovering over the tips of Iris’s tails. They flickered and danced, writhed and surged, as if trying to escape the tenuous hold that Iris’s will had over them. And Iris was more than willing to let them go. She launched them at the kasha, two tiny motes of streaking flames whose sentient hunger demanded to be satiated. They were like Kamikaze fighters in their mad race toward the kasha.
“Do you think those tiny specks of void fire will be enough to meow me!”
More hellfire erupted from his body, burning brightly yet not so much as singeing him. He held out a hand and the fire began to gather, to coalesce into single existence, a tiny sphere of tightly packed heat. Condensed, it burned brightly like a star.
The fire shot from his palm and slammed into the void fire. While the sentient flames were, indeed, fearsome in their hunger, their insatiable need to consume all life, that did not mean they were invincible. The hellfire that slammed into them was far more powerful than the flames that Iris conjured. It overpowered the black fire, ripping it asunder and continuing on toward Iris, who froze at the sight of the condensed ball of hellish combustion heading her way.
“Move it!”
Kevin was there in an instant. He rushed forward like a bolt of lightning. One arm wrapped hurriedly around Iris’s waist, lifting her up like a father would a misbehaving child. Powerful thigh and calf muscles exploded into action like the pistons of an engine. Kevin launched himself back, avoiding the fireball, which struck the ground several seconds after he had vacated the very spot it hit.
While Kevin was forced to close his eyes because he was carrying Iris, the vixen in his arms raised her hands to shield herself as the flames detonated against the ground.
As was the case with most explosions of this nature, the first thing to hit them was a concussive shockwave. It slammed into them with the fury of a hurricane, nearly lifting Kevin off his feet and almost flinging Iris out of his arms. Only some quick thinking on Kevin’s part kept them from going airborne. He pulled Iris to the ground and placed himself on top of her, protecting the vixen with his own body.
After the shock wave washed over them, then came the blast of scorching hot air. The superheated, oxygen-rich air seared their skin with its burning heat. Dust and gravel slammed into their bodies, fine grains that scratched and irritated their skin. Tiny trails of blood leaked from deep scrapes where the flesh had peeled off.
Explosions were an unusual thing. Kevin had learned about them in science class. When an explosion occurred, it pushed all of the air away, shoving it across a vast expanse of space. When this happened, it created a vacuum, a hole in which nothing existed, a split second where there was a single place on this earth that could almost be likened to the absolute nothingness of space. It only lasted for a second, however, and when that second passed, all of the air that had been displaced was sucked back in, as if the Earth was trying to regain its equilibrium, trying to fill that empty space in which something should exist, needed to exist.
Kevin was nearly ripped off of Iris’s body as the airflow reversed, surging back toward the place where the explosion had occurred. It was only thanks to the two tails wrapping around his body, courtesy of Iris, that he didn’t get sucked into the space where the overall volume and pressure of airflow would have no doubt crushed him.
When the explosion died down, Kevin gingerly climbed to his feet and helped Iris stand as well. He and the vixen by his side gaped at the crater before them. It wasn’t massive, not when compared to some of the meteor craters he’d seen on field trips, but the twenty by twenty-foot-wide hole in the ground definitely wasn’t something to scoff at either. A perfectly rounded hemisphere, the ground inside of it smooth like glass, steam rising from its surface, fumes and vapor that clogged the lungs, choking them, was definitely something to be wary of. The person who made it was even more so.
“It seems I missed, meow.” The voice of Kağan made them turn. The kasha stalked toward them, clawed hands curling and uncurling as though imagining what it would feel like to wrap around their necks. Glowing yellow eyes with slit-like pupils glared at them. “You’re awfully fast for a human, meow. I’m impressed meow were able to dodge that.”
“Don’t underestimate humanity.” Kevin glared as he reached down. His guns, silver and black weapons of destruction, rested snuggly in the holsters that were strapped to his thighs, until he pulled them free and pointed them at the kasha. “We may not have your supernatural powers, but that doesn’t make us weak.”
Kağan stared at the young boy who dared to defy him, at the human who, by all rights, should have been cowering before him.
Then he sneered, a vicious leer that would have caused lesser men to lose control of their bladder.
“Humans are the most pathetic creatures in existence, meow. You have no power, no abilities to put you on par with us yōkai. You are nothing, meow. You’re just a bunch of pathetic, overgrown apes, who have yet to learn their place.”
“And yet it is humanity that stands on top of the food chain.” Kevin’s guns did not waver. They remained pointed at his foe. “If you think we’re so weak, then how come you’re hiding among humans?”
“I am not hiding, meow!” A vicious scowl marred Kağan’s feline muzzle. “I never hide. This city is mine, meow! Everyone within this city belongs to me, meow. I control all of them, and they do my bidding like the good little puppets they are. You humans are my playthings, meow!”
“Not anymore.”
Kevin fired off what appeared to be several rounds from his guns. However, the energy did nothing to Kağan, merely evaporated against the fire coating his body like ghostly images. The kasha narrowed his eyes.
“Do you think I’ll allow myself to be meow’d by one of your pathetic illusions?” He snarled as he recognized the Kevin in front of him for the illusion that he was. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on meow! Now die!”
Kağan turned around to see the running form of Kevin quickly growing closer. A swipe of his claws sent crescents of hellfire at the boy, who ran headlong into the attack with little care to his own safety.
“Meow?!”
Kağan watched with a shocked stare as his attacks did nothing. The crescent waves of hellish flame traveled straight through Kevin like he wasn’t even there, as if he was a wavering ghost, an ethereal being with no corporeal form for him to attack. It was like the child was a hallucination�
�
… Or an illusion.
That realization came too late. Before Kağan had time to turn around, a barrage of youki bullets lanced out from the darkness of the night. They struck the kasha in the back, drilling into his body. The projectiles of water youki slammed into his flame-covered fur, putting out the flames present. They couldn’t put them out for long, however. His flames burned hotter than 3,200 degrees Fahrenheit. But it was long enough for the celestial bullets to burn his flesh with divine energy.
Psychological warfare. It was a common tactic. Tricking people into doing one thing, thinking they are right, when instead you do something else. Deception. Trickery. That was what had happened here.
Iris had indeed cast an illusion on Kağan, a set of false images woven into his brain, and the kasha had merely assumed that the illusion he saw was them standing in front of him, never looking past the first false image. In truth, he had been hit with a double-layered illusion. A feint within a feint. If it didn’t piss him off so much, Kağan would have been impressed.
The kasha turned, angry hissing erupting from his feline mouth. Flames spewed from the cat-like muzzle. The fires that raged over the yōkai’s body flared all the brighter, a sign of anger, of fury at being humiliated in this manner.
“You insufferable mice.” Kağan’s face twisted into a rictus of resentment, vitriol made manifest. “By the time I’m finished with meow, I’m going to—”
Kağan’s words were cut off when several projectiles drilled straight into its eyes. Pain. Agony. The kasha roared as the feeling of two powerful bullets composed of youki penetrated his sockets. His eyes burst like overripe fruit. Carmine liquid and viscous, pus-like fluid dripped from damaged eye sockets, staining the midnight fur of his face. He raised his clawed hands to cover empty sockets that no longer had eyes to see through.
Kevin’s barrage of gunfire continued. A hailstorm of energy lanced out of glowing barrels like water spraying from the nozzle of a hose. They struck Kağan’s body like nails being driven into wood by a hammer.
Burn marks appeared along the yōkai’s body, singed fur and blackened skin. It burst through them and attacked the skin directly. Blood spurted from wounds created by drilling projectiles of water. They penetrated Kağan’s skin and caused tiny geysers to shoot out.
“Void Art: Void Fire.”
Several flickering balls of black flame joined Kevin’s assault. They struck Kağan’s body and remained there, eating away at him, dissolving his flesh. The kasha’s pained roar echoed across the city.
For a while, it looked like Kevin and Iris had the upper hand. For a moment, they dared to hope that their combined assault would be enough to defeat this yōkai.
That hope was dashed when the fires flickering on Kağan’s body burned brighter, when the flames licking Kağan’s skin like the tender caress of a lover suddenly burst into a raging conflagration. The black flames dissolved into the wind as they were overpowered. Snuffed out. The energy projectiles that once did so much damage were suddenly blocked by the powers of the kasha’s incredible flames, of the burning fires only those with a connection to the Shinigami could wield.
“Enough!”
A wave of fire burst from Kağan’s body. Torrid air hit Kevin and Iris like a desert sandstorm, forcing them to cover their eyes before the heat could cook their eyeballs.
“I have had it up to here with you two!” Kağan’s furiously snarling face was a vicious mask of hatred. “If you think that a pathetic ape and some two-tails is going to get the best of meow, then think again, meow!”
Iris snickered. “He’s still saying ‘meow.’”
“What did I tell you about antagonizing the cat monster, Iris?”
Kevin wiped the sweat from his forehead. Even from a distance of nearly twenty feet, the heat radiating off Kağan’s body was enough that he could feel it from where he stood. The very air around the kasha was bursting and volatile. The ground beneath the yōkai’s feet had begun to bubble and boil, the earth becoming superheated and red like magma.
Loud hissing erupted from Kağan’s body. Wounds that had once gushed blood healed over. Bubbling fluid gathered in empty eye sockets, taking shape, becoming spherical. The eyes reformed. Nerve fibers like a million tiny strands wrapped around white fluid. Translucent film covered strands of optic fibers. The center bled yellow, a tiny circle reminiscent of two moons took shape within each socket, slit-like pupils appearing within. It was disgustingly fascinating to watch.
“He just healed himself,” Iris stated, quite unnecessarily.
“I know. I saw it.” Kevin rolled his eyes.
It wasn’t healing, but more like regeneration. It was impossible to heal from Void damage. That was because of the Void’s nature. Things consumed by the Void were forever lost. However, if Kağan was able to replace what had been damaged, then it would be the same as becoming brand new.
“To think two lesser beings have forced me to this stage.” The kasha’s thick, growling voice was filled with contempt. “It shames me, meow.”
“What shames me is that I’m fighting someone who says ‘meow’ as a catchphrase,” Iris quipped.
Kevin facepalmed. “I really wish you would stop antagonizing him.”
Kağan’s glare was so full of malice and blazing odium that it couldn’t simply be called hate. That did it no justice. The loathing he felt was the kind that could have caused weaker people to suffer a heart attack.
“You two are going to die here, meow.”
Kağan’s declaration was followed by flames coalescing around his hands. White hot they burned, inching along his elongated claws until the deadly sharp protrusions were covered in fire.
“I think we’re in trouble,” Iris stated solemnly.
“What an astute observation,” was Kevin’s sarcastic comeback.
“So, do you have a plan?”
“I was thinking we should make a tactical withdrawal,” Kevin admitted.
Iris raised a delicate eyebrow. “So we’re running away?”
“We do not run away.” Kevin glared at her while still keeping the kasha in his sights. “We simply withdraw tactically.”
“Right.” Iris nodded. “That’s what you call running away.”
“… Shut up.”
***
The chase was on.
Kevin and Iris ran through the streets. Behind them, the bounding of feet and hissing of melting black top let them know that their enemy was still after their blood.
The streets at night were depressingly empty. Not a single soul, aside from them and the big, fury hell cat chasing them, was present.
Kevin glanced around at everything in sight, searching constantly for something they could use to escape from the kasha. He saw cars parked along streets. Fire hydrants sat on sidewalks. Light posts buzzed and flashed, illuminating ground.
“Got any plans crawling around inside of that head of yours?” Iris asked as she ran alongside him.
Kevin looked at her, then looked back down the street they were running through. “I’m working on it.”
“Yeah? That’s good. But you may wanna work faster.”
Kevin scowled at the vixen by his side. “I’m working as fast as I can.”
“Your fastest obviously isn’t fast enough.”
“I’d like to see you come up with something, then!”
A fireball raced between the two, cutting off their conversation. Kevin and Iris jerked apart to avoid the searing heat. Even so, they couldn’t keep from hissing as the skin on their arms and shoulders received second-degree burns. The ball of fire continued on, passing them by to strike a mailbox. The eruption of flames rose into the air like the plumes of a phoenix. The mailbox turned into melted slag, molten metal bubbling red liquid that drizzled across the sidewalk and into the street.
Kevin and Iris leapt over the liquefied metal and continued running.
“Do you think you can trap him within an illusion?” Kevin asked.
�
�Maybe.” Iris looked back at their foe, then grimaced. “It won’t be easy, though. Not if you want it to be a solid illusion and not some cheap parlor trick like the last few illusions were. I’ll need time to set it up.”
Kevin turned his head slightly to look back at Kağan. The kasha was still charging after them like a bull that had seen red. Large, clawed feet slammed into the pavement, hissing and spitting, the sidewalk melting with every step their enemy took. Cars melted as the cat yōkai passed them, their metal chassis unable to withstand the heat of the flames that danced along the fire cat’s body.
He looked back at Iris. “I’ll give you that time.”
“Are you sure you’ll be okay?” Iris finally expressed concern for him.
“Trust me,” he said, feigning a confident smile that he did not feel.
This was going to suck.
***
Kevin knew that what he planned on doing was stupid.
That didn’t mean he was not going to do it.
Without missing a beat, Kevin leapt into the air and spun. His feet left the ground. His body turned. He aimed the gun in his left hand at a fire hydrant they’d just passed, and one that Kağan was traveling closer to. The black gun emitted a bright blue flash as he pulled the trigger. It roared like a cannon, blue energy shooting out like a lance to strike the fire hydrant. Kevin completed his spin and landed on the ground.
His aim had been superb. Well, it was probably just luck. The youki projectile slammed into one of the hydrant’s arms, blowing it clean off. His timing couldn’t have been more perfect either. Water shot out like a jet stream, slamming into Kağan like a drill piercing the heavens. Steam rose with a hiss as Kağan was blasted off his feet, skidding along the ground, and crashing into the wall of a building, breaking it, causing it to crumble around him.
“Now’s your chance,” Kevin told Iris, who nodded and ran down the nearest alley.
A Fox's Rescue Page 7
