Superhero Universe: Tesseracts Nineteen

by Claude Lalumiere

Daystar knelt over me, beaming. Her red hair was wild and sweat-damp. Her brown leathers shone like burnished bronze. “Normally I’m chasing you, not saving you.”

  Daystar is a paragon. A shining knight. In times gone by, she’d have been a saint, or a prophet. She was a golden goddess, virtue incarnate, and she’d vowed to bring me in the last time we’d crossed paths. I might let her, if I could convince her to help me tonight. I knew how to use power, but Daystar was power.

  She tilted her head as I rubbed some blood from my lip with a gloved knuckle.

  “You really have no shame or decency. No—”

  “Respect for the dead?”

  She didn’t answer. We’d danced this dance before.

  “I respect the dead fine. I just prefer them to stay that way.”

  Daystar extended her hand to me, and I took it. She might think she could trap me, but where there was shadow I could make myself unfound. Benefits of a Hades cap. We’d never touched, other than to trade punches and kicks, and it felt as if I were shaking the hand of God. She blazed as bright as her namesake, but even with all that light there were still shadows at the bottom of the grave.

  There was no sign of Doc’s goons. She must’ve caught me looking, because she said, “Ashes to ashes.” The fossils had been stacked in a pile. “I’ll return them when I’m certain they’re safe.”

  The look she gave me said that they’d be “safe” after she’d taken me in.

  “I can help you bring down Doctor Death.”

  “I don’t need your help.”

  “Daystar—”

  She sighed. “My name is Susan.”

  “We need to team up.”

  “You still insist on this lunacy? Your delusions are going to get people killed.”

  “What’s going to get people killed is you refusing my help. Maybe you can take down Doc on your own, but can you keep his hostages alive too?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “How do I know I can trust you?”

  “You know I hate them,” I said. “For all the times we’ve fought, I never once sided with the darkness over you.”

  I could see her considering. Time to sweeten the pot. I held out my hands, wrists touching as if I were going to let her handcuff me.

  If Daystar waited any longer, it would be morning, and we’d be too late. “Agreed.”

  “Come into my parlour,” I said, gesturing at the columbarium across the graveyard.

  She arched an eyebrow but gathered up the fossils and followed me without speaking. I paused when we reached the structure. The only folks I’d ever shown the place had already been dead at the time, so I felt a little self-conscious having Daystar in the Bunker.

  Revealing my hideout to Daystar might not be the best plan, but I needed her. I touched the names of my parents, and a door slid open, stone grating on cement. I entered, Daystar followed. The lights came on as the door closed, illuminating the wrought-iron spiral staircase that led us down into the earth.

  A composite man was on the slab, awaiting autopsy so I could figure out what made the creature so damned deadly. Daystar set the fossils down next to the body with barely a passing glance and moved on to my oaken workbench. She looked around the Bunker, taking in my outfits draped on dummies, the walls of weapons, the trophies.

  She asked, “Is this all the Fight is to you? Some sort of child’s game?”

  “I was never a child. Doctor Death saw to that.”

  “He killed your parents.”

  I nodded. “Old story. One I’m sure you’ve heard before. First things guys like the Doc do when they blow into town is take over a mortuary. Gives them peace and quiet, and lots of raw materials.” I squeezed my eyes shut, but that couldn’t hide the vision of what Doc had done to my family after they were no longer useful.

  “They used to own this funeral home, didn’t they?”

  My silence was her answer.

  Softly, she said, “They buried my grandmother.”

  I hoped for her sake that had been before Doc had enlisted them.

  “I never realized you grew up here,” I said. “Always seemed like you were too good for a place like this.”

  “This is a good place,” she said. “When it’s not full of monsters.”

  She laughed at that last bit, and I joined her.

  “Mort Cheval is always full of monsters.”

  “And that’s why you went into the family business?”

  “Let them take a run at me instead of someone else. I’ve taken on all comers — living, dead, or undead — and buried them. Where they belong.”

  Daystar nodded. The dim aura that always surrounded her brightened as if it was stretching out to comfort me, to fill me with warmth. I pushed my chair back from the table. There’d be time enough for a warm walk in the sun when Doc was in the ground— where he belonged.

  She took a seat at the workbench. “You intrigue me. A bonedancer who thinks he’s a hero.”

  “I’m not one of them,” I said, hotter than I intended. “I kill them. I use their gear— harm’s already been done there. But I’m not one of them. I’ll never be one of them.”

  Daystar watched me, her eyes searching for subterfuge. “Go on.”

  “Doctor Death is back in town,” I said. Her face showed no recognition. “You might know him by a different name, Marcus O’Reilly.” She nodded. “He’s responsible for the fossil thefts and the disappearances.”

  Daystar grimaced. “Why?”

  “The museum dug up something remarkable. Something rare.”

  “And?”

  “And Doc is going to wake it up.”

  Daystar got my meaning immediately. “He’ll be the head of a cult of one,” she said.

  I nodded. “Even the ancient reptiles had gods. Gods of eat, gods of fuck, gods of kill… the gods of eat and kill are pretty hard to distinguish. And when the god of kill is sated, and the world is meat, guess who’s going to control what’s left of a dead world?”

  She shuddered. “Where are they now?”

  I gestured toward my car, a customized Lincoln Continental Mark III. It looked badass and had a big trunk. Perfect for my kind of work.

  “I thought you’d never ask.”

  Daystar rode shotgun and the hydraulic lift took us up to the funeral home’s garage. I hit the door opener and turned over the engine. The Lincoln growled like it had been built in Hell instead of Detroit, and we roared out into the night.

  * * *

  I cut the lights and drove by my grave-sight. The red glow in the distance told me exactly where Doc was. Good thing the heavy tint on my windows kept Daystar’s light from giving us away.

  I parked the Lincoln by a hill covered in long prairie grasses and peppered with trees shrouded in half-spent leaves. Down a gulley I could see Doc’s goons scuttling all over the dig. Doc had assembled some kind of dual-purpose work bench/altar out of slabs of bentonite shale. There were some lumpy shapes huddled in front of the altar; maybe the shapes were still hostages, maybe they were just raw materials now.

  LED camping lanterns flickered on the walls of the gully, casting monstrous shadows. But the real monsters were very clear. I could see the fossil that had been the pride of the museum’s discoveries, a hitherto unclassified species of marine reptile. Something far larger, and older, than the mosasaurs and plesiosaurs that usually turned up in these parts. I looked around at the trees and grass, rubbed a bit of dirt between my gloved fingers. Hard to believe this prairie had all been under water once.

  Normally, grave-sight doesn’t turn up much outside of a city. For a wild place to show this much death… I shuddered. It was blazing bright in the gulley, like I was staring at a raging forest fire. I could see the power clusters that had allowed its malevolence to survive through the epochs, waiting for someone like Doc, even as the flesh rotted off its bones and those bones became stone.

  I heard a sharp snap. Shale breaking. The fossil shifted. Even from this distance, I could hear the soft patter of pebbles an
d dirt falling as the fossil moved.

  It moved.

  The press of aeons no longer held its bones. The skeleton ran the entire length of the gulley. Bones rose up from the ground, ribs looking like they belonged to some great ship under construction, not a living creature. The great jaw creaked and groaned, opening and closing like someone trying to get the feeling back into a numb hand.

  I whispered to Daystar, “We’re too late. It’s awake.”

  “No,” she said, pointing toward the far end of the gulley. The shapes by the altar shifted. “The door is open, but it has not stepped through. We’ve arrived just in time.”

  I wrinkled my brow. For all my earlier talk, it was very long odds that we’d be able to stop Doc, bury his monster, and get those prisoners out alive.

  Daystar must’ve suspected what I was thinking. She turned to me, her eyes two suns burning in the night. “You will not kill the hostages to stop the ceremony.”

  “We have to be realistic—”

  She shook her head. “Lost causes are the most worthy.”

  I tried to protest, but Daystar cut me off again.

  “The living must take precedence over the dead.”

  From the tone of her voice, there was going to be no arguing with her. So I didn’t bother.

  “If I don’t make it out of this,” I said, “I’ve always respected you. You’re the closest thing I have to a friend.”

  Daystar’s smile was sad. Either at my admission, or at the thought that we were both likely to die in that gulley.

  “If you die, I will ensure your spirit is never disturbed.”

  That was something, at least. “And if you die?”

  “Leave me in the ground. I could use the rest.”

  I reached into one of the pouches on my belt and pulled out a vial with a human eye floating in gel. I popped the cork and let the orb plop into my hand. I bounced it on my palm. The thousand-year-old eye was still as round and plump as a freshly picked grape. Sister Slaughter claimed the deadeye had come from the greatest marksman who ever lived. I don’t know about that, but she sure could shoot while she had it under her tongue. What I did know, was that the eye was dangerous: once focused, it would imbue me with a desire to kill that equaled its accuracy.

  I took off my goggles, tilted my head back and squeezed the deadeye till it burst, the jelly dripping into my eyes. Daystar looked away, grimacing. I couldn’t blame her, but tonight was my night. Disgusting as my preparations might be, I couldn’t afford to miss.

  Standing straight, I flicked the holster flaps open, and drew my Colts. “Let’s give Doc his apple for the day.”

  “Remember there are more important things than your revenge.”

  I nodded. “Gods are your specialty. Pissing off Doc is mine.”

  “How do you think you’ll manage that?”

  “Remember how annoying I can be? The nicknames. The insults.”

  She fought back a smile. “You do like the sound of your own voice.”

  Doc hated anything with a whiff of humour about it. He was the coolest cool, the blackest black. An asshole.

  “When I’ve got them distracted, you burn those bones straight down to Hell.”

  Daystar nodded. I touched the barrel of my Colt to my cap in salute and leapt over the edge of the hill, sliding down the shale and into the belly of the beast. The gulley was too steep to sneak around Doc’s side and ambush him. Probably why he’d set up his altar that way, he had to suspect I’d show. Which meant I’d had have to run the gauntlet to get to him.

  His goons were all kitted out like the big chomper who rang my bell back at the graveyard. Teeth that bite and tails that smite. One of them wore the jaws of some kind of giant shark as a headdress. The jaws creaked open and closed in time with the dead bugger’s chants. The ground shuddered and the goons danced to the tremors.

  I wove around Doc’s goons. They were strong, but not fast. Now that I knew some of them had tails, they wouldn’t be able to surprise me again. Tombstone bullets flew. Doc’s minions roared in anger and stopped their chants to chase me. I didn’t bother with the ball-and-chain bombs, if Daystar and I did our jobs, those angry spirits wouldn’t have anywhere to go but the Kingdom.

  “You!” Doc roared.

  “What’s up, Doc?”

  Doc had shaved his head and white paint turned his face into a reptilian skull. Otherwise, he was dressed all in black, although the crow feathers hanging off his jacket like tassels were a new touch. With the god on the threshold, I couldn’t let any more blood touch the altar; and if I shot Doc, I’d make a very big, very messy hole. I aimed high and he threw himself behind his altar. Granite bullets rang off shale. Doc cried out. Must’ve hit him with a splinter or a ricochet.

  I fired at the minions to keep them from resuming the chant. They screamed in anger and pain. I kept my back to the gulley, one pistol trained in Doc’s direction, the other plinking his goons.

  I singsonged, “Come out, come out, Doc.”

  He left the altar. I turned to face him and flashed my emblem again. He threw a hand in front of his face, and I fired. He cried out and fell. This was it. I had him. After all these years. I had him.

  I ran towards him, but something caught my foot and I fell. My jaw slammed against the shale, and my Colts clattered out of my hand. Then one of Doc’s super goons hoisted me into the air.

  “You deluded scavenger,” Doc cried. “You will be the first to be fed to the god. But you will not be alone!”

  I smiled.

  His brows scrunched together, cracking his facepaint. “I have you. Why are you smiling?”

  “I’m not alone.”

  The sun rose a few hours early as Daystar made her presence known.

  Doc shielded his eyes with his hands, and the goon holding me squirmed as if Daystar was holding a blowtorch to his back. I slipped free and rolled toward Doc. When he saw me coming, I was already swinging. My fist caught him in the jaw and spun him around. Not gonna lie. It felt good. Damned good. Too good. I followed up with an elbow to the back.

  Not sure if Doc bit his tongue on the way down or broke his nose when his face impacted the stone, but a great gush of blood splattered on the altar. That wasn’t good

  The entire gulley shuddered. Slabs of shale tumbled down the walls, cracking against the stone on the bottom. Wind howled over the rocky terrain. Dirt and dust filled the air, and I had to spit the grit from my mouth.

  Behind me, I heard Daystar cry out. Doc pushed himself back to his feet and turned to look at me. He had a wild look in his eye. Blood streamed down his face. He smiled.

  Not good at all.

  I had never witnessed the level of thanatomancy Doc was pulling here. It was off the scale, death to even approach him. I picked up my Colts and ran. I hoped Daystar kept the god off me. Even if the hostages hadn’t yet been sacrificed, being that close to Doc’s death magic would probably give them all cancer. As far away as I was, I could still feel blood trickling from my nose.

  I chanced a look over my shoulder. Doc’s fossilized gateway to power was scuttling around. It was almost comical to see that motley assortment of bones moving, but it zipped around on those ribs like a millipede. It had Daystar trapped inside its ribcage, its neck curved round trying to bite her. Her hands held open the beast’s great jaws. For now.

  Help her or get to Doc. Daystar made my decision. A single shaft of light cut through the night, blazing a path straight to the hostages.

  “Go,” she yelled. “Get them out!”

  Caught up in the warmth of that light, I knew I had a safe run. It felt strange: Midnight Man, running with the light.

  I reached the hostages and kicked over the altar. Didn’t know if it would help. Couldn’t hurt. And it made me feel good. But that feeling had cost me my shot at Doc.

  He’d reached the top of the gulley. Damned crow jacket. Rats always leave a sinking ship, even if they need feathers to do it. By the time I’d raised my Colts, he’d disappeared.
If I used my deadeye, I might be able to get him. Make an impossible shot. Magic bullet time.

  Daystar cried, “The hostages!”

  The Colt quivered at the end of my outstretched arm. An extension of my body. An extension of me. Death personified. I focused my deadeye. The red hate burned. There was no shot I couldn’t make. I could feel Doc running. His heart pounded opposite the measured beat of my vengeance. Take him out for everything he’d done to me. To my family. Avenge everything he’d made us do to each other.

  Daystar’s words echoed somewhere deep within me: the living must take precedence over the dead. It would be so easy. No. I owed Doc more death than I could easily count, but, if I turned my back on Daystar and left Doc’s hostages to die, I’d be no better than Doc.

  I’d get another shot to bury Doctor Death. And I’d take it. I holstered one of my guns and stretched out a hand to the hostages. The eldest of them, the paleontologist, I assumed, took it first. Her trust seemed contagious, her students stood up wobbly-kneed.

  “Stay in the light,” I warned.

  They ran, slower than I’d have liked, but they ran, and I followed. I shot at Doc’s remaining goons, trying to drive them away from our exit zone. When we were safely clear of the altar and Doc’s dead zone, I stopped, and turned my deadeye on the god. Its body had weakened, its ancient bones were starting to crumble and flake in Daystar’s light. She could finish it, eventually. But I didn’t think she had the time. The god’s ribs scratched and scrabbled against Daystar’s protective aura. Her glow started to fade.

  I had my shot. I took it.

  Tombstone bullets threaded the nostril holes of the beast’s skull into where its brain had been. Daystar ripped the jaws apart, and the god shrieked in denial. Its body disarticulated, and its bones were paper in a fire, and then ash, blowing away on the wind.

  Mingled with the god’s scream as it fell was something… human wasn’t quite the correct word, but whatever that scream was, it had come from Doc’s mouth. He may have gotten away, but I killed his god, and that pained him. I smiled.

  Small victories.

  I hauled Daystar to her feet.

  She didn’t let go of my wrist.

  It was her turn to smile. “I promised I would take you in.”