Evil to Burn

by Lisa Klink

  “Sofia,” he said calmly, “is there any other way out of this room?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know.” She shook her head.

  He touched her arm. “Something like a ventilation shaft, plumbing, garbage chute…?”

  She perked up. “The elevator!”

  Ryan hated to argue, but…“I thought it was out of service.”

  “The elevator shaft, I mean.”

  She hurried to the elevator, Ryan right behind her. They tried to squeeze their fingers between the doors, unsuccessfully, for a few moments. She dashed to the reception desk and returned with a metal clipboard. Together, they wedged it into the narrow space and pried the doors apart just enough to get their hands in there and pull the doors open all the way. Sofia took off her shoes and used one sensible heel as a doorstop.

  Ryan peered into the elevator shaft. The car sat at the bottom of the shaft, basement level three. He saw a service ladder on the wall to his left.

  Sofia said, “There’s an exit to the garden on L1. First lower level.”

  “Right.” Ryan stepped into the shaft and onto the ladder. The rungs were thin and awfully close to the sheet metal wall. He moved down carefully, one step at a time. The sound of the panicked guests was slightly muted, and he realized what he wasn’t hearing: a fire alarm. No help was coming.

  He stopped by the next set of doors. Sofia stretched down to pass him the clipboard. Ryan reached over and wedged it between the doors. He got a grip on the closer half of the door and pulled it open.

  By now, several guests had noticed the open elevator. They crowded around as fire consumed the lobby. Sofia held her arm across the doorway and announced, in her most official tone, “Hold on. In just a moment, we’ll be ready to get you out.”

  And to her surprise, they listened. She tossed her other shoe down to Ryan and he jammed it between the door and the track.

  He jumped onto the landing of lower-level one. Nothing here was on fire, and that was good enough for him. “Okay, send them down!” he called.

  Matt moved quickly through hallways lined with guest rooms. The lights in this part of the building were off, but he still had his flashlight. He shone it along the wall, looking for a fire hose or a fire extinguisher, anything he might be able to use against Nash. He saw none. Which made sense when he thought about it: if you were planning to torch your hotel, you wouldn’t stock it with fire-suppression gear. To hell with building codes.

  He stopped and looked back to see if Nash was following. A guy made of fire shouldn’t be too hard to spot in a dark hallway. Unless he could change back into an ordinary-looking man. Matt waved the flashlight around, broadcasting his location. He hurt. Just about everywhere. There were patches of burned skin all over his body. His polyester-blend shirt had melted into his flesh in a few spots.

  Matt shoved the pain to the back of his mind. It was there, but he would deal with it later. He had to avoid getting killed first. He saw the glow of firelight on the walls and Nash rounded the corner. The carpet burned beneath his feet. When he saw Matt, he sent a line of flame racing toward him.

  Matt ran. He turned down an adjacent hallway and he kept going. Now he was looking for stairs, to lead Nash farther up, away from the lobby. He spotted an exit door. He went to it and waited a moment, letting Nash see him there before ducking into the stairwell.

  He climbed to the third floor, then the fourth. He heard Nash on the stairs behind him, and felt the heat in the enclosed space. At least there was nothing flammable in the concrete-and-metal stairwell. Matt wondered if he should try to keep Nash in here. But a close-quarters fight would work to Nash’s advantage. All he had to do was touch Matt to hurt him. And Matt had no way to hurt him back. His ax hadn’t been very effective. He’d really been hoping to find a fire hose.

  He kept going. No better ideas came to him as he climbed up the next six floors. He pushed through the last door and came out onto the roof.

  The terrified party guests, of course, didn’t form an orderly line to climb down the ladder in the elevator shaft. The first few people clambered over the edge of the floor and swung their bodies into the opening on the basement level. Ryan grabbed their clothes to pull them onto the landing.

  More people tried to cram themselves through the doorway, shoving each other out of the way. “Stop it! Please!” Sofia urged, but they weren’t listening anymore. She grabbed one man as he was about to topple into the open shaft. She almost got pushed in herself. The heat from the fire grew steadily more intense.

  Ryan helped a seemingly endless stream of people to the safety of the lower level. His muscles began to tremble from fatigue, and his heat-induced headache had returned. Finally, the guests stopped coming. Sofia climbed down the ladder and hopped over to Ryan.

  “Is that everyone?” he asked.

  She nodded. Forty-two people now waited in the dark hallway, not sure where to go next. Sofia went to the light switches, flipped them on, and turned to the group. She had regained her professional bearing. “This way,” she told them, and strode off in her bare feet.

  The guests followed. Ryan brought up the rear. The Native American theme continued here, as they passed doors marked with names like Sacajawea Room. There were displays of authentic Shoshone artifacts, like clothing and jewelry, on the walls. Ryan thought it was a little overdone. Then he saw the bow and arrow and stopped.

  They were mounted beside a small sign, which read that they had belonged to the great warrior/shaman Joseph Wedu. He examined the arrowhead, then held up his own to compare. They were about the same size and shape, made from different kinds of stone. Ryan knew perfectly well that this wasn’t the same Shoshone warrior who had once owned his arrowhead. It couldn’t be. The coincidence would be…unbelievable.

  But was it a coincidence that the bus bringing him to Battle Mountain had crashed? Or that Matt had been on the same bus? Or that Ryan happened to have the perfect weapon to use against that zombie? No. There was a larger story playing out.

  Sofia had come back to find him. She asked, “Are you okay?”

  “I was meant to find this,” he told her, his eyes on the display.

  “What are you talking about?”

  Ryan turned to her. “Go on ahead. Get everyone out.”

  She stared at him in disbelief. “Let’s all get out, then we can…”

  “There’s something else I have to do. I’ll be all right,” said Ryan.

  His confidence must have convinced her, because Sofia didn’t argue. She led the party guests outside to the garden. As the sky darkened, they watched the hotel burn.

  Ryan carefully pulled the warrior’s bow and arrow from the wall. He slung the bow over his shoulder. Matt had said they had to find the face of the Dark Man. He’d also said it was somewhere underneath where they’d been standing in the lobby. Which couldn’t be far from where Ryan was right now.

  He went still, trying to sense the prickly, dark energy he had felt standing on the Ouroboros. He could feel it, like an unspoken fear in the back of his mind. It seemed to be drawing him forward. Ryan walked ahead.

  Matt moved away from the stairs. The patch of flat rooftop was maybe forty feet square. The only cover was a large HVAC unit. There didn’t appear to be anything flammable up here. Other than Matt himself. He had no solid plan at this point, besides keeping his distance from Nash.

  His foe emerged onto the roof. He was unmistakably angry now. He closed in on Matt, who dashed behind the HVAC. Nash circled around it. So did Matt, keeping the HVAC between them. The game of keep-away was a little childish, but he would play all night if he had to.

  Nash stopped. He laid both of his fiery hands on the big metal box. Nothing happened for a long moment. Then the thing started to melt.

  The sheet metal housing glowed orange. It oozed slowly over the equipment inside. The copper heating coils melted quickly. Fan blades folded down over their motors. One of the compressors sparked briefly, then sank into the unit’s molten base.
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  If flames could look happy, then Nash was clearly enjoying himself. He mushed the fused mass together like he was sculpting with it. Matt took the opportunity to retreat to the far side of the roof. Movement on the ground caught his eye. He looked down to see the party guests gathered in the garden. They were safe.

  Nash came at him. Matt dodged aside. “Your sacrificial victims escaped,” he said with satisfaction.

  Nash spared a glance down into the garden, then turned back to Matt. “I still have you.”

  He reached for Matt and his arm stretched out longer, becoming a jet of flame. This took Matt by surprise and he didn’t get out of the way quite fast enough. Fire brushed the side of his face, alarmingly close to his right eye. Pain exploded across his cheek.

  He dashed across the roof, as far as he could go. It wasn’t far enough. He looked over the edge of the roof again, this time down the back of the hotel, hoping to see a fire escape. He wanted to get away from Nash and regroup, come up with a new strategy.

  He didn’t see a fire escape. He did see the big blue swimming pool. Throwing Nash into it might be very effective. He would need to maneuver the guy to the edge of the roof by the pool, then hit him with the ax to knock him over the side. Could work. If he didn’t land on the patio next to the pool. Which, in his fiery state, probably wouldn’t be enough to kill him.

  Nash charged him again, both arms extended.

  It was here. When Ryan reached the door to the Golden Eagle Ballroom, he knew that the Dark Man’s image was inside. He could feel its pull.

  The door was locked, of course. He landed a solid kick next to the knob. Then another one. The third blow did it, and the ballroom door swung open. Ryan took a moment to catch his breath from the brief exertion. He took his grandfather’s arrowhead from his pocket and gripped it in his hand. It would protect him from the Dark Man’s evil.

  He walked into the ballroom. Nice parquet floor, ornate chandelier, room to seat a hundred people or so. Totem poles had been placed along the walls to give the room some personality. Most of them were decorative fakes. One wasn’t. It had been installed by Gregory Nash himself.

  Ryan went right to it. A stack of carved wooden faces scowled at him. The one at the top had white skin, orange circles painted on either side of his head, and a red ball on the end of his nose. It was, as Matt had advised, really fucking ugly. The face of Mr. Dark.

  He held up the arrow and pulled the stone arrowhead out of the notch in the wooden shaft. He replaced it with his own arrowhead. Perfect fit. Ryan nocked the arrow in the bow and stood about ten feet in front of the totem pole. He took aim and fired.

  The arrow struck the Dark Man right in his beady black eye. Ryan waited, not sure if he would actually see the evil departing. Nothing happened.

  Ryan didn’t understand. The arrowhead had penetrated a good two inches into the wood. But waves of dark power still radiated from that face. Somehow, he had failed.

  Matt knew he was losing this fight. He had tried to get Nash to the edge of the roof over the pool, but the guy wouldn’t go there. He knew what lay below. Matt had tried to reach the stairs, but the fiery bastard stopped him every time. He had managed to evade or block most of Nash’s strikes, but some got through, leaving painful burns that would eventually become debilitating enough to give Nash the opening he needed. Then he would get hold of Matt and incinerate him.

  Even if Matt decided to go down fighting, there was another problem. This entire building was a sacrificial altar, designed to amplify the Dark Man’s corrupting power. Would it still work if Matt were the only one to be sacrificed? He couldn’t take the chance. He couldn’t let himself get killed on this roof, and he’d found no way to escape.

  He really didn’t like the last option he’d come up with. If Nash wouldn’t let himself get knocked off the roof, then Matt had to forcibly drag him over. If they hit the water, there was a chance Matt would survive the ten-story fall. If they landed on concrete, then at least he wouldn’t be on the altar when his skull went splat.

  He circled Nash, lining him up with where he remembered the pool to be. Nash reached for him, shooting out a hand toward Matt’s face. Matt ducked under it and charged. He tackled Nash, planting a shoulder below his ribs and grabbing him around the waist. He drove the man back. His skin seared where it touched Nash. They hit the low wall around the edge of the roof and toppled over. Still locked together, they fell.

  The mental and physical exhaustion of the day hit Ryan all at once and he let himself collapse, defeated. He had been so sure of what he was supposed to do. He’d been wrong.

  But Ryan had been right about his grandfather’s arrowhead protecting him. He had walked right up to the image of the Dark Man with no ill effect. Now the arrowhead was out of his hands, stuck uselessly in the totem pole. And the evil started creeping in.

  Ryan knew it. Instinctively, he resisted. But he was so very tired.

  Water feels a lot like concrete when you slam into it at fifty miles an hour, Matt discovered. But it did douse Nash’s flames. He became a flesh-and-blood man again, struggling to free himself from Matt’s grip. Matt had broken several bones when they landed, including two in his left arm, but he locked his right arm around Nash’s throat and held the man’s head underwater. Nash clawed desperately at Matt, raking his nails through burned skin. Matt didn’t let go. Finally, Nash’s blows grew weaker and then stopped. Matt held him down a couple of minutes longer, just to be sure. Then he released him.

  Nash’s pale, thin body floated on the surface. Matt wondered again how he’d known about Mr. Dark, and what kind of deal they must have made to build this elaborate altar disguised as a hotel. Now, he’d never know. Matt dove to the bottom of the pool to retrieve his ax, which had fallen from his hand on impact. He surfaced and breathed in a welcome lungful of air. The pain of it let him know he’d broken several ribs. His left arm hung at an odd angle, and was charred black from wrist to shoulder, just like his right arm, his chest, and the right side of his face.

  He felt something else, even worse. Pure evil, radiating from the building in waves. Mr. Dark’s image still existed somewhere inside. The hotel was burning merrily by now. The face very well might get destroyed with it, but Matt couldn’t count on that. He had to be sure it was eradicated.

  He climbed out of the pool, noting at least two more broken bones as he did. He went around to the garden on the side of the hotel, where he’d seen the people from the lobby. When they saw Matt, there were several gasps and a small scream or two. He could only imagine how he looked, badly sunburned and then scorched, limping, dripping wet, and carrying an ax.

  He didn’t see Ryan. With growing concern, he approached a couple of guests. “Was there a blond guy with you? Young, sunburned?”

  “Yes.” Sofia looked worried as well. “He stayed behind. He said he had to do something.”

  “Where?” asked Matt.

  She pointed to the lower level entrance. “Through there.” He went.

  Matt hurried through the basement hallway. The fire hadn’t spread down here yet. That would change as the floor of the lobby weakened and collapsed. He passed several closed doors, then reached the Golden Eagle Ballroom.

  He saw Mr. Dark’s face on the totem pole, and Ryan on the floor in front of it. He ran to the kid. Ryan was conscious. He also had two new lesions on his forehead. This time, they were fetid and rank.

  “It didn’t work,” said Ryan. “The arrowhead…” He gestured to the totem pole and the chunk of flint protruding from it.

  He was resisting Dark’s influence, Matt saw, like Jerry had on the altar on Blood Mesa. But Jerry had needed to hold on to his humanity only for a few moments before he died. All the other grad students had succumbed. Ryan surely would, too.

  “Fight it,” Matt ordered him. He half lifted, half dragged the younger man away from the totem, but neither of them had the strength to get far.

  Ryan was fading. His voice was quiet. “I’m sorry.”

&nb
sp; “Fuck sorry,” snapped Matt. He wouldn’t be responsible for the kid’s death, and certainly not at his own hands. “Fight. Think about Amanda. You love her. Hold on to that.” His love for Janey had helped Matt keep his humanity through even the worst moments. He wished Ryan the same.

  He turned to the totem pole, raising his ax with one arm. He would reduce this monstrosity to splinters. Matt brought down the blade through the Dark Man’s forehead.

  As it split the wood, the metal blade scraped the flint arrowhead and created a spark. The tiny flicker flared into a spectral blue flame, which engulfed the entire totem pole in seconds, turning it instantly to ash. The flame vanished. The pile of ash collapsed. Just that quickly, it was over. Mr. Dark and his evil presence were gone.

  Matt still gripped the ax as he looked back at Ryan. He didn’t want to be forced to do this. He never did.

  The lesions had disappeared. Matt was impressed. Ryan had real strength, apart from the arrowhead. Matt wasn’t too comfortable with the idea of destiny dictating his life, but it sure seemed like they had been meant to team up for this.

  “Come on,” he told Ryan. “Let’s get out of here.”

  “Yeah,” the kid agreed. He reached into the pile of ashes and retrieved his arrowhead, then tucked it safely back in his pocket.

  They staggered out of the hotel together, to the sound of approaching sirens. Several party guests had called 911. Firefighters tried their best, but the hotel was beyond saving. Paramedics tended to Matt’s and Ryan’s various injuries and pumped them full of saline on the way to Battle Mountain General Hospital.

  At the hospital, Matt inquired whether a woman and her son had been rescued from the bus crash in the desert. Yes, the nurse told him, they were both in the ICU and expected to make a full recovery. Did Matt know anything about the crash? No, Matt told her, he didn’t.

  He overheard enough hushed conversation among the hospital staff to gather that everyone was talking about the mysterious group of dead bodies at the crash site. Two had been shot. One actually had his head split open. What had happened out there? The two survivors, Karen and Daniel, were both claiming not to remember a thing after the accident. This only fueled more speculation.