Affliction (Hellsong: Infidels: Cris Book 1)

by Shaun O. McCoy

  “You load sixteen tons, and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt. Saint Peter don’t you call me, cause I can’t go. I sold my soul to the company store.”

  The song lyric he got wrong is telling. He stops, out of breath and obviously in unfathomable pain.

  I kneel beside him. “If you see me coming you better step aside. A lot of men didn’t, and a lot of men died. One fist’s iron, the other of steel . . . if the right don’t get you, the left one will.”

  He grits his teeth and looks up to the smoky sky. “You load sixteen tons, and what . . . do you . . . get?”

  The entrance to the Core is unguarded. No one is walking in and out. I hear no singing. About half of the torches have burnt out. The rest sputter on their sconces. I go down an unlit hallway for a second and grab an unused torch. I light it and move on.

  The next room is filled with the bodies of workers. None of them had risen as corpses, of course, because they weren’t allowed any corpsedust. The bodies themselves are horrific. One man’s femur is broken. Another has the right side of his face crushed, his cheek bone depressed into his head.

  One man is still alive. He crawls across the floor, dark blood seeping out of a wound in his back. He sees me.

  “We tried,” he says, tears in his eyes. “The Devil’s too fast. Too strong. We couldn’t even . . . hit his armor.”

  They had been armed with picks. Likely, even if they had known the Archdevil’s weakness, they still would have lost. I draw my 9mm and rest its barrel on my torch. I step slowly over the dead, keeping my body as steady as possible. This was the way Q moved.

  I wish he were here. He belongs in a fight like this. His heart wouldn’t beat like a steam engine in his chest. He’s an actual infidel. All these corpses around me would not have come from men who had died for nothing. The Infidel Friend rebellions succeed. Mine is a failure because I’m not who I claim to be . . . but who the fuck cares about all that? At least these men died trying.

  In the next room I see the other side of the rebellion. Miners sit there, eyes closed. They hadn’t twitched a muscle, I bet, when their friends died fighting for freedom against an unspeakable evil. The anger gets me shaking. I point my pistol at one, but I dare not waste a round. If I am to be honest with myself, and believe that altruism is not worth a bullet, then I must accept that misanthropy isn’t worth one either.

  “Did you sit here, motionless, while your friends were slaughtered?” I ask one.

  He shudders but offers no response. His eyes remain firmly closed. I spit on him and pass by.

  The halls are filled with the dead workers and the sitting workers and the half burnt torches. The adrenalin has me now. I feel it inside me. I am more awake than I have ever been before. I’m so full of energy that it takes all my will power to keep myself from running pell-mell down these corridors. My blood is coursing so fast through my veins that I can feel my gums itching. The wound on my left palm burns with the anger of the infidels. My breathing is quick and steady. I have never felt so ready to kill before in my life.

  I hear voices coming down a corridor from the room where the aqueduct is at ground level. I leave my torch behind and follow the path that leads that way. Their voices get louder. I recognize Hagar’s idiot tone. Oh, man. I can’t wait to kill him. I’m practically salivating over the idea.

  I put my back to the wall and look around the corner.

  The next room has a staircase leading up and a couple of exits. Myla’s there, along with Hagar, and one other dim eyed bastard. My gut tells me to shoot Hagar first, but I know it’s a bad idea. First Myla, then the Devil’s man, then Hagar. Hagar is probably the worst shot. Besides, I think I recognize the gun in his hand. It’s the innkeeper’s gun, though God knows how Hagar got it. Hopefully he hasn’t found any bullets for the thing.

  I spin around the corner and level my gun at Myla. My heart catches in my chest and my hand shakes. I remember the times when it was just me and her against all Hell. I remember us winning little moments of happiness. Suddenly I’m no longer a killer. I’m a hurt young man whose dearest love abandoned him and took his only son.

  They see me. I swing my gun over and drop the Devil man with two bullets to his chest. Myla draws her gun and is aiming it at me. I fire at her as quickly as I can. I hit her in the right shoulder, sending her spinning to the ground. I’ve got just enough time to kill Hagar and come back to finish her off. Hagar’s oversized frame is already running for the exit.

  HARKEN ME, INFIDEL. YOU ARE A FOOL FOR HAVING NOT FLED.

  The Devil rounds the corner where Hagar is trying to flee, his clawed feet clicking against the stone floor. His obsidian-like armor glistens in the dim firelight of the room. It’s damaged in only one place. The Devil’s shoulder is exposed revealing the bright colored reds, yellows and oranges of his natural pigmentation. His leathery wings spread for a second as he enters the room and then fold back behind his shoulders.

  On the ground between us, the Devil’s man lies bleeding.

  Myla is shaking, perhaps in shock from her wounded right shoulder.

  The Devil’s brilliant red eyes stare at me from beneath his armor plated face.

  I might be able to break up the Archdevil’s armor with my pistol and then get more effect from the Old Lady’s lightrock shells. If worse comes to worst, I can always aim for his shoulder.

  I point the 9 millimeter at the Archdevil, intending to empty the magazine into him. I have never seen anything move so fast. I get two bullets off.

  His clawed arm swings at my head in a blur. I manage to slip it, but only barely. I keep close to him and spin on the ball of one foot, trying to stay with him. I had always thought of myself as fast, but in this case, it’s my slowness which keeps me alive. He’d swung all the way around with his blow and struck out at me with a spinning backfist. Had I been a more competent fighter I would have stood up right into it. As it was, it also passed over my head.

  My back is to him, so I kick out as I turn to try and get my gun back in line. The kick hits him square, but it’s like kicking a stone pillar. Rather than moving him, the strike pushes me toward the stairs. I charge up them, taking them three at a time. The Devil comes after, his clawed feet tearing into the stone stairs sending pieces of broken rock flying through the air all around him. Myla fires a few bullets at me with some kind of automatic weapon. She’s aiming it with her left hand, and I’m pretty sure the bullets missed me. I manage a few more shots at the Devil with my pistol before leveling the Old Lady.

  In my haste to draw her, I drop the .22 which falls off of the staircase. I fire a round of buckshot at the cracks my bullets had made. My hurried attempt to get the Old Lady in line with his body causes me to aim the barrel a bit too far to my right. Some of the buckshot hits him in the shoulder where the rebellion had removed a chunk of his armor. It doesn’t do much damage. Hardly any at all. It reminds me a little of shooting buckshot into a stone block . . . but to the Devil, it changes the game. He pauses just five stairs below me as if in shock, staring at the wound in his shoulder, at the oh-so-crimson blood that is seeping out around the glowing lightrock buckshot.

  He had not known that I could hurt him.

  I unload some more buckshot into him. He lets out an otherworldly shout of anguish and turns his back, shielding his weakened armor with his wings. I take the moment to jump down from the staircase. Myla manages to load another clip into her gun one handed. It’s a God damned Uzi. I ram the butt of the Old Lady into her face and snatch the Uzi away from her. The Archdevil jumps from the staircase into the air, his wings spread, and glides toward me. Running backward, I empty the Uzi’s clip at him. I realize why she’d had trouble aiming the damn thing. Its kick is ridiculous. Even so, I manage to keep it pointed at his center mass. His chest plate breaks into shards and falls away. I leap over the aqueduct and fire with my shotgun, hitting the Devil only by virtue of the buckshot’s spread. That was the last shell in the Old Lady. I have got to find a way to
get her reloaded. The devil crouches and launches himself at me. I bounce off a wall I didn’t know was behind me and fall forward. Trying to save myself, I roll into the aqueduct.

  The Devil hits the same wall I just did right above me. He’s sideways, and clings there, his claws digging into the rock. I scramble to my feet and manage to get a shell into the Old Lady. The devil descends into the aqueduct. I load another shell, this time it’s one of the lightrock slugs.

  Behind me is the tunnel of the aqueduct. This is not the place I need to be. I can’t face him here in such tight quarters.

  Light from the buckshot shines through the wounds in his already nearly luminescent skin as he approaches.

  This must be where I die.

  He swings at my head and I have no choice but to backpedal up the aqueduct. He’s faster than me, so I can’t turn and run. Also, he’s too close for me to get more shells into the Old Lady, and I know these two shells aren’t going to take him out.

  He swings again and again, pushing me backward. The darkness envelops us. I can only see by the light shining out of his wounds. I aim and fire. The first shot, buckshot, takes him in the chest. He’s no longer surprised that I can hurt him, and the wounds aren’t serious. The second shot is one of the slugs. It hits him in the side of the face, knocking him backward. His wings spread as he reels, attempting to catch his balance. His claws try to dig into the aqueduct, but whatever metallic substance the ancients made this damn thing out of defies his strength. He slips to the ground.

  Continuing to backpedal, I load more shells, making sure to put in some slugs as well.

  Come on Old Lady, I need ya. I know this isn’t the shit you were meant to fire, but just bear with me. You know you always wanted to kill an Archdevil.

  He crouches, trying to launch himself at me, but his claws slide again, and his jump only brings him down to his knees. Frustrated, he tries to run after me, but his speed is hampered by his lack of traction. On my end, the tread of my boots is doing just fine.

  Blood is coming down the right side of his face from the wound I’d inflicted just below his eye, like an unchecked stream of tears. Buckshot glistens behind his brilliant red blood as it streams down across his chest and shoulder.

  I unload another six shells into his body. The buckshot hits him all over, one blast breaking off a chunk of the armor on his leg. The two slugs I loaded get him in the chest. The wounds are deep, and one of the lightrock slugs sticks into him, shining its light out of its hole like a flashlight in the dark.

  I continue to backpedal as he chases me down the aqueduct. He can’t quite reach me on this surface, but he can dictate whether we go forward or backward. He decides to keep pushing forward, and for my part, I try to be equally relentless. Whenever he slips or slows in the slightest, I load another round into the Old Lady.

  He stops to collect himself, bending his backward jointed knees. He’s about to leap, and I expect his feet to slide out from under him again. They don’t. He leaps straight up, which appears not to require as much traction. Before he comes down he flaps his powerful wings, turning his body over and propelling him upwards. His clawed feet dig into the ceiling, which is made of stone, not the ancient’s metal. He walks toward me, as if gravity meant nothing to him.

  I blast a slug into his foot as he steps forward. He crashes to the ground, his impact echoing up and down the aqueduct.

  He rises, and I continue to backpedal.

  My lungs are burning and my calves are molten fire when we exit into the chamber that leads to my old prison. The Devil scurries up the side of the aqueduct, his claws scratching uselessly against the hard surface. I unload what I thought was buckshot into his leg, but it turns out it was a slug. It drops him face first into the aqueduct. The armor had already come off of the front of his face, but the plating on the back of his horned head falls away now. He tries again, this time flapping his wings to help his mighty burst, and manages to leap over the edge of the aqueduct.

  I run up and stare down over the edge, but I dare not drop that far.

  The Devil lands with a crunch at the base, shattered pieces of armor shooting out from him in all directions. I have very few shells left, but I send another one his way while he tries to stand. The slug hits him in the back of the neck. He lets out another shout, but this time it’s more fearful and less angry. He runs for the exit. I look toward the service ladder, but I have a hunch about where he’s going.

  I run back down the aqueduct.

  Myla is almost out of the chamber when I come around the bend. Blood is flowing out of her nose from where I’d bludgeoned her with the shotgun. She’s picked up the old man’s pistol that Hagar had dropped earlier.

  She pulls its trigger. As it happens, Hagar hadn’t managed to find any more bullets for the thing.

  I dare not waste any of my precious few shells remaining from the Old Lady, but I grab up the .22 lying next to the Devil’s man. I point it at her and fire. It’s fucking jammed. She must have tried this one already.

  She runs around the corner, her red hair, now partially unbound, trailing in long wisps behind her.

  I work at the pistol, pulling back the slide mechanism and letting a bullet fly out. I see another unspent shell on the ground where Myla must have tried the same thing. I try to fire, but nothing happens. In desperation, I drop the magazine and search the corpse. He’s got two more magazines on him.

  I retrieve the other .22 I’d dropped off of the staircase, pop in one of the mags and tuck the other one into my belt.

  I chase after her.

  Only one in four torches is still lit in this corridor, and those flicker dimly. It’s enough to see her blood where it has splattered on the floor. I come to a turn where the blood goes one way, but it seems wrong, like it was sprinkled.

  Out of instinct I run down the other passage. After the turn, her normal blood pattern picks up again. Smart bitch.

  The tunnel goes dark, but I see the bubble of her torchlight ahead of me. Then that light is overpowered by a brighter light. She’s heading into one of the interrupted lightrock veins. Her long shadow is cast down the corridor. I speed up as I approach.

  The gate lock is swinging. I see her for a second, descending the stairs that lead into the light vein. I try to take aim at her as she sprints through a group of seated workers but she ducks down behind an outcropping of hellstone in the bottom of the pit. I crash into the gate, but the lock holds. Furiously, I stalk from one side of the gate to the other, but I can’t get a bead on her.

  I look at the seated workers. They huddle together against the walls of the lightrock, their eyes closed firmly against reality. I’m not going to be able to get help from them.

  Myla’s voice is desperate and pleading. “Cris, stop!”

  “Where’s Aiden?”

  “I know you think what you’re doing is right,” she shouts, her voice hoarse, “but it’s not. You’re ruining his future. You’re hurting your son.”

  “Where is he?” My shout is also hoarse, and equally desperate. “Where the fuck is my son?”

  “We always said we’d do what’s best for him. You can’t protect him, Cris. You just can’t. No one can but the Devil.”

  “What’s best for him is not having him serve Satan.”

  The workers do nothing.

  “You’re such a fucking foolish asshole!” Myla’s yelling her heart out, as if all the emotions of the ruins of our relationship are being released at the same time. “Foolish! What’s right on Earth is not right here. You’ve got to let that go. You were killing your son. Killing him. Remember that night we fought the dyitzu? Aiden was almost killed. That’s why I had to leave you, because you can’t protect us, and you’re too damn stubborn to adapt.”

  Suddenly I’m calm. I have no idea why. It’s like the sea of emotion passed over me. No, calm isn’t the right word. I’m something else. Something on the other side of an emotion that I don’t think even has a word.

  “Even if you we
re right, my love,” I tell her, “and Aiden would have a safe and loved and fulfilled life at the cost of you serving this Devil, so many other children, so many other people have lost everything they had. If the cost of raising Aiden was the ruination of Maylay Beighlay, it was not worth it.”

  “You mean you wouldn’t kill another child to save your own?” She seems incredulous.

  I think of all those Christians who so willingly let God’s child die for their own sins. Thank God I didn’t let that happen. At least that bastard’s blood isn’t on my hands. That emotion, the one I can’t think of the word for, rises like a tide of bile in my chest. It’s the kind of emotion a man would have to have to knowingly kill his mother. It’s the kind of emotion I’d imagine the perpetrators of genocide must hide in the recesses of their hearts.

  I raise the gun and aim it at one of the workers. I fire. He dies.

  “Myla, tell me where my son is.”

  I hear her gasp.

  I aim again. The barrel of my gun does not shake.

  I fire. He dies.

  “Where’s my son?”

  “Don’t do this, Cris!” she shouts. “These people did nothing to you. They’re innocent. They just don’t want to get—”

  I aim, and the report of my bullet cuts her off.

  “Where’s my son?” My voice is loud, but it sounds as emotionless as the voice of the marble man.

  “This isn’t you!” she yells. “Cris, this isn’t you! You’re better than this. You were the one person who wasn’t changed by Hell. Please. You can’t do this to them. You can’t be a monster.”

  The workers are all still silently sitting, their eyes closed. I pick out another.

  I fire, and he dies.

  “Stop! Please stop.”

  I aim, but her shrill voice gives me pause.

  “He’s in the Devil’s chambers!”

  Somehow I had hid this truth from myself. For some reason I had imagined that Myla had some piece of decency left in her. What a fool I was. He was with the Devil. Aiden was being raised by an Archdevil. His soul was being tainted by that thing’s will. His bloodstream is probably packed full of wightdust.