Chapter Twenty-Eight
“He’s coming to, sir,” said a voice that seemed to come from a dark well. Jude blinked his eyes and struggled to make his vision go from blurry to clear. As it cleared he began to wish it would have stayed blurry, as he looked up into the smiling face of Lucius Daemon.
“Welcome back to the land of the living, my boy,” said Daemon with a chuckle. “We were looking for you. How convenient of you to deliver yourself to us. Though I wish you would refrain from killing so many of my employees.”
“Maybe if I just killed you I could avoid the middleman,” said Jude, blinking his eyes. A sharp slap to the face made him open them wide, clearing his head at the same time. He glanced to the side and saw that Sarah was in a chair next to his. Her eyes were still closed, and her breathing was steady, as if she were still asleep.
“You should learn to watch that tongue,” said another familiar voice. “It might make the little time you have left go a little less miserably.”
“Nice to see you again too, Stark,” said Jude, licking his lip and tasting the blood that was oozing from the cut Stark inflicted. “It is always a pleasure to see your smiling face. Especially when I send it to Hell.”
Stark raised a hand as if to deliver another backhand. A shake of Daemon’s head and the Secret Policeman lowered his hand, his eyes continuing to burn into Jude’s.
“I don’t see you carrying out either of those fantasies any time in the near future,” said Daemon, looking back at Jude. “And I have decided that it is worth the risk of you haunting me to have you eliminated, at this time and place. Don’t you know I deal with a score or more hauntings right now? A Mage in my position does not rise to the heights without leaving a number of bodies moldering in the earth. And vengeful spirits roaming the premises. Yours will be nothing more than another inconvenience.”
Jude frowned when he heard that. He looked over at Sarah, a shiver of terror running up his spine. The haunting card was the only one he had to play. If a powerful mage really didn’t worry about that, and he could see why the man might not be too concerned, then he had no more cards in his hand. Simply put, he and Sarah were both dead when it came to it.
“So what happens now?” he asked, fearing the answer. Sarah moaned and her eyes fluttered. He almost wished she wouldn’t wake up, wouldn’t have to endure the torture that waiting to be sacrificed would be for both of them.
“We wait for your young lady to wake up,” said Daemon with a smile. “Then we give you a good look at what you came to see. Then we allow you to join in the fun.”
Sarah moaned again and opened her eyes, blinking and squinting at the bright light.
“I think she’s with us,” said Stark, reaching over and grabbing her chin in his hand, lifting her face to look in her eyes.
“Daddy?” she stammered, her eyes glancing around.
“I’m afraid your esteemed father did not make it,” said Lucius Daemon, moving into her line of sight. “He and the other two males were killed in the fight.”
Sarah let out a short cry, and her eyes teared up. Stark smiled down at her like a predator about to feed.
“He was still alive when I got to him,” said the Secret Policeman, looking straight into Sarah’s eyes. “I didn’t think he was going to make it, so I put him out of his misery.”
Liar, thought Jude, looking at Stark. He had seen Gerald going down from a head wound no one could survive. Stark was trying to torture the woman, making him seem like a bigger, scarier villain in her mind.
“You scum,” cried Sarah in a sob. “Hell waits for you, when your time finally comes.”
“You’ll get there ahead of me,” said Stark with a laugh. “Scout out the terrain, and let me know where everything is when I get there.”
“Now that you’re awake, let’s give you a good view of what’s happening down in the chambers,” said Daemon, motioning for some men to come over and move the pair in their chairs.
Tears poured down Sarah’s face. Jude looked at her as she cried, wishing he could put his arms around her, kiss the tears from her face, do something. But he was as helpless as she was, unable to do anything for either of them. Unless he could maybe call up some power. And then battle it out with the most powerful Mage on Earth?
He looked over at her and saw her mouth a silent word, no. He realized that she knew what he was thinking. He had made a promise, to her and to God, to not use magic. But the Good God was not doing anything for him right now. In fact he had not seen any evidence of the Good God working for him lately, beyond the amulets they had worn. He looked down, comforted for a moment to see that it still hung around his neck. Would that do anything for him now that he was in the hands of evil men? He had to hope it would, but the hope was very slight.
The men finished pushing the chairs into place. Jude was about a foot away from Sarah. He wanted to reach out and comfort her, but his hands were well secured to the arms of the chairs with heavy cord. He looked over at her, seeing her red face and tear streaked eyes, and finding everything about her beautiful. She looked over at him, sniffling from the moisture that had been released into her sinuses.
“I love you,” he whispered, giving her a small smile.
She moved her lips without uttering a sound, but he could read what was meant. I love you too. He nodded, then turned his head to take in as much of the room as he could, looking for any means of escape. He couldn’t see any. As long as they were tied into these chairs there was no way out.
“Aw,” said Daemon, standing behind them. “It is so nice to have found someone to share your life with. Or at least your afterlife, in your cases. But here comes the first act of our little show. Enjoy it. You have your whole lives ahead of you. Maybe an hour. Maybe two if I feel generous.”
“You’re a monster,” hissed Sarah at Daemon, her eyes following the leading of two of the small Eldritch to the two chambers they could observe from their positions.
“Because I torment you so, my dear,” said Daemon with a laugh. “I have just lost my wife and son to a monster,” he continued in a harsh voice. “Your boyfriend here was supposed to solve the murder. He accomplished nothing. I had to defeat the damned monster when it came after me. All I do here is try to keep our civilization going, to stop the monsters from the dark from overrunning our people. And your Church does all in its power to stop me from doing it.”
Jude noticed that Daemon was growing ever more angry as he spoke. He feared that the man would lose it any moment, and order them taken into the chambers.
“And how many innocents will you sacrifice to preserve your civilization?” asked Sarah, her own voice rising in anger.
Jude felt his eyes riveted as he saw the two little people sitting in their chairs, the men in each chamber chanting the ritual words of transfer. The brain spikes on their long arms fell from the ceiling and smacked into the foreheads of the creatures, killing them instantly. Blue power rose into the air, along with some tendrils of red that the system filtered and shunted aside. The blue energy continued to rise, filling the conduits of the chambers and channeling upward, to the building above, where it would enter the storage chambers for use in the city’s grid. After a minute of rising before the terrified eyes of the pair of captives the last dregs of energy fled. The workers in the chamber unstrapped the bodies and took them over to holes in a corner, where they were unceremoniously dropped for processing below.
“I will sacrifice every one of these things to preserve my own people,” said Daemon, glaring at the two, then turning his attention to the floor.
“And when you have used them up?” asked Jude, watching as the next two were brought into the chamber. “What will you do then?” One of the little people struggled, but had not a chance against the big human pulling him along. The other, a female, wailed loudly but didn’t physically resist. No matter. Within a minute both were secured to the chairs and the next ritual began.
“When their world is empty we will go on to the ne
xt one,” said Daemon, his voice rising. “There are endless inhabited realms out there, ours for the taking.”
“And when the people find out?” said Sarah, her eyes staring at the next victims as the mages in the chambers raised their voices to a crescendo and the brain spikes started their descent.
Daemon started laughing, a booming, almost roar as tears came to his eyes.
“The people you say,” he said after he got himself under control. “The people. The people don’t care. As long as they have their comforts, their entertainments and their safety, they couldn’t care less what costs others have to pay.”
“You’re wrong,” said Sarah, her face reddening and her eyes narrowing in anger. “The people care, if they know.”
“They aren’t going to know,” said Daemon, leaning over Sarah and putting his face close to hers. “You are not going to tell anyone anything.”
Daemon started, then looked away as the next group was brought in. He leaned over the railing himself and looked down into the right hand chamber, as an Eldritch in ornate robes entered. The creature in the other chamber fought and screamed. This one looked up and met Daemon’s eyes with a slight smile on his face. He walked to the chair and ascended it like it was a throne, holding his arms out, allowing himself to be trussed up for sacrifice.
“That one calls himself their God King,” said Daemon, gesturing toward the smiling blue man. “From what I understand, he claims domination of the whole planet, and is the center of their secular and religious government, such as it is.”
“And you’re just going to kill him like an animal,” said Sarah with disgust. “The ruler of a sovereign race.”
“They weren’t very sovereign when we rounded them up,” said Daemon.
“They sure did fight to keep us from getting him though,” said Stark, who was looking at a pocket watch as he spoke. “I need to be going sir. Wish I could stick around and watch you pith this one, but I’m already late.”
Daemon nodded his head and looked back down at the Eldritch ruler in the chamber as he was being prepared. The little man yelled something up at Daemon and the Mage looked down with a quizzical expression on his face.
“What did he say?” he asked one of the men on the platform.
“He says you will be sorry,” said the man with a laugh. The little man in the chair started laughing as well, and Jude wondered about the sanity of the creature. Surely he knew what was about to happen. Surely he knew his life was about to be taken. Unless he knew something the humans didn’t.
“You shouldn’t kill this one, Daemon,” said Jude, his mind going back over the last week and what he had learned.
“What does it matter which of them I kill,” said Daemon with a huff. “We’re going to kill all of them eventually. They don’t matter to me. They don’t matter to your fellow citizens. Within a decade or two they will be gone, and we will have a half century's worth of energy stored in the system.”
“That’s not what I mean, Daemon,” said Jude, lowering his voice. “You know that red entity that was killing your employees? The one that killed your son, that killed your wife?”
“What about them?”
“Remember the tendrils of red energy that come out of these creatures when you kill them?”
“What about it?” said Daemon, leaning over and looking in Jude’s eyes.
“It’s the same energy that comes out of these creatures,” said Jude, knowing he spoke the truth. “The same energy that coalesces into the demonic creature, Daemon. It too is a Daemon, a force of nature, the anger and rage and need for revenge of these creatures you have been killing here. And in that chair down there you have the focus of all those emotions and drives. And when you kill him you will unleash something you can’t control. That’s why he’s laughing at you.”
“That’s bullshit,” yelled Daemon, glaring at Jude, then back down at the diminutive ruler on the chamber floor. “I beat that thing when it came for me. Totally destroyed it. And if another comes I will destroy it as well.”
Daemon gestured to the man on the floor of the chamber containing the ruler, circling a finger in a signal to get it going. Jude could see that Daemon’s ears were reddened. The man was angry, and wanted to take it out on the ruler, no matter the consequences. He looked over at Sarah, and saw that she was mumbling words, her eyes closed. She opened them and looked over at him, a smile on her beautiful face.
“The Good God will be with us,” she said to him. “Be ready, for he will make a way.”
Jude looked at her, feeling the anxiety leaving his body, knowing that everything was going to be OK, if he allowed things to go as they were going. Daemon stood looking down at the sacrificial chamber, an expression of triumph on his face. The God King of the Eldritch looked back at him, a mocking smile in return for Daemon’s expression.
The pithing spike came down at the swing of the arm. It struck unerringly on the top of the ruler’s head, all according to plan. Blood splashed and the spike went deep into the creature's head, and energy flowed out through the wound. And that was the last thing that went according to plan.
The blue energy flowed for minutes. Jude could feel the tension rise in the chambers below and on the observation deck. The people around him were alarmed at the amount of energy coming from this one small creature. And then he noted the true horror, as the Eldritch, sitting in the sacrificial chair with a spike driven into his head, looked up and locked eyes with Jude. He winked with an eye that should not have been under conscious control. Then his gaze shifted over toward Lucius Daemon and he opened his mouth in a roaring laugh.
The blue energy increased. The conduits that pulled the energy in overloaded, sparking, one catching on fire. Two of the conduits exploded, and blue energy flowed and sparked off all the surfaces of the sacrificial chamber. A lightning bolt of power flew from the wall, striking the engineer in the chamber and lifting him from his feet. He flew into the air, his mouth open and blue energy flowing from that orifice and his eyes, his body shaking, finally smoking and catching on fire. Another bolt struck at Lucius Daemon. The Mage put up an arm, caught the bolt, and channeled the energy into himself. His lips moved in a spell, and Jude realized that the powerful Mage would not be brought down that easy.
Jude looked over in panic at Sarah. She again had her eyes closed and was whispering a prayer. He didn’t know if prayer would really help in this situation, but he figured it couldn’t hurt, so he started to improvise one of his own, asking for God to protect her, no matter what happened to him. His eyes he kept open, staring in wonder and horror at the event before him.
Daemon had raised his hands overhead and started to shout words of power. The blue energy began to respond, the bolts stopped flying, and the Archmage exerted his will over the forces that continued to flow from the little blue man. Jude watched the energy continue to come out, endlessly.
The creature is a God, he thought. Maybe not the God, the creator of the Universe. But a God nonetheless, by any other definition of the word. A being of great power. He glanced over at Daemon, surprised that the man could control this level of energy, knowing that eventually he was going to reach his limit. Wondering when that limit would be, and how much destruction would be caused when the Archmage had to release the power he was absorbing.
“Kill him,” shouted Daemon, grimacing from the effort of controlling the energy. One of the techs in the chamber picked up a maul that was kept for dispatching victims if something went wrong with the pithing. He raised the maul and ran at the creature in the chair. A glance from the God King and bolts of blue power flew from his eyes, striking the man and burning him to a statue of ash, hammer and all. The ash stood there for a moment, then crumbled to the floor.
A loud booming echoed through the rooms, and a man on the observation deck fired an automatic at the small ruler. The bullets sparked in midair and deflected into the wall. Another bolt of energy jumped from the wall and struck the man in the head. His brains and blood va
porized and blew his head apart like a melon. The body hit the floor, still clutching the pistol that had proved useless against the ruler.
Lucius Daemon shouted a word and threw a hand in the direction of the ruler. A wavering ball of force, ten times stronger than anything Jude could have thrown, flew toward the little man. It wavered in an opposite ripple and broke apart before it could reach the diminutive ruler. He smiled again at Daemon, blood and gore dripping from the wound in his head, then shouted a word in a voice that sounded more like the roar of a hurricane than anything a living creature could produce. The blue energy stopped flowing, and red energy gouted from the hole in the creature’s head toward the ceiling, gathering into a formless shape about the level of the observation deck.
Daemon threw bolts of power at the blob of red energy. The wavering force globes hit and dissipated into the blob, each one causing a slight bit of growth. More energy flowed from the ruler into the ball of energy. The other employees panicked and took off, running through doors as fast as their feet would carry them, a couple looking back for a moment, then hurrying away. Daemon continued to stand defiant and throw magic at the growing entity. Jude looked at the entity, then at Daemon, not understanding what the man thought he was accomplishing. He knew he would have run by now, but the Mage seemed to have too much pride and arrogance to admit defeat.
The blob of red rippled, then formed into an animal face, transparent enough to see through. A large rippling main formed on the head of the beast, nostrils flared, while slitted eyes stared their hate at Daemon. A mouth formed and opened, revealing a large maw with long teeth, growling silently at the Mage.
Daemon shouted and threw more power at the entity, which moved forward at a slow pace. Daemon shouted, his face contorted with rage and fear, throwing everything he had at the entity. The monstrous face moved to within six feet of Daemon, mouthed a silent roar, and lunged across the space with sudden speed and fury. The mouth rose and fell over Daemon’s head, moving down until the teeth were over the man’s chest, then snapping shut. Jude could see Daemon’s head and upper body through the transparent creature. The head and shoulders jerked and the body shuddered as the energy teeth penetrated the abdomen. The body went limp and the mouth opened again, this time swallowing more of Daemon, until the man disappeared completely into the transparent red energy. The body jerked for a moment, began to blur, and faded away into nothingness, transported by the entity to some other space. Jude was sure it would not be pleasant for the man, wherever it was.
Daemon Page 26
