Division Zero: Lex De Mortuis

by Matthew S. Cox

  “He looks upset,” said Dorian.

  “Ya think?” Kirsten scrambled to her feet and jammed another stimpak in her thigh.

  “I think I’m gonna sit this one out, too weak.” Dorian looked at her, winked, and blurred into the car.

  “Oh, nice, leave me alone with this thing…”

  The growl morphed into laughter.

  oncrete pylons slid from right to left through Kirsten’s vision as she and the demon Charazu circled. Dust rolled by in glimmering clouds where it caught in the headlights. Long, thin projections from its chitinous back scraped the ceiling, causing a grating noise that rattled down her spine. In some bizarre way, this creature was less frightening than a mortal with a gun.

  Kirsten would feel no guilt for destroying this.

  “So, you’re a demon, huh?” The lash formed in her hand. “I was expecting something a little more… fiery. Not a six-ton flea.”

  I wonder if this is what Kincaid meant.

  Its roar rose up to a screech and then fell through a low frequency rumble to a lingering popping noise in the back of its throat. Charazu stomped toward her, bashing one of the pylons into concrete powder and mangled rebar with the back of its arm. She ducked a swipe of claws and twisted over in midair as it barreled past, lashing a smoldering trail across its side.

  A flat landing knocked the wind out of her as the demon careened into another post headfirst, cracking it. She got to her feet just in time to avoid a lunging downward whomp; rather than impale claws through her back, it snagged her by the boot. Her hands scraped bloody over debris as it ripped her into the air, swinging her around by one leg.

  Demolished apartment blurred into a haze around the demon’s face. Kirsten raised her left hand, focusing on the essence of the grip around her boot. She found it after two spins and sent a surge of energy at it, forcing its fingers to loosen. She slipped a few inches. Charazu roared; six legs gouged the floor as he came to a halt to focus on retaining his grip. She dangled upside down like a caught fish. Howling as her hip came close to dislocating.

  Kirsten screamed through a clenched jaw, a manifestation of her battle of wills. The demon moved to the side and held her against another post while drawing its free arm back. Fear of being stuck between its fist and a concrete post broke her concentration. The clawed hand tightened around her boot; that foot went numb.

  A lash slapped Charazu across the nose; a hasty attack meant more as a distraction to take its mind off smashing her. It roared again, shaking from side to side. Ignoring the confusion of being upside down and battered into the wall, Kirsten lashed again and again. Charazu staggered backwards, wailing in protest, trying to put a hand in the way to guard its face. The feeble strikes did little in the way of damage, but if the noises Charazu made were any indication, it caused a great deal of pain.

  Kirsten kept at it, despite knowing she only annoyed it, until it hurled her to the side with a howl. She hit the ground on her chest, finding several pieces of sharp debris. Her spinning slide came to a halt against a pile of drywall slabs, which collapsed on top of her.

  “Shit, shit, shit.” She shoved at the junk, trying to dig her way out.

  Charazu shook off the pain; the tiny arms raked at its nose. The great creature shifted and moved at her. Arms rose to the sides as six legs took on a wider stance, face hovered low to the ground. Another growl sent waves of scalding air over her, rife with the choking rot of sulfurous decay. Hunks of plasterboard crumbled as she tried to grab them in haste, covering her in grey powder. Charazu lurched into a charge that shook the floor; more junk slid from the top of the pile. One piece cracked her over the head, shattering. She ignored it, flailing at the collapsing heap.

  Sudden bright light painted Charazu’s side, causing it to glimmer. For three brief seconds, crimson flecks glowed amid a smoky transparent onyx shell, and then the beast vanished with a tremendous crash. Demonic screeching warped to the right, the sound bending in the manner of a passing train.

  Wham.

  Flakes of concrete clattered as the floor, indeed the entire building, shuddered. More stuff fell on top of her. Minutes later, she dragged herself out from under the pile and stood. Favoring her right foot, she limped towards a rolling cloud of dust. The patrol craft’s tail lights resembled the eyes of an even larger demon in the mist, until a momentary breeze cleared enough for her to see. Charazu lay on his side, pinned between the front end of the armored hovercar and the metal-reinforced elevator cluster. A spatter of luminous orange liquid streaked the wall above him, seeping out of the gaps between plates. Azure arcs from wires at the ceiling leapt to the hood as glowing flecks spat in intermittent bursts from a power box between two shafts.

  “Worked for the kid,” said Dorian, giving her a thumbs up.

  He seemed to bask in the electrical discharge for a moment before he moved the car back. The hood armor had a tiny dent where the creature’s elbow caught it.

  Charazu exhaled a deep labored moan, somewhere between agony and exasperation.

  She gave her partner a worried look. “Are you feeling all right?” He risked his security blanket, his home…

  He blurred from the driver’s seat to stand at her side. “The old girl’s tough.”

  Scraping; stone on stone. Charazu shifted, twisting to bring all its eyes to bear on Kirsten.

  Dozens of middle-aged women appeared in a horseshoe around her, holding drinks and nicohalers. Her uniform vanished, leaving her naked, backside bright red and sore. The women laughed, pointing.

  Kirsten frowned. “Mother only had six friends, not eighteen, and you forgot to shrink me into a kid. These old biddies aren’t too scary at eye level.” The lash glimmered. “I’m also not afraid of this anymore.”

  The illusion shattered. She lunged at the demon, the ribbon of energy coiling after her, aiming for its face. Charazu scrabbled at the ground, sliding away from her. She struck the demon’s front end as it forced itself up onto its legs, drawing forth an agonized roar that knocked more silt from the ceiling. Dorian took the sidearm from his belt and walked into the snapping electricity. Spectral energy focused, he projected attacks in the shape of laser blasts. Charazu cringed from the strikes, though seemed to regard them as a nuisance.

  The lash found him twice more before the creature ceased feigning pain. It lowered its head, rotated to face her, and drifted closer on its long, spindly legs―oblivious to her attacks.

  “Umm. Dorian… It’s either really damn tough, or I’m not hurting it.”

  He gave up shooting it. “I can feel it doing something. It’s got some kind of protection. Maybe we need to draw it away from the gate.”

  Kirsten backed up, stepping with care over hunks of mangled furniture. Her spine involuntarily clenched at the sound of glass crunching under her boot. Dropping the lash, she held both hands up and focused her power at the massive insectoid horror. Charazu shuddered, clawed leg-tips gouged the floor, trying to force through her resistance. She closed her eyes, digging deeper for strength. The great demon shuddered to a halt, snarling and seething foul-smelling fumes.

  They stalemated.

  Konstantin seemed confident in my ability to stop this thing, but it’s so damn strong.

  “Dorian,” she gasped. “What else can I do?”

  “Try some priesty shit?” Two more of Dorian’s blasts bounced away. “How the hell should I know?”

  Priesty shit? What does that even mean? Kirsten grunted. Fear of what this thing would do to Evan gave her a second wind. She pushed it back one inch, cement crumbling around six clawed feet.

  It roared as a jet-black tongue lanced out, wrapping and crushing her wrists together. Kirsten leaned back as it pulled, widening her stance. Boots slipped through the dust; she screamed from the burning pain of its touch.

  “Back!” she demanded. “Back to the pits of hell with you! Get y―” The rest was lost to a wail of agony as the searing tentacle coiled up her arm and crept around her neck.

  Her pani
c caused her power to surge, pushing Charazu back two steps, but he dragged her along.

  Dorian leapt forward, grabbing the slimy tendril and going after it with his belt knife. “Put more feeling into it. Like, ‘in the name of God I command you.’ You know, something of that nature. Maybe demons only know Latin?”

  I can’t say that… I don’t believe it. She scowled. I’d feel so stupid. The scent of her own burning wrists and throat distracted her. The tongue pulled her lean into a forward tilt.

  A cry of exertion erupted from Dorian as he wrenched his knife into the tentacle. The slimy appendage failed, snapping apart in two directions. One end whipped her in the face, the other shot back down Charazu’s throat. With tension gone, Kirsten fell over backwards screaming with a red, burned squiggle on her cheek. Charazu staggered into the closest its body shape could approximate to sitting; the impact of its shell-covered body pushed a two-foot hole through the floor.

  “Hope no one lives in that apartment…” Dorian blinked at the damage, before running to Kirsten’s side.

  Whimpering, Kirsten flailed her arms to unbind her wrists from the still-boiling tongue. Severed from its owner, it took on a life of its own and thrashed about, striking at her face. The throbbing mass coiled ever tighter around her neck. When Dorian grabbed the loose end, she put a boot between her arms and pulled her hands out of the rubbery cord. Having lost its grip on her arms, the tendril squeezed as if to pop her head off.

  Kirsten held her breath, swatting at the abomination with a lash. It burst into a spray of black slime; Dorian staggered away. Charazu scrabbled at the floor, one hand over its mouth as it howled. Great claws shredded the concrete as it tried to pull itself out of the gap.

  Blisters covered the back of her hands and red oozed around each wrist where the skin had melted. Kirsten clawed at her belt, dosing two stimpaks before shock wore off. The skin bubbled, blisters faded, and she howled as if her hands had been cut off, and the stumps sealed with cauterizing fire. A wreath of incineration felt as though it surrounded her neck. Dorian whirled at her shout, cringing at the realization of what she had just done.

  Don’t use stimpaks on burns. Day one of the training manual.

  She shrieked herself hoarse, drifting into a delirium of endorphins. An army of microscopic machines destroyed scar and regenerated good tissue; she felt every single tiny biting mouth. What did Konstantin say?

  His voice drifted through the misery. “I’m sure you will be able to stop it, now that you know its name.”

  Its name.

  “Kirsten!” Dorian shouted. “It’s loose.”

  Tremors in the ground, rumbling as it stomped at her. So much pain. I don’t want to move. She thought about getting up, but couldn’t.

  “Mommy!” Evan’s voice was only in her imagination, but he got through.

  She sat up, once more focusing her psionic energy at the demon. Its charge became a forward stumble, right through her effort to halt it. Oh, he’s pissed.

  “Charazu!” she screamed. “Your name is Charazu, and by that name I command you back to the Abyss.”

  The demon faltered, the battle of opposing forces went completely in her favor in a split second. Six legs swept out from under it and the massive suspended body crashed down. She surged with so much power her eyes radiated glowing blue-white energy. Charazu burst into silver flames and slid twenty meters into the elevator bank. The resonant boom of crushed sheet metal echoed dozens of stories up and down. She forced herself to stand and staggered after it.

  “Charazu, you have no power in this world. I do not allow you to remain here.”

  Scintillating light streaked across her view. This time, the lash split the shell wide open. Charazu wailed. All the menace of before changed, lending a pleading tone to the demonic sound. Legs and arms flailed, a remnant of its tongue lolled out through jagged teeth, spraying black gunk.

  “Charazu, I commend you back to the Abyss.”

  Kirsten put her hands together as if holding the lash like a two-handed sword. She whipped it around and over her head, and a sensation left her mind as if an impaled knife had just slipped out of a head wound. The intense drain of power brightened the astral whip and detonated what remained of Charazu into an explosion of gore that blew back and away from her in a cone.

  “Back to the Abyss!”

  She sagged forward and fell to her knees. Piece by piece, fragments of shell liquefied into puddles of tar. Seconds later, they became watery and appeared to soak into the concrete. Faint wisps of energy exuded from the splatter, whispering as the portal sucked them in. Blood dribbled over her upper lip, the worst nosebleed she ever had. One hand to her face, she sat back, too tired to breathe.

  Dorian approached. “Kirsten… look.”

  She turned. The portal flickered into view, silent roiling energy at its edges.

  Her trembling hand wobbled before her eyes. The effort to use her power came on with the sensation of needles in the brain. More blood seeped through her fingers. I couldn’t bash it… it looks so much like glass.

  “Dorian…” Kirsten crawled through the dusty debris-strewn mess until she found a length of rebar. Clasping it with her bloody hand, she pulled the metal in line with both the astral and physical world. It hurt to use even that minor power, but far less than a lash. Her blood soaked into the steel, leaving the bar clean.

  “Got it.” Dorian took the bar and approached the gate.

  Kirsten put both hands over her nose to stem the tide of blood. Damn stimpak case is empty. A great shattering rumble rolled over, delicate twinkling of glass combined with the sound of a bomb going off. Spectral winds ripped past, fluttering her hair. Dorian slid to a halt on his back next to her, looking surprised, bent rebar in hand.

  “Well… it broke.” He tilted his head to smile at her, not bothering to sit up.

  The unnatural darkness lifted from the shattered space, allowing just-past-noon daylight to wash over them.

  The sun is so warm.

  irsten knelt still for some minutes, chest on fire, wrists sore, neck burning, and a rod of pain through her mind. Dorian grunted and managed a slight manifestation―enough to rub her shoulder. She sniffled.

  “Why are you crying?” He squeezed.

  “I…” She looked at him. “I’m having those silly thoughts again.”

  Dorian chuckled. “Partners often have a close bond, but it’s different than lovers. You deserve a live person. I will never be able to give you children. I’ll always be here for you, but I can’t be what you need.”

  Kirsten shrank into herself, offering a reluctant nod. “Yeah… I know. I still love you though, even if it isn’t that kind of love.”

  “I’m ready,” said a deep voice.

  She looked up at Icarus, back in one piece. He swayed as if standing took all his concentration. She asked Dorian for help with a look and he pulled her to her feet.

  “All right. Thank you for saving my ass. I’m sorry it’s this way for you, Icarus.”

  Icarus chuckled. “Michael. Please, call me Michael. I can’t argue I did a bunch of awful shit in life. I got put where I belonged, I ain’t gonna bemoan it. I just don’t have the stomach for it anymore. Honor and valor and all that… Damn corporations don’t have any of it. Go ahead and call me a taxi, eh?” He closed his eyes.

  “Admitting it is a start. I don’t know how it works down there but… there’s hope.”

  She beckoned.

  Dorian squeezed her hand as the mood changed. Within a moment, the area filled with whispering darkness. Michael nodded at the sound of myriad whispering. He held his arms out.

  “Come, I am ready to go.”

  One large Harbinger exuded from the mass, gliding up to him. It matched his arms-wide gesture and leaned its vaporous head back. Kirsten, still clinging to Dorian to stay on her feet, bowed at it as much as her pain allowed.

  Michael took a step towards it, but the Harbinger’s gaze came down, and it slipped backwards into the ro
lling wall of darkness, leaving Icarus to stare at Kirsten with a quizzical look. The same look settled over Kirsten’s face as a shimmering cloud of silver unfolded through the air. The light spread outward from a point, causing the mass of Harbingers to recede further.

  Ribbons of silver energy emerged from the center, spreading up and to the sides in a shape semblant to wings. Between them, the body of a woman emerged. Alabaster skin glowed with blinding purity; long white hair streamed behind her, lofted by an intangible wind. She wore nothing aside from light, sheets of it wrapped about her body like the robes of a Greek statue.

  “Michael Coley, twice you have accepted your proscribed fate, and you chanced oblivion to spare the life of one who you once considered enemy.” The woman gestured, and a silver-rimmed doorway opened.

  Beyond it waited a man, similar in appearance to the creature floating there; only he had wings of fire instead of threads of light. He bowed in a welcoming way as people, perhaps Michael’s ancestors, faded in around him.

  Michael took a step back. “There are more deserving souls than I.”

  “A determination you have not been tasked with making.” The floating woman smiled.

  He bowed, his body bolstered. No longer seeming hurt, he vanished into the doorway and it collapsed around him.

  Kirsten did not move the entire time, making no sound other than a mild squeak when the strange woman faced her.

  “…Angels?” Kirsten whispered.

  “You must have questions, though my time here is short. Know that I am a being of energy. I am mercy. Your kind once called us Seraphim, but such a word only brings to mind a concept. Such concepts can be tainted by belief, twisted by men for their own ends.”

  She remembered a wispy tendril of light just before she smashed into the advert droid. “Thank you.”