Outlaws of Babylon

by Eugene W. Cundiff

  "Death unto the demon and the nonbeliever! So shall it be!" the Six screamed as he opened fire. It was Richter's turn to hit the ground as he heard the Six's bullets shrieking toward him, but unlike his prisoner he quickly rolled up to a crouch and brought his gun up at the zealot.

  "Councilor, get d--" Richter began to shout, but he quickly saw that both the bullets and the man who had fired them were suspended in midair by the Rose's power. "--or not, never mind. You all right, Kurt?"

  The Rose nodded. "Yeah, I'm good Frank. Check the troops, see if anyone got hurt in that last stunt while I have words with our friend Tony Montana here."

  "How do you even know that reference?"

  "I knew a guy who was big on old movies," Kurt answered. "Before these bastards murdered him. Now, where are Isabela Jackson and the Whitechapels?"

  McMahon's body grew rigid as he hovered in the air before Kurt, his joints popping loudly. The Six's face turned defiant.

  "Kill... me... demon... I am not... afraid... of you! I will... never... betray them!"

  Kurt sighed.

  "I expected you'd say something like that. And you look like he type that threatening with pain and torture won't work on either. Am I right?"

  McMahon's only answer was a cold-eyed stare. Kurt nodded.

  "Yeah, thought so. Sheriff Richter, bring the prisoners forward."

  "Sir?"

  "Humor me, Frank."

  The Vet nodded and turned to his men. He could not quite hide the hesitation in his voice as he gave the order.

  "You heard Councilor Petrovich. Get them moving!"

  The Council forces shoved the captured Sixes forward at gunpoint, pushing them down onto their knees between McMahon and the Rose. A handful of them showed the same sort of courage their apparent leader did, but most of them began to pray or to sob, and the stench that came to the air made it plain that at least one of the zealots had wet himself in terror. Kurt looked to McMahon.

  "I'm going to ask again: Jackson and the Whitechapels. Where are they?"

  "Go back to Hell, demon!"

  "I'll spend my year in Gehinnom when the time comes," Kurt smiled, coldly. "But not before my work here is done."

  Kurt's eye flashed, and the kneeling Sixes began to scream and wail as their limbs contorted violently in the grip of his powers. McMahon's jaw clenched, but his eyes turned away from the horrible display.

  "Leave them... out of this...."

  "Tell me where they are."

  "No."

  "Then this blood is on your hands. Will you even notice it, given how much already stains them?"

  The Sixes kept screaming, only growing louder as Kurt continued to twist their limbs in his psychic grasp. The tormented men began to choke and spit blood.

  "Last chance for them. Where are your leaders?"

  McMahon closed his eyes, whispering prayers under his breath. The other Sixes gasped and sputtered, and an obviously queasy Richter stepped up behind Kurt.

  "Sir... I understand you need the information, and that these bastards have no right to mercy, but... they're livin' people."

  Kurt shook his head.

  "No, they're not. They died the minute they put those shirts on. They died when they tried to execute Shelly at the Exchange. When they attacked my new home not once, but twice!" Kurt's eyes flashed, and he raised his fist into the air, levitating the tortured Sixes from the ground. "They died when they murdered Ric and the others!"

  The Sixes managed one final chorus of screams as Kurt unleashed his full fury upon them, crushing their bodies into ruined piles of dead flesh and jutting shards of bone. Their gory remains fell to the blood-soaked ground. Only McMahon remained held aloft, and he laughed madly.

  "Go on... do it. Got no regrets. Kept you busy... while they got away. I go to glory... a martyr for the cause. So shall it b--"

  McMahon's words were cut off as Kurt crushed the air from his lungs.

  "I find your excess of faith... annoying."

  The last Six kicked and struggled in midair as Kurt slowly choked the life from him. Richter shook his head.

  "Kurt, this... this is monstrous. Please, surely the Saint wouldn't want you to do this? This isn't a fight. It never really was. Remember that day at the Market, when you stopped his kind from doin' exactly this sort of thing?"

  Kurt looked over his shoulder at the weathered older man and the gathered Council forces who stood behind him. To the last they were hardened survivors of the worst the fallen city could show, and to the last their faces were pale with horror. McMahon fell to the ground atop the gruesome remains of his comrades, gasping for breath. Kurt's voice was tired as he spoke.

  "Tie him up. Gather the weapons, then sweep the building for anything salvageable, take it back to Braddock's to be split up into shares, get everyone paid for the job. I... I need some air."

  Kurt's body was swiftly engulfed in a corona of psychic power, and he hurled himself skyward without further word. Richter watched the young Councilor fly away until he was distracted by the voice of an Irishman behind him.

  "Glad he's on our side, yeah?"

  "Yeah," Richter replied, "and I hope to Hell he never has cause to see me as an enemy."

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