Demon Gate: Beyond the 9th Circle: The Rapture Was Just The Beginning.

by Heath, Joel

  turmoil in Major Walters’ eyes. But why?

  Spencer wondered.

  “Major?” Spencer briskly whispered. His

  eyebrows went up showing the silent question. “There were too many, we need a better

  strategy.” Major Walters said.

  The sun lowered quickly as the hours passed,

  many of the soldiers spent much of that time

  cleaning their guns, as though it would increase their efficacy. But many were just preparing to die knowing that no rescue was coming, and there was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.

  Spencer found Gretchen in a discussion which included Captain Huddleston and Major Walters. Sunset was mere minutes away.

  “Scouts have confirmed it, we’re surrounded.” Major Walters reported.

  “Can we make it to the west parking garage?” Spencer asked.

  “Are you suggesting we run?” Major Walters demanded.

  “Are you suggesting we stay and die?” Spencer shot back.

  “If your girlfriend can’t rig up a detonator, then we may have no choice.” Major Walters said.

  Spencer couldn’t believe what he was hearing. But on the other hand, he did have a point.

  “With all due respect, Major. Our chances of surviving another assault are not looking good, we can’t get everybody away in time and even if we could there’s no guarantee those things won’t pick us off.” Captain Huddleston summarized pointing toward the demon army that had them surrounded.

  “Are you suggesting we just surrender to the enemy?” Major Walters demanded.

  Captain Huddleston paused.

  “You know, that’s not a bad idea.” Captain Huddleston commented.

  “What!?” Spencer asked as though the captain had lost his mind.

  Captain Huddleston smiled as he revealed his plan. “We take out the queen and the rest will be easy pickings, so we just take her out.”

  “With what?” Major Walters demanded, “We don’t have a sniper rifle that could take her head off, and we can’t get close enough to do it.”

  “Unless you were surrendering.” Gretchen surmised, realizing what Captain Huddleston was planning.

  “But even if you managed to get close enough there’s nothing you could use to kill her and that’s assuming you could get away at all, it’s a suicide mission.” Spencer argued.

  “Especially if she figures out what we’re up to.” Gretchen commented.

  “If we do nothing we’re dead anyway.”

  “But who would kill her, and what would they use?” Spencer demanded.

  “We still have a small stash of C-4; I could get close enough to use four pounds of it; that would take her head off and leave behind little more than a messy smudge.” Captain Huddleston offered.

  “You?” Major Walters asked.

  “It can’t be you, sir. But we need one of our best if this is going to work, and we need to do it now or we’re all dead,” Captain Huddleston commented. “We don’t have a choice, sir. It has to be me.”

  “Good luck, Captain.” Major Walters reluctantly agreed, offering a heartfelt salute which the Captain returned before he left to prepare to die.

  The sun finally set when Major Walters met Captain Huddleston just inside the entrance nearest the hive queen.

  “Are you sure we can’t talk you out of this?” Major Walters asked.

  “If you’re asking if I want to die, the answer is ‘no’. But it seems fate has other plans for me.” Captain Huddleston replied,

  disheartened.

  “We’ll wait for your signal to detonate.” Major Walters assured before saluting Captain Huddleston one last time. Captain Huddleston returned the salute before heading out the door with his hands held high. Major Walters headed back to the forward command post they had established several hours earlier.

  “I surrender!” Captain Huddleston cried as he emerged from the exterior door. Within seconds he was set upon by dozens of demons, but none of them attacked him, they seemed to escort him to the hive queen.

  As Major Walters arrived in the forward command center he took up a position by a window and watched as Captain Huddleston reached the hive queen under heavy guard. For several seconds they seemed to talk before she turned away, apparently convinced of the Captain’s change of heart.

  Captain Huddleston reached into his flak jacket and pulled out the C-4 and tried to plant it on the queen, the demonic entourage shrieked as they realized what Captain Huddleston was up to, the hive queen wheeled around and shrieked then she drew a sword on her back and slashed at the Captain’s forearm at the mid point, the limb fell to the ground and Captain Huddleston screamed in pain as he grabbed his severed limb as he quickly started bleeding, then the queen raised her sword and sliced across Captain Huddleston’s neck, severing his head which fell to the ground along with his body.

  “LIGHT HER UP!” Major Walters shouted. Gretchen flipped a single switch on her jerry-rigged detonator and the C-4 erupted into a concussive blast of heat that enveloped the queen.

  For a brief minute or so everything grew deathly quite except for the crackling fire that consumed the hive queen. Then a shape emerged from the fire which as it subsided. The hive queen survived, stepping from the fire which was her closest ally, she raised her sword to the darkening skies.

  “Fools.” She hissed, “Now we will take you by force.” The hive queen paused, slightly lowering her sword as she took a deep breath, then thrust the tip skywards as she unleashed a terrible shriek.

  The darkness seemed to come alive as thousands of shapes emerged from all sides into the light of the waning fire still smoldering around the ruined body of Huddleson. This seething dark forms flew at the building, spraying millions of shards of broken glass as they quickly entered the hospital and seized everybody they could, and as quickly as they came, they were gone.

  When the dust had settled Major Walters, looked around to see who was left. All he could see was a young Lieutenant, Spencer and Gretchen. Spencer’s ears burned with the screams of the soldiers outside, dying as they were dismembered.

  As the last of his men’s screams faded into the night, he heard a single terrible voice. “You will pay the price for your treachery, dawn will bring you no respite, survive if you can.” The queen spat, and in a moment she was gone.

  “I don’t like the way she said that.” Gretchen said.

  “Major, what are we going to do now?” Spencer asked.

  Major Walters reached for his radio.

  “This is Major Walters, anybody still alive regroup in the main lobby immediately.”

  Major Walters said then lead the way back to the main lobby where he met two other soldiers. Both were Privates First Class.

  Spencer looked around, not giving his full attention to Major Walters’ strategy, he expected that the demons would be breaking down the doors, why hadn’t they already?

  “I thought I heard someone as we passed radiology.” One of the privates commented, almost as though he did not want to, like he was restraining an urge.

  “Did you see anybody, Private?” Major Walters asked.

  “No, sir, I just heard footsteps.” The private replied.

  Major Walters turned to the Lieutenant. “Lieutenant, take these privates and go back, if there is another survivor we’ll meet you at the access corridor to the west parking garage.” Major Walters instructed, “We’ll wait there for five minutes and then we get the hell out of dodge.”

  “Understood, sir.” The lieutenant saluted.

  Major Walters, Spencer and Gretchen headed for the west parking garage, cutting through the dead bodies that would never be buried.

  After the hallway turned the Major’s dead soldiers vanished from sight. But Major Walters still looked back.

  “Major?” Spencer asked, “Is something wrong?”

  Major Walters turned back to Spencer. “Could we have done something different?” Major Walters asked.

  “I don’t know.” Spe
ncer consoled. “Maybe this was a long time coming.”

  “You think…” Major Walters stopped himself. “I thought I lived an honorable life, I went to church, helped out in the community, served my country. Maybe I could have done better. Maybe that’s why God is … allowing this to happen.”

  Finally they reached the door that lead to the west parking garage and they waited, the seconds quickly turned to minutes when finally several gunshots echoed down the empty hospital hall breaking the fear-filled silence.

  Major Walters grabbed his radio, “Lieutenant, what’s going on?”

  There was no reply. “Lieutenant!”

  Major Walters received no word from any of the three men that were searching for

  additional survivors so he headed back down the hall. As he came to the turn he was met by one of the privates, he was bleeding profusely from a gash in his upper arm.

  “Private, what happened?” Major Walters demanded.

  “They’re in the building, sir.” The private revealed.

  Spencer found a door leading to a linen closet and pulled everybody inside. Major Walters pulled out some sheets so he could fashion a heavy bandage for the private’s wound before heading out for the garage.

  As the door to the garage came into focus, Spencer and Gretchen stopped and stared in horror at what they saw through it. A large, demonic frog-like thing; a class of creature they had not yet seen. A clattering sound drew the attention of all four to the rear.

  “She’s coming.” The private said in horrified apprehension. Major Walters pulled everybody into another room that boasted a large sturdy metal door. The room was filled with large industrial washers and dryers; Major Walters closed the door and pushed a washer into position to keep the door closed for as long as possible if the hive queen arrived and was looking for them.

  For the next hour they sat in dreadful silence, knowing that the private needed medical attention that he wasn’t going to get while they were hiding in the laundry room.

  “Sir.” the private began.

  “Hold on, private, we’ll get out of here.” Major Walters assured.

  “I’m sorry, sir.” the private said, and then slumped over in a pool of his own blood; he was beyond help and slipped into death just that quietly.

  What seemed like days passed, but was in fact only seven hours later, a sound entered the room through the barricaded door, a scratching noise.

  “She knows we’re in here.” Major Walters assumed, and by so doing realized that the door wasn’t going to stop her, and barely slow her down.

  “We’re going to have to try and kill her.” Spencer said. Gretchen jumped when the door shook as the queen struck it trying to force her way into the room.

  Suddenly a light more brilliant than the sun spilled under the door and into the laundry room, the scratching and knocking ceased, it was replaced by a shriek, maybe it was a battle cry and the clank of metal on metal, and then silence. For several tense minutes nobody dared to move, and scarcely to breathe. Finally Spencer approached the door and put his ear to it to listen.

  Then he turned to Gretchen and Major Walters. “I don’t hear anything.” Spencer said and began to move the washer out of the way. Seconds later he was joined by Major Walters and Gretchen.

  The door creaked as it opened, a pile of dust that resembled volcanic ash lay at Spencer’s feet, there was no sign of the queen and they also could not see the demonic frog.

  “Where did she go?” Major Walters asked.

  Gretchen looked at the ash on the floor. “Do you think she…” Gretchen paused searching for a word to describe her thoughts.

  “Died?” Major Walters asked, “It would make sense.”

  “Let’s not stick around to find out.” Spencer said glancing at the outside of the door; there were several deep gashes in the metal coat that protected the door. Sword marks? Or were they from a set of nasty looking claws?

  Spencer moved swiftly down the hall. The door to the west parking garage drew near and opened automatically as Spencer approached. The last to go is the automated robotic stuff, great. The door opened on the overhead passage into the parking garage where Spencer found more of that fine dust on the ground. Spencer’s GTO was only thirty feet away, and yet

  something screamed in his mind. Again a warning, something helping me?

  “Weren’t there two hives?” Spencer asked.

  Spencer decided to err on the side of caution and retrieve the sword from his nearly empty trunk. As he closed the trunk, the tip of a darkened sword appeared in the middle of Major Walters’ chest then protruded more than twelve inches further, the tip of a hive queen’s sword.

  Realizing death was here with no escape now, Major Walters grabbed the tip of the sword and held fast trying to give Spencer a few extra seconds to grip the sword well and rush forward to kill the second hive queen. Spencer took those extra seconds and used them well. Dodging around the doomed Major Walters, Spencer swung his sword and decapitated the hive queen.

  The hive queen crumpled to the ground pulling the sword out of Walters’ back. Spencer caught the major, who then stared with

  frightening intensity into Spencer’s eyes.

  “Get out of here; get out while you still can.” Pushing Spencer away, the major fell to the ground where his life quickly slipped away, blood oozing out into a halo around his body.

  Spencer retreated to the exterior wall of the parking garage and looked around. Most of the demons were breaching the hospital; they had one slim chance to get away. The demons gathered around the dead queens, giving the couple precious moments in which their run for the highway went unnoticed.

  Spencer and Gretchen got into the GTO and sped along Louisville Avenue and up to 19th Street where he had direct access to the Marsha Sharp Freeway and the Texas Tech Parkway, which merged onto Highway 84 heading for the New Mexico border. They crossed into New Mexico at about eleven in the morning. The heat of the desert made them wonder if Hell was coming to earth or if they were just unlucky enough to be trapped in a million acre sauna.

  They passed a sign indicating the small town of Clovis and they decided the town was small enough that there would be minimal danger. They pulled off of Highway 60 to look around. The town was much like all the others they passed though, except there was no sign of occupation, nor were the streets littered with corpses of humans or demons, there was nothing but quiet and undisturbed buildings. It seemed like a good sign.

  Spencer and Gretchen agreed not to stay too long, so they opened up a couple MRE’s and ate what they could washing it down with stale water from the large canister. Spencer realized that there would be a long drive ahead so he looked for a gas station.

  There were a series of gas stations along East 1stStreet. The first one they came to was not viable, as the gas station had been burning for some time, possibly several days. Any fuel still in

  the tanks was unattainable through the stsmoldering flames. Down the street where 1 Street met Prince Street, there was another gas station. It didn’t look like there was any power, but Spencer knew how to bypass the fuel pumps and get the fuel moving into his tank.

  “You think there’s anything we could take with us in there?” Gretchen asked, nodding at the convenience store section of the station.

  “It’s worth a look,” Spencer replied. He reached into the backseat for the compact P-90, loaded a clip, and escorted Gretchen into the convenience store. Spencer quickly made a survey of the store and found that there was nobody left alive or dead. They went about gathering what food remained on the shelves. Most of the drinks had gone flat, the milk was well on its way to becoming cheese, and most of the fresh food was growing a putrid layer of mold. The only choice was water, dried food and items with high levels of preservatives like Twinkies and potato chips.

  Gretchen spied the ladies room and handed everything she had to Spencer before heading in.

  Spencer approached the closed door, “We don’t have time for this.
”

  “Then meet me out at the car,” Gretchen said from inside the bathroom.

  “Hurry, we really should keep going,” Spencer said before leaving the store and loading their haul into the car.

  Spencer opened the drivers’ side door to his car, climbed in and closed the door. He looked at his watch; it read a quarter to one. They could have been halfway to Albuquerque by now. Spencer waited semi-patiently for what seemed like hours, before he walked back into the store and found the bathroom door was open and Gretchen was nowhere in sight.

  “Gretchen?” Spencer called, not knowing who or what else cold be in the area as he searched the small store. Then he heard a terrifying sound, like a deep ominous rolling thunder on the horizon. Spencer headed out the door and saw a hoard of demons coming. They were trailed by pure darkness and death. They were a couple miles distant, but he knew they would reach them very soon.

  Spencer turned and headed back in shouting for Gretchen; he figured he could have overlooked something. Looking in the bathroom he saw it - a window, but it was smashed open.

  Spencer checked the men’s room, the storage room, the office, everywhere he could think of, growing more frantic by the second because any minute the entire town would be overrun my demons. He could kill the queen; he knew that for sure now. But would he survive long enough to face her? And what had happened to Gretchen?

  Soon the decision to leave or keep searching for Gretchen reached a tipping point and he had no choice but to leave. “I’m sorry, Gretchen.” Spencer mourned out loud.

  Spencer got into his car, started the engine before speeding away, all the while looking for Gretchen in his rearview mirror.

  But as he passed beyond the city limits he realized she was gone. He wondered if he would ever see her alive again. The only hope he could have was the demons would see his car and come after him and leave the town alone. Then Gretchen could try to make her own way to the safe zone.

  Spencer put the pedal to the floor and his car buried the needle in the red for another two hours before he stopped and got out of the GTO and finally started to freak out.

  “I LEFT HER TO DIE!” Spencer wailed. The feelings of attractions, the feeling of being alone, they all swirled in him while he crouched on the ground. His mind would not calm down and he couldn’t move. Finally the horror of his choice faded enough for him to calm down. Not a lot, but enough for him to decide he should have stayed, to feel he made the wrong choice. But it was too late to go back to look for her. The only thing that was left was ahead and was what Spencer hoped would be a safe zone.