Jack's Back ((Ascension: Book 2))

by Adam Moon

  He tossed the under-grown horns against the far wall and then he tightly wrapped a towel around his forehead. It soaked through with his blood in an instant.

  He thought about breaking off his hooves to see if there were feet hidden inside of them but he thought better of it. If there weren't, he'd feel like a dumbass and he'd have to hobble along on stumps; not exactly an ideal situation considering all that he needed to accomplish.

  Dick-eyes came scuttling into the room. It had a magazine clutched between two of its legs.

  Jack bent down to retrieve it. It was a National Enquirer. He looked at the spider like it was an idiot with shit for brains but then the spider scurried up his leg, across his abdomen and chest, and then down his arm that held the magazine. It tapped the front cover impatiently with one of its large, hairy spider legs.

  The cover story was titled, "Why do angels keep trying to rape me?"

  Jack read it through.

  Apparently some young lady from Chicago believed that she had been chosen the same way the virgin Mary had been chosen, but instead of receiving God's seed, she was to receive the seed of an angel...and apparently she was not on board with that. She claimed to have fought off half a dozen angels already but they kept coming back for her. She said her future child was supposed to be the new messiah or something along those lines. At the end of the piece, the reporter said that the delusional girl was unavailable for a follow-up interview.

  Did that mean she was in hiding?

  Jack had no leads on Lucifer so he figured he'd go see what this insane girl was up to. Lucifer was an angel, despite what he'd morphed into outside of God's grace, so maybe Lucifer had tried to rape the girl too, if of course, her story checked out and she didn't turn out to be a crack pot. If so then maybe she'd know where Lucifer was hiding.

  It was worth a shot, and the spider liked the idea so it would probably bear fruit.

  Jack placed dick-eyes on the floor and then rewrapped his head. The blood streamed less now so he put the cowboy hat on to hold the towel in place. He draped his windbreaker over his shoulders and said to Dick-eyes, "Get the gang together and debrief them. We need a vehicle too. Hurry now."

  He glanced one last time at the magazine in his hand and his eyes fell upon a headline at the bottom of the front page. It read, "Satan Comes to Wisconsin, page 8."

  He flipped to page eight out of curiosity but the story was small, lacking any truth or details. No one had snapped a photo of him but someone had drawn a rendition. It made him appear cartoonish, with huge horns and reptilian eyes, but at least they drew his tail with as little accuracy. The tail looked powerful and it had spikes up and down it. If only that part were true, he thought.

  He snickered and tossed the magazine down at his hooves.

  He had to do a better job of flying under the social radar. He didn't think God read the National Enquirer. He could only hope people regarded the magazine the way he remembered: As a bullshit rag for hillbillies and weirdoes.

  Uh Oh!

  Jessie had a dream. He dreamt of monsters. When they began to appear at the foot of his bed in brilliant flashes of light, his eyes flickered open and he whispered, "Find Jack."

  The monsters rushed out of the room in a terrifying, undulating wave as Jessie drifted back to sleep.

  Afraid of Monsters

  Melanie dove behind the sofa. Hideous beasts emerged from Jessie's room and fled the house with a seemingly singular purpose. They dented walls and broke furniture as they went.

  By the time she gathered the courage to peek over the top of the sofa, the creatures were all gone and the house was destroyed. The carpet was torn to shreds, the pictures from the walls were all on the floor, broken, and the air smelled of smoke and wet hay.

  She'd seen some of these creatures in the past. The werewolf was certainly familiar, the sight of it sent chills up her spine. The tiny bat-mobiles, she remembered from a year ago, drove across her walls and ceiling before exiting through the front door. Before she laid eyes on the rest, she'd ducked behind the sofa for safety.

  She didn't know what this meant but the last time these creatures appeared, a lot of people died.

  Trickster gets Tricked

  Luke said evenly, "Son, where do you think they went?"

  Jessie lied, "I don't know. They ran away before I even woke up."

  Luke cocked his eyebrows at the boy and then wheeled on Melanie. His features were overcome with confusion and maybe just a hint of fear.

  "The last time those things showed up, it was a massacre, but at least there was a purpose behind it. What the hell does this mean?"

  He was trying his best to hide the dread building in his heart.

  Melanie shrugged. Their fight was long over. Maybe the creatures had nothing to do with them. She bit her tongue though. It looked like Luke's anxiety was ready to burst at the seams.

  He paced back and forth, deep in thought. Then he remembered the red death ball. Where was the damn thing? Shit, he'd tossed it away a few days ago. Its power was all dried up, so it was just a useless trinket, right?

  But that must have something to do with this. The ball had once been a portal. Lucifer had used it to cross over and then he'd shut Jack inside. Had the ball been reactivated, and if so, by whom?

  Could Jack be pulling the strings from hell, the way Lucifer had last year? No fucking way. Lucifer spent millennia learning how to manipulate the earth realm from hell-side, and even then he wasn't very good at it. There was no way Jack could figure it out in just a year.

  Then what did this mean?

  Was God starting to figure things out? Nope. God was not a subtle man. He wouldn't bother with conjuring creatures, he'd just point down and Lucifer would evaporate. That's how the guy had always worked when he even cared enough to intervene, which was almost never. But he'd act when he found out Lucifer was trying to activate the apocalypse.

  Yeah, Lucifer was pretty sure God had no hand in this. Maybe the child was just going nuts as his powers waned?

  Now that he was earth-side, he didn't possess the ability to tweak Jessie's dreams anymore, probably because he didn't need to now that he had escaped. That was it. Jessie was acting on auto-pilot without Lucifer there to lead the way and direct the dreams.

  He turned to Melanie and smiled. "We'll keep an eye on things, but let's not worry about the things we can't control.

  She nodded her head but she didn't understand his nonchalance. His son could have been killed today, and Melanie too.

  Road Trip

  Dick-eyes had stolen a truck. Jack didn't even bother asking how it had got it to their hideout, he just got behind the wheel and drove.

  It was tough with the hooves but he managed.

  They were about an hour away from Chicago but once they got there, things would get tricky. They had no idea who the girl was or where she was holed up. But they knew angels were trying to rape her, so all they had to do was keep an eye out for an angel running around with a rage induced boner and follow him to her.

  Easier said than done. Jack wasn't even sure he'd be able to recognize an angel when he saw one, but they had nothing else to go on.

  If only Jack's memories would come back to him, maybe there was a better plan that made more sense that he'd simply forgotten about, buried somewhere deep in his head.

  Oh well, at least Dick-eyes seemed to know what their next move should be.

  Angels and Demons

  Shelly was running again. She was thankful for her agile frame because she'd been doing a lot of running lately.

  The angel had lost sight of her, but it was quick so she knew it would catch up to her. Right now, all she could hope for was a miracle or some type of divine intervention and she knew for a fact that wasn't about to happen.

  A sly smile flitted across her lips as she ran. This was all so absurd. She couldn't even go to the cops. She guessed that an angel most likely wouldn't care one way or the other about just raping her in the lobby of the police
station in front of every cop in the city. And she also guessed that the cops probably wouldn't be able to stop it.

  She'd tried to go to the press but they basically made a laughing stock of her.

  Oh yeah, she thought, who'll get the last laugh when I actually do get raped by an angel? Oh, wait. Never mind.

  This time was worse than the others. Usually these fuckers found her at night or in the early morning hours when it was still dark out. She didn't know why that was. Was it because it was only at nighttime that she stayed in one place, hiding out while she slept? Were they able to sniff her out, or follow a trail, or whatever?

  But that was ok because it was easy as pie to lose these idiots at night. They were blind as bats in the dark.

  But this angel had spotted her on the streets in broad daylight through pure, dumb luck. She wouldn't be able to lose him in the dark like she had with the others.

  This might be it for her, she realized. She was about to be raped. The scummy fucking prophecy was about to be fulfilled whether she liked it or not.

  Her legs kicked harder as the realization hit her. They worked like perfectly timed pistons, propelling her onwards at breakneck speed.

  And then the angel was upon her out of the clear blue. It wrapped her in a bear hug and maneuvered her down a narrow alleyway.

  It pushed her against a brick wall with no pretensions of tenderness. She was powerless against it. It's flesh was impervious, like solid concrete.

  Tears streamed from her eyes. This was it.

  The angel was ugly as fuck too. It had a blotchy, bulbous nose, yellow teeth, awful breath, and a mole the size of a marble on its right eyelid that made the lid droop and lent it a demented looking quality. It's eyes were bloodshot.

  It looked like this angel was spending a lot of time hitting the bottle during his stay on earth because he had a booze hound's complexion.

  She hated to admit this to herself, but the rape would be worse because of how grotesque he was. It was an ugly thought but it was just how she felt.

  As he was reaching up her shirt with his calloused hand, a blur of motion came rushing into them, knocking them both to the pavement.

  Her vision went in and out but what she saw made her throat lock up, trapping the scream inside forever.

  A fucking werewolf was mauling the shit out of the rapist angel. As reality blurred she had a vague realization that maybe that was just the delirium tricking her eyes into seeing something that could not be real. Werewolves don't exist. But then again, angels don't exist either.

  Just as her brain shut down completely, an oversized and blood-soaked demon wearing a cowboy hat and a tan windbreaker stood over her and smiled sadistically.

  She heard its massive hooves clopping the ground in great, loud bursts as it circled her prone body, no doubt excited to feast on her flesh and then her soul.

  She heard the gnashing of teeth beside her and the angel's death throws as it lost the battle for its life against the ravenous hell hound. She felt warm blood specks hit her cheeks and hand as the werewolf tore.

  Two big beautiful eyes with thick lashes were suddenly peering into hers from only inches away. Then she saw that they were attached to the biggest, gnarliest spider her nightmares could have ever concocted. What the hell was going on?

  Her brain was trying to reboot but it was getting far too many system errors.

  Then all went dark.

  Karl Marx, the Snitch

  Lucifer saw it out of the corner of his eye, but he'd smelled it almost an hour ago. The hell beast was waiting patiently out of sight for the right moment to approach him. It stunk of hell. The charred flesh smell and that awful stink of livestock tickled Lucifer's nose and brought back old hate-filled memories.

  Now was not the right moment for anything hell related. His adopted family were inside the house and two of his followers were circling the property on lookout. There were too many potential witnesses and he couldn't afford for any of them to start asking questions about hell beasts or question why one of them might want to bend his ear.

  He didn't know what the beast wanted, but he knew it was friendly. He knew that because he was Lucifer, the greatest being to ever grace hell or earth. No hell spawn would dare fuck with him.

  This creature was probably bringing news and Lucifer's curiosity got the better of him.

  He told his men to take off, shaking each of their hands and thanking them for their service to the cause.

  When they finally left, he took a walk around to the back yard and stepped behind the garage. He knew the beast would get the hint and follow him back there.

  The beast was larger than most, but Lucifer recognized him. He was eight feet tall with the lower body of a gargantuan ant and the head and torso of an old grey bearded man.

  Jack had called him the Karl Marx ant but that was only because the bushy grey beard looked like the famous Leftist's.

  The Karl Marx ant approached carefully. He held up his human hands as a sign of good will and surrender.

  Lucifer smiled and beckoned him closer. This had better be good or he'd rip the monster limb from limb and cast him back into hell forever. And when he returned to his rightful home, he'd inflict even more punishments on the ant. No one wasted his time, not even his closest allies.

  The Band's Back Together

  Jack stared at the thin young woman, unconscious on the sofa. They'd brought her back to their hideout for safe keeping. She hadn't stirred yet even though they hadn't exactly been gentle with her. The werewolf had crushed her against the side door the entire drive back and Jack had accidentally bonked her head as he pulled her out of the car. She'd have probably been better off if they'd just left her alone.

  She looked young, maybe early to mid twenties. Her hair was auburn but it was matted in angel blood at the moment. She was slender and fit, and pretty enough for a girl who'd been living like a vagrant for the past month.

  Dick-eyes was busy setting up perimeter sweep shifts for the hell spawned creatures that had recently become a part of Jack's group. They'd found him and Dick-eyes as they searched the city streets of Chicago for the rape victim to be.

  At first, the sight of them put him on edge and he was certain he was in for a fight, but then he remembered some of them from his past life; they were here to help. They'd helped him in his past life rescue his son and he not only owed them a debt of gratitude, but he knew he could trust them with his life.

  They had all died for his cause then and they'd do the same for him now. It was reassuring to know that.

  How they'd found him without drawing any unwanted attention to themselves was nothing short of a miracle because they looked exactly like what they were: Beasts from hell.

  Getting them back to Wisconsin was a problem but Dick-eyes stole another vehicle and they each brought a load back with them. Each vehicle was packed like a clown car, but with hideous hell borne beasts and one skinny unconscious girl.

  They were lucky the cops didn't spot them and pull them over. Or was it the other way around?

  The werewolf was there and the pig, and the hyena too. The small bat-mobiles (bats with wheels for legs) rolled lazily along the ceiling, fast asleep.

  They'd had to house the white tiger in the bathroom because of its blow-hole on its back that spewed out a thick blood-like substance all over the damn place.

  He put the stupid goatraffe in the tool shed out back but only because it was a frickin' douche bag. All it did was say fuck off and spit at you. It was basically useless in battle.

  The clones were absent, which made sense because why would he need them on this mission? They looked nothing like him anymore now that he was no longer a man.

  The invisible female monster that had taken a shine to him wasn't with them either but maybe she was still upset that he'd shunned her advances the last time around. It was too bad because she had come in very handy being that she was invisible and invincible at once. She was the perfect shield.

 
Maybe she was here, just looking on like a love sick voyeur, but it was impossible to know for sure. But he imagined she wasn't here because she'd be groping his junk by now.

  The writhing mass of naked beautiful women was absent too but that was ok. Their usefulness was determinant on the enemy giving a shit about nude female forms. Lucifer wouldn't care about them the same way the guards at the facility had last year so their effectiveness would be nullified.

  The toad was nowhere to be seen, and Jack was glad for that. It was useful but it made him sick to his stomach. It was the size of a Volkswagen Beetle and it ate people alive, slowly and painfully. Then, when it was done swallowing, it would shit out a dozen or so tiny versions of the person it had just eaten. He'd seen it do just that and it nearly turned his stomach inside out. It had eaten an enemy guard and then shit out a bunch of little versions of him last year. The little guards then took up the fight, but for their side. Jack was relieved that it hadn't shown up.

  None of those absences bothered him much. What made him suspicious was the absence of the Karl Marx ant creature. That guy was a smart tactician of formidable size and speed who would've come in handy against a foe like Lucifer. Jack felt his absence more than all the rest put together.

  Oh well, they'd make do without him.

  Plus they had two extra creatures. One was a small black cat. He didn't know what unique skills it had but he knew when he found out, he'd be amazed, or more than likely, mortified.

  The other confused him even more so. It was a fat green, hairy caterpillar. It was as long and thick as a python, but cute rather than scary. He named it Mr. Pickles because it looked a bit like a pickle and sent it to stay outside in the backyard, only because he kept tripping over the thing. He had no idea what skill-set Mr. Pickles had but he was excited about the possibilities.