by Barry Reese
“Are you okay?” she asked—a bit stupidly, she realized, for Vincent left a trail of blood on the wall as he slid to the floor. He toppled over onto his back, and Jenny gasped as she saw a huge hole in his chest, the result of something very sharp having been jabbed through his dense skin.
Jenny looked up to see an aristocratic man dressed in black holding an oversized spear in his left hand. Beneath a thick moustache, the man’s lips were curled up into a cold smile.
“A patchwork man,” Dracula said aloud, humor lacing his words. “A monstrosity like that won’t have any place in any world ruled by me.”
“Is he… dead?” Jenny asked, her eyes flicking back down to Vincent. Frankenstein’s creature didn’t appear to be breathing, and the ragged edges around the hole in his chest were crisping and peeling away, like the end of a lit cigarette. Whatever foul magic was held in the tip of the Spear of Destiny, it was slowly eating away at Vincent’s flesh.
“He was already dead,” the vampire hissed. “I could have probably controlled him with the Spear, but I have no use for something whose blood is pumped by foul science alone. It is life’s blood that I crave!”
Jenny swallowed hard and took a step back as Dracula came towards her. He hissed like a cat, and his body seemed to shift, becoming mist. This, she realized, had been how he’d snuck up on Vincent. The cloud of mist enveloped Jenny, and for a moment, panic surged through her. She wanted to scream, but a horrifying image of Dracula entering her body through her nostrils and mouth made her pause. She held her breath instead and closed her eyes, calling upon the strange abilities she possessed. Other than the uncanny ability to jump through time, she wasn’t sure what else she was capable of—in different places and times, her powers manifested in different manners.
This time, she felt her body shift through space, and when she opened her eyes, she was outside the tunnels. She was standing on the streets of Paris, a block or two away from the entrance to the labyrinth beneath the streets. Though she was pleased to be safely away from Dracula, she knew that Vincent and the others were now trapped with the enemy. She thought about using one of the communicators that Max had given her, but the Claws team had quickly discovered that they worked erratically in the tunnels of the dead.
Instead, Jenny closed her eyes again and thought of her new friends, and she prayed she could reach them in time to warn them of the trap they had stumbled into.
* * *
“Something’s not right.” Rachel Caine held her hands to the side of her head, a soft glow of emerald surrounding her eyes. “I can’t reach any of the others… not even Nathaniel. And I can always hear him in my head!”
Revenant pursed her lips and squeezed the guns she held a little bit tighter. She knew that Esper was one of the most powerful telepaths on the planet, and if something was blocking her powers then it was very serious, indeed. The two women had heard soft murmurings ahead of them and set off in pursuit, but now they were moving much more discreetly, with Revenant at the lead. The tunnels were so narrow that it was impossible for them to stand side by side.
“What could cause that?” Sally whispered. “Another telepath? Magic?”
Esper shrugged in exasperation. “Damned if I know.”
Revenant tilted her head to the side. Up ahead the tunnel widened, and there was a flickering of light that indicated a torch was being used for illumination. The soft, rhythmic slap of flesh against flesh was instantly recognizable, and Sally heard a young female voice moan the words, “Uncle Alf.”
Esper was close on Sally’s heels as Revenant peeked around the corner and let out a silent gasp. An attractive nude woman was sitting astride Adolf Hitler, the Fuehrer’s pants pushed down around his ankles. He was reaching up to squeeze her bouncing breasts, and his mouth was hanging open, revealing his sharpened canines.
While Sally was watching in mute astonishment, Rachel was springing into action. The sight of this man who had caused so much pain was too much for her, and she rushed into the room, kicking Hitler hard in the face.
Hitler’s niece screamed and scrambled away, grabbing at her clothing that had been discarded on the floor. She pulled it up over her breasts and cowered in the corner of the room, looking like a frightened little girl. The Fuehrer, meanwhile, recovered very quickly. Esper’s attack hadn’t harmed him in the least, and he reached out and grabbed hold of Rachel’s ankle, squeezing with such force that the red-haired woman howled in agony. Revenant heard the horrific grinding of bones that indicated that Esper’s ankle was being ruined in the madman’s grip.
Sally moved forward and squeezed the triggers of her guns. The silver bullets that her gun held were soaked in holy water before being slid into their chamber, and as the bullets tore into Hitler’s flesh, he began to burn. Tossing Rachel aside, Hitler scrambled up to his knees. Still nude, the Fuehrer cut an almost comical figure as he bared his teeth and hissed. Sally didn’t laugh, however, as the Fuehrer threw himself at her and knocked her to the floor. Her arms came up in the nick of time to prevent the vampire from tearing out her throat, but she knew she wouldn’t hold out for long—Hitler’s vampiric strength was too much for her.
Rachel was on her knees, tears streaming down her cheeks from the pain in her shattered ankle. Though she wasn’t able to sense the others telepathically, that didn’t mean that she was completely powerless. She stared daggers at Hitler, calling upon her telekinetic abilities. The vampire was yanked off of Revenant and slammed against the wall. A number of skulls embedded in the stone shattered at the impact and others tumbled to the floor.
Hitler was given a moment of respite as Rachel’s concentration faltered from the pain and Sally struggled to catch her breath. He turned his gaze upon his niece. “Geli! Run! Find Dracula and tell him that I’ve found some of the Peregrine’s pets!”
Geli stared at her uncle’s wounds, noting that they were still smoking. She finally took her uncle’s command and fled down another passageway, but she didn’t get far before running straight into the Lord of Vampires.
Dracula caught her in his arms, the Spear of Destiny slung over his back and held in place by a leather strap. “Girl… what terrifies you so?”
“Uncle Alf,” she said between gasps of air. “He’s in trouble. Two women came in and attacked him. He called them the Peregrine’s pets…”
Dracula’s eyes roamed over her exposed flesh and he felt the stirrings of lust as he did so. Realizing that now was not the time for such things, he pushed her aside and smiled coolly. “Then I’ll have to dispatch them as easily as I did the monster down the hall.”
* * *
Jenny Everywhere opened her eyes, panting heavily. She hadn’t been too sure where she’d come to, having only pictured the entire Claws team rather than any particular member. She’d hoped to appear wherever she was needed most, and her powers frequently allowed her such freedom.
What she found was like something from a nightmare.
Vincent had been dragged into the same room where Revenant and Esper lay bleeding. Rachel’s throat was a bloody mess, and she lay on her back twitching, her eyes staring blankly at the ceiling. Sally appeared to be in better shape, though she was on her side, her mouth hanging open, with a thin trail of blood running down her chin. The ragged nature of her breathing led Jenny to suspect that the team’s leader had sustained at least one broken rib.
Vincent’s body was a shriveled mess, looking like it could crumble to ash at any moment. The expression etched on his face was one of pain and agony, and it broke Jenny’s heart to know that his last moments on earth had been spent wondering if he would ever find true love.
Jenny started to “jump” back to Max and tell him what had happened, but then she remembered that there was still one member of the Claws team who was missing. As if on cue, a warm hand settled on her shoulder, and she whirled around, fully expecting to come face-to-face with Dracula again. Instead, she saw the worried face of Nathaniel Caine. He was steadfastly avoiding looking at h
is wife’s bleeding body.
“I’ve done as much as I can do for them,” he said wearily. They were near death when I found them. Rachel and Sally should live… but I couldn’t save Vincent.” Nathaniel looked downwards, a single tear catching the light, hanging on the tips of his eyelashes.
“Where are Dracula and Hitler?”
“Around here—they’re not far, actually. But I’m too spent to go challenge them at the moment. Give me ten minutes and I’ll be up for it. Healing people takes a lot out of me.”
Jenny was about to suggest that they take their friends out of here and contact Max when the walls around them began to shake, and a horrible sound filled her ears. It was like someone was waking from a deep slumber, one that had ended in a terrible nightmare.
“What’s going on?”
Nathaniel watched as the sunken orbs in the skulls around them began to glow. In the deeper burial chambers, bodies were beginning to stir, and all over Paris, the call had gone out: the dead should rise and serve their new masters. “Dracula’s decided it’s time for Endgame. He’s calling forth the Parisian dead.”
Jenny screamed, backing up against Catalyst as a skeleton staggered into view, its claw-like fingers extended forward, raking at the air. “Crap,” she whispered. “We’ve got to get out of here.”
Catalyst nodded, calling upon what little power remained to him. He formed a barrier of light around himself, Jenny, and his fallen comrades. All of them vanished, leaving behind a set of catacombs growing increasingly noisy as the dead continued to stir.
The heroes emerged from the teleportation spell two blocks from the entrance to the underground area. They were atop a building, staring down at the city streets. There were no dead to be seen here, but off in the distance, screams, sirens, and gunshots were beginning. They would be joined by more soon enough, Nathaniel knew.
“This isn’t right,” Jenny said, and Nathaniel noticed for the first time that her innate optimism seemed tinged with genuine doubt. “I came back here to help save the world… but this isn’t looking too good.”
Nathaniel didn’t know what to say to that, so he simply knelt at his wife’s side and checked her pulse. Her bleeding was slowing and he could see that the spell he’d cast was continuing to work on her wounds.
When he looked back at Jenny, she was standing on the very edge of the building, a determined look having replaced her expression of doubt. “Mr. Caine?” she asked.
“Nathaniel,” he corrected.
“Nathaniel,” she said, nodding and turning to look him in the eye. “Let’s stop playing around with these guys. It’s Hitler and Dracula, backed by an army of the dead. We really need to kick some ass.”
Catalyst found himself smiling, despite the hopelessness of their situation. “I’ll go fetch the Peregrine—and you still have your communicator?”
“I do.”
“Then use it to call Leonid Kaslov. He’s being held in reserve. With the Claws team out for the count, we’re going to need him.”
Jenny gave him a thumb’s up. “And then we kick ass?”
“And then we kick ass.”
CHAPTER XVIII
Old Foes, Reunited
The bistro’s sign read Maurice’s, and from the dingy exterior, the Peregrine supposed that it had been out of business for quite some time. Max stood just outside the front door, the Knife of Elohim held in his right hand. The mystic blade glowed in the presence of evil, and right now it was burning like the sun.
Up above, the moon hung fat and bloated in the sky. It was still hours from sunrise, but Max wasn’t sure that the presence of the sun would do more than annoy Dracula at this point. With the Spear of Destiny in his possession, sunlight would most likely never pose a true threat to him. He’d gone over again and again the history of the Lance, as presented to him by Bella and Zadak. Their call had filled in some of the gaps in his own knowledge, and he was pleased to know that, if the Spear could be wrested from Trench, that it could be used as a force for good.
Jacob Trench.
The name evoked many memories for Max. He’d only been in Atlanta for a very short time before Trench had embarked on his mad scheme to unlock Lucifer’s Cage. The Peregrine’s pursuit of the villain had led him into the arms of Evelyn for the first time, and together they had journeyed to face Trench in Germany, where the madman’s pursuit of power had led him to giving up his body for demonic possession. In the end, Trench had rejected his devil’s bargain, turning against the devil inside him. Trench had died and the world had been saved, but in many ways it had only been the beginning for Max. Whereas before he’d split his time between battling the supernatural and more common street crime, the years after had seen him increasingly plagued by ghosts, vampires, and demonic entities.
Now he was back and, according to his father, powerful enough to have struck down both Dracula and a vampire version of Hitler. While Trench was very clever and dangerous, it didn’t seem likely to Max that Trench could have pulled that off.
The Peregrine couldn’t shake the feeling that something was very wrong about all this, but that had definitely been his father who had appeared before him, and despite all their problems, his father never lied when it came to matters of justice.
Max strode to the front door, which was boarded up with a “No Trespassing” notice placed on it. He raised his right foot and drove it hard against the door. It cracked open but remained impassable. A second kick smashed it open, however, and the Peregrine stepped in, the Knife illuminating his surroundings. The main area of the bistro featured a checkered pattern on the floor, several cobweb-covered tables and chairs, and a small counter where orders had once been placed. As the Peregrine moved around the room, he heard the sounds of clapping coming from behind him, in the direction of the shattered door. Max spun about and came face-to-face with Jacob Trench.
Trench was no ghost - that much was certain. This was Max’s old foe, standing there in the flesh. He looked no different than he had ten years past, when Max had put down like a rabid dog.
“Bravo, Max. You always play your part so well in these little games of death.”
The Peregrine stared at Trench, his voice low and deadly. “Why go to all the trouble of coming back to life, Jacob? Did you enjoy having me kill you so much that you wanted to experience it again?”
The smile on Trench’s face faded somewhat. “You ruined years of planning, Max. You stopped me from becoming a god.”
“I think your memory is addled. You turned against the demon that was hosting your body, remember? You realized that you were nothing more than a tool for him to use for his own purposes. You were never in control.”
“I would have worked it out! I would have taken possession of my body again, but you made me feel weak. You manipulated me!”
The Peregrine saw a definite glint of madness in Trench’s eyes, and he knew there was no reasoning with the man. It was quite telling, however, that Trench was not holding the Spear of Destiny. Where was the unholy weapon?
Trench didn’t give him much time to wonder about that, however. “You’re never leaving here alive, Max. But the worst thing for you isn’t the fact that you’re going to make your wife a widow—it’s that your torment is only just beginning with death. You’ll be revived by Dracula to serve in his army of the dead, alongside these horrid creatures!”
To punctuate his words, Trench stamped his foot on the checkered floor, and from behind the counter shambled five monstrous members of the undead. Three of them were men and appeared to have been dead for quite some time. Little flesh clung to their bones now, and their clothing was nothing more than loose tatters that drooped from bony shoulders and arms. The other two zombies were women, and were much fresher. Aside from the unhealthy tint of their skin and the gaping wounds at their necks, they could have almost passed for the living. Their own dresses were ripped and torn, allowing their breasts to occasionally slip into view.
The Peregrine processed Trench’s words
in the split second before he took action. Trench had mentioned Dracula, meaning that the vampire was hardly removed from the playing field. This meant that Max’s father was either wrong in what he had said… or he had lied.
Knowing that now wasn’t the time to worry about that, the Peregrine ran forward and jumped up onto one of the dusty tables that stood on the center of the bistro floor. He used the tabletop as a prop to propel himself higher into the air. As he danced through the air, he drew one of his pistols and began firing, blitzing the zombies with specially-modified ammunition. The bullets ripped tremendous holes in their rotting flesh, and when Max returned to the ground, he was now less than three feet from Jacob Trench. Whirling around to face Trench, the Peregrine tossed the Knife of Elohim, catching Trench in the left shoulder.
As Trench reached up to yank the Knife free, he began to scream. The mystic blade did extra damage to those with evil spirits, and Trench certainly qualified. As his palm wrapped around the hilt of the dagger, his flesh burned, producing a sickly sweet odor that filled the room.
The Peregrine was unable to finish off Trench during this moment, however, for the zombies were still moving towards him, despite the fact that one of them had a hole in his face big enough to shove a fist through. Max pulled forth his other gun, giving him one in each hand. He strode towards the undead, squeezing the triggers of his pistols as he did so. The zombies weren’t much for dodging, so his bullets found their intended homes again and again. As he’d taught Sally to do, the Peregrine soaked all his silver-tipped bullets in holy water, and the effects they had were dramatically increased as a result. He blew apart the undead horde until they were unable to rise from the floor, leaving them as nothing more than twitching pieces of human meat.
In his younger days, scenes such as this sometimes unnerved Max. The human mind, after all, was not normally conditioned to viewing the shambling undead. But all things could become familiar in time, he had come to realize—even something as horrible as this.
