I can't. Dying.
A cultist had removed a vial from his robes. He shoved a syringe into it and began pulling out a thick red liquid. "Give me that!" Torres ordered as he snatched the syringe away.
"You not die until I say so," Mordechai insisted. "Listen to your elders, boy. You have power to fight off zombie bite, just like you fight off werewolf when we met first time."
That was different. That was something I could fight with my hands. I was never infected by the werewolf.
"Of course not infected, because you are not monster now. You are Monster Hunter. Quit being stubborn and listen. Werewolf can't turn you. Zombie can't turn you. Vampire can't turn you, if stupid enough to get bit by vampire too you are. Regular Hunter, yes, but you? Different you are. You only turn if you give up."
So I can't die until I give up?
"No, that's just dumb. Turn, not kill. They can kill you just fine. Cut head off or blow up or set on fire, maybe shoot you in face, you die." He spread his hands as if balancing the scales. "Sploosh. Dead. Just like everyone else. But you are Chosen. Harder to kill Chosen unless he is being big baby. Certain things only you can do. Old Ones not realize who they're fighting with."
Torres jammed the huge needle into the nerve bundle between my ear and jaw and slammed the plunger down. The thick clump of liquid burned. Every muscle in my body automatically contracted with brutal force. The legs of the chair slammed back and forth on the floor. "Hold him!" Torres and one of the others grabbed me by the shoulders to keep me from flopping over.
Mordechai walked right through Torres as if he wasn't there, and I suppose in the twilight spirit world that my old mentor currently inhabited, he probably wasn't. Mordechai leaned close to my ear and whispered, "Don't give up."
The drug, or potion, or whatever the hell it was they shot me with pummeled my central nervous system like a jackhammer. The now-familiar black lightning was not just in my vision. It was colliding back and forth between the very fibers of my being. My body was a battleground, an undead virus was my enemy, and the prize was my soul.
"Never give up."
I won't.
"I know. That's why you are one who drew short straw."
Then I died. I think.???
I'd done this kind of thing enough times that nothing could really surprise me at this point. I was standing in the ornate ballroom at the Shackleford family estate. I was either in the past, before we'd blown it up and set it on fire while trying to kill Susan, or in the future, when we'd finally gotten it fixed, because the room was absolute perfection. The walls were covered in mirrors, giving the illusion that it was much larger than it really was, as each view doubled and tripled onto itself. The massive chandelier reflected the sunlight from the tall windows, causing the crystals to sparkle brilliantly. The hardwood floor had been polished until I could see my bedraggled reflection in it.
There was a man waiting for me in the center of the room. I did not know him. He was a head shorter than I was. The stranger was lean, but muscular, with long brown hair, muttonchops, and a mustache that extended to the end of his square jaw. He was in his forties. His uniform was made of creaking leather, with thick protective pieces over the torso and wrists, and a guard that pulled up over the throat to shield from bites, similar to our modern suits. While his archaic armor was battered, his guns were not. He had a pair of Colt Peacemakers with ivory grips holstered on a heavy-duty gun belt. The ammo stuck in the cartridge loops of the belt shined with old-school silver bullets.
The way he carried himself seemed vaguely familiar. "Who're you?"
"Somebody who's been sent to help. Mordechai kindly asked that I not let you pass." He had a very pronounced old Southern accent. "You ain't done yet. There's a mess of folks counting on you."
"I know."
"You best not fail them." He glanced around the ballroom, as if taking in something familiar. "I never liked this room. It felt snooty. It was for bunches of rich folk, gallivanting around in their fancy clothes, telling each other how important and pretty they were." He snorted. "But you know that it was always the most special to her, ever since she was a wee little thing."
He was talking about Julie. This was her favorite room in the old Shackleford plantation house. This was where we were supposed to have gotten married. The stranger hadn't picked this backdrop. I had.
"What am I supposed to do?" I asked.
"Damned if I know. Get back there and take care of business I suppose."
"I'm dying. I got bit by a zombie."
The stranger shrugged. "Cheat death then."
"Cheat?"
"If you ain't cheating, you ain't trying hard enough. That's what I always say. So pull your head out of your rear, get righteous mad, and get to killing."
"I will."
"Then what're you doing giving up and dying?" He pointed for the door, not that I'd walked in, but I got the idea. He was sending me back. "Them monsters ain't gonna kill themselves! You a Monster Hunter, or not?"
"I'm a Monster Hunter!"
"Good!" The ghost had a mischievous grin. "My boy always had a good eye for talent."
Okay. I was back. I inhaled for what seemed like the first time in eternity.
"Hang on," Torres said. "He's still breathing."
I wasn't normal. I knew that. That point had been driven home a long time ago. I had no idea what I was. All I did know was that I didn't want to die. Especially not like this.
The pain returned like a crashing tsunami. It was like being on fire and electrocuted and drowned at the same time. The virus, an incomprehensible curse from outside the boundaries of this world, pushed one last time to finish me. I screamed at the top of my lungs, a combination of fear, agony, and fury. My thrashing increased in intensity. The joints of the chair cracked. "Get help!" Torres cried as he tried in vain to restrain me.
The black energy swept through my body like a flash flood, burning, purging, cleansing, only this time I was the one in control. The lightning clashed with the virus. Then as quickly as it started, it was done.
The war was over.
The shaking stopped. My head flopped limply onto my chest.
"Wait!" Torres commanded.
The pain was still there. But now it was different, the fever had passed. I flexed my hands on the arms of the chair. I could feel again.
"Is he dead?" a cultist asked hesitantly.
"If he is, it's your fault for not getting the needle fast enough," Torres snarled. Fingers stabbed my neck. "Wait… I've got a pulse. And… it's really strong."
Thanks, Mordechai.
He was still in the room, waiting patiently. "Don't thank me yet, boy. Life ahead of you is hard one. Much work to do. Much sacrifice to make. Sometimes I see what's coming, and I feel very bad for you. No, no thanks for me. Someday you probably curse me for not letting you just die."
I heard the door open. It was a young woman's voice. "It's time. My father needs the sacrifice."
"Yes, mistress," Torres responded.
"What happened here? What was that noise?" she asked with a very proper, high-brow English tone. "Did you harm him?" That one question held a lot of menace.
"No, but we had to give him the shot your father gave us. Pitt was beginning to turn. He's passed out now."
"Lucky for him, pity for us. Come along then. Time is short." The door closed.
What now?
The ghost laughed. "Do what you do best, of course!"
"Come on, guys. Let's go." The chair lifted from the ground. There were three of them carrying me, and since I'm a big boy, they were still struggling. "Great Dagon, this son of a bitch weighs a ton. Careful," Torres admonished. "If you piss off Lucinda, she'll skin us all. Get the door."
Mordechai?
But there was no answer. He was gone.
I could think again. Had he even really been here? Had I been hallucinating? Had I really died again? Had I beaten the zombie infection, or was I just feeling better because of the shot?
"Hold on," he barked. He was holding the chair on my right side. "He's awake."
"Did you take Myers' treasure?" I kept my voice weak. "He told me to… keep it safe… from you."
"What treasure?"
"Some powerful…" I mumbled something else, too faint for him to hear. He leaned in closer. I risked a peek. He was at bad-breath distance. "Can you hear me now?" I whispered into his ear.
"What did Myers say?"
I bit his ear. I really chomped down on it as I jerked my head away. Torres screamed. The chair toppled, sending me crashing to the floor. Spitting his ear out, I jerked violently against my bonds, pulling with every bit of strength I had. The twine held, but I tore the arms right off the chair. I was free.
Cultist on my left, one behind me, one at the door. I swung my left arm, leading with a big chunk of splintered wood and slammed the nearest bad guy in the crotch. He doubled over and I threw an uppercut into his throat. My fist never contacted, but the chair arm did. He went down, choking.
A weight collided with my skull. I was too furious to slow down. I was up, driving my shoulder into the next cultist, taking us both across the room. I threw the smaller man into the wall, crushing him into the paneling. I slammed him in again, breaking his ribs. The last cultist rushed me, but ran directly into my boot as I side-kicked him in the stomach. Since I was twice his size, the kick put him on his back.
All four of them were hurt. I had to press my advantage quickly. Even as experienced as I was, there was no way I could take on multiple assailants in my sorry state. The one against the wall was wheezing, gasping for breath. I brought the chair arms down on his skull with terrible force, striking until the wood was nothing but splinters. The man I had struck in the throat didn't look like he was moving, but the cultist I kicked was trying to rise. Abomination was still sitting where Torres had left it. I scooped it up and charged.
He reached for his squid necklace, either to signal for help, or to activate some sort of magic, but I never found out what exactly, as I flicked open Abomination's silver bayonet and slammed it through an eye socket and into his brain. I yanked the bayonet out and he toppled, twitching to the carpet.
That just left Torres.
He was crawling across the floor, panicked, disoriented, holding his hand against the side of his head, blood streaming between his fingers. There were still loaded magazines in my pouches, so I reloaded, worked Abomination's charging handle, and put a round of buckshot into the chamber. Torres wasn't currently a threat, so I risked a quick peek out the curtained window. We were on the third story of the mortuary, overlooking the back of the graveyard. It was dark, but I could see quite a bit of the cemetery below. There was a lot of movement, robed figures with torches and flashlights moving between the mausoleums. Something big was going down out there. I let the curtains drop and got back to business.
"Hey, Anthony," I said, my voice cold and detached. My pistol was on the ground. He had seen it and was trying to reach it. I didn't plan on letting him. "Stop right there. Yeah, I'm talking to you." He kept crawling, making a kind of whimpering noise. Furious, I walked ahead of him and put my boot down on his hand. "Try listening with your good ear."
"How… how did you…" he gasped. Apparently that kind of injury was very disorienting. "You should be…"
"Dead?" I asked, as I tugged the cords from my wrists. "Eventually, but I'm busy right now. What's your boss up to?" I ground down on his hand. He cried out. "Start talking"-I put my bayonet against his back-"or I start stabbing."
Torres raised his head. He looked pathetic with one ear. "You can't stop us."
"Maybe, but I bet I can kill a whole mess of you in the process." There was a groan. I glanced over. Two of the cultists were stirring. Apparently every member of the Condition animated as an undead as soon as they expired. The one that I had stabbed in the brain wasn't going anywhere, ever, but the other two were going to be an issue here pretty quick.
"See… already my brothers are rising. The Exalted Order will never stop-"
I swung Abomination over and blew both zombies' heads off. The blasts were deafening in the small room. "They look stopped to me." If that didn't raise the alarm, nothing would. I bent down, grabbed Torres by the back of the neck, and jerked him to his feet. My strength had returned. In fact, I was feeling pretty damn good. Good.. and violent. "I've just got one question, Anthony. Why? Why'd you fall in with these people? Why'd you betray your friends, your country? Why?"
His eyes were windows into insanity. "I had a revelation. I saw the majesty of the Old Ones. I heard their songs. Their mysteries were-"
Screw this. I squeezed the back of his neck harder as I dragged him across the room. "Yeah. You know what? Never mind." I paused long enough to rip the MHI patch from his robe before shoving him against the window. The glass shattered, and he tumbled headfirst and screaming out of sight. There was a tearing noise and the screaming stopped abruptly.
I stepped forward. The damp night air was refreshing. The curtains billowed around me. Torres' crumpled body was impaled on multiple fleur-de-lis tops of an iron fence. Several other surprised Condition members had rushed to the body. One of them looked up and pointed my way. "It's the Monster Hunter!"
"Damn straight," I responded as I stuck the Velcro patch back on my armor. "That's more like it." Then I shoved Abomination out the window and fired the 40mm grenade launcher directly into them. Everything in the blast radius was torn apart by shrapnel. I turned away from the window, picked up the rest of my gear, and headed for the door.
I wasn't done yet.
Oh, no, not nearly done. I was just getting warmed up.
Chapter 20
Several Condition members tried to stop me inside the mortuary. I cut them down without remorse. Compared to monsters, whack jobs were soft targets. There was a phone in the hallway but it was as dead as the cultists. I was rocking another magazine into Abomination as I cleared the stairs and reached the back door. The cemetery stretched before me. A fog was rolling in and mist was collecting between the mausoleums. Spotted throughout the fog were bobbing lights, cultists moving to intercept me, and who knew what else was out there. The smart thing to do was probably run and hide, maybe find a phone and make a collect call to the Department of Homeland Security. Anything but go out there where the unkillable Hood and his minions were lurking.
But at the same time, if Mordechai had just been a figment of my feverish imagination, and the only reason I was operating at this tempo was that shot Torres had given me, that meant that as soon as it wore off, I would go back to joining the ranks of the undead. For all I knew, I was going to keel over any second. I had to take my chances. Whatever Hood meant by eternal night was already starting.
I went straight forward with no real strategy in mind other than shooting anything that moved. And there was lots of stuff moving. The grass was thick and wet, sliding around under my boots. The names on the tombstones seemed English, but I still had no idea where in the world I actually was. It was cool, but not cold. Looking at the stars, they were weird enough that I figured I was in the southern hemisphere, not that it mattered now. I was on my own. I headed in the direction with the most lights. Hood could see in the dark but most of his followers were human and could not.
Shapes appeared through the mist and then retreated from view as I swung to face them. I knew that things were watching me from behind every stone wall. I could only imagine what kinds of horrid beasts had joined up with the Co
ndition for their big moment. It made perfect sense. In a world without daylight, the creatures that we hunted would have an absolute vacation.
But nothing attacked. Cultists and creatures both hung back.
I reached the lights. They were the giant, portable, construction kind. Some huge project was taking place in the middle of the old cemetery. Bulldozers, dump trucks, and backhoes were parked off to the side. A giant hole, at least as big across as a football field, had been dug here, and it was obviously a rush job, completed recently. The ground had been churned into mud. Tombstones had been carelessly smashed into bits. The machines had cleaved right through the earth and I could see where they had just dislodged or cut cleanly through old coffins. Skeletal limbs were discarded and forgotten like bits of trash.
I approached the edge of the hole and looked inside. The mist was swirling in weird patterns. Strange insects cast giant shadows as they flew in front of the huge lights. There was something in the hole, something odd, but it was still covered beneath loose dirt and broken coffin bits.
Hood was standing in the center of the hole, waiting for me, arms folded. Standing at his side was a young woman, also wearing intricately decorated robes. Both of them had put on elaborate golden headpieces with all sorts of squiddy goodness and were wearing amulets that just felt unbelievably ancient.
"You didn't have to get all dressed up," I said.
"Those who mock shall mourn, unbeliever!" the girl shrieked. She was the one who had bossed Torres around. She was actually kind of cute, if you disregarded the whole diabolical, crazy-fanatic thing. "Your fate is sealed. Your time is done!"
Hood smiled and patted her on the arm. "You must forgive my daughter. The exuberance of youth, you know." She scowled but he ignored her with parental smugness. "Lucinda, my heir, meet the man who's been a thorn in my side. I'm happy to see you came here voluntarily. So you've decided to fulfill your destiny?"
"If my destiny is killing you, then yeah, guess so." There was motion behind me. Things were circling, surrounding the hole on all sides. I risked a glance over my shoulder. Cultists had approached from behind. The fires that I had earlier thought were torches had been other teleportation devices. All of his worldwide church had gathered for this event. "Nice hole. You dig this for me?"
Monster Hunter Vendetta mh-2 Page 45
