by N. P. Martin
“Wait, don’t go!” I said, springing to my feet.
But a second later, they had disappeared back to wherever they came from. I stared sadly at the empty air for a moment, crushed that my family had gone from my life once more.
Then, in my head, I heard my big brother’s voice as if he was still there. “Stop your whining, Gus,” he said, “and get the hell on with it.”
So I did.
55
Consumed
WHILE I WAS speaking to my family (or their Astral forms—I still hadn’t had time to process what had just occurred), Mr Black was hovering up by the hole in the roof, using his dark magick to rapidly accelerate Rloth’s entry into the world. Pure black energy belted out from his hands as he channeled it into the portal, ensuring the portal expanded and tore the sky further so the great Rloth could fit through. Rloth’s giant tentacle protruded from the mouth of the portal, looking like it belonged to some monstrous sea creature. However monstrous it was, however, I knew it wouldn't be anywhere near as monstrous as the rest of Rloth. Few people had ever laid eyes on a being like Rloth and lived to tell about it. Beings such as Rloth tended to live in the deepest, most primordial parts of the universe, unless, like Rloth, they created their own dimension for whatever reason. One of the oldest grimoires in my Sanctum contained pages that held a few rough sketches of beings like Rloth, and I can tell you right now, none of them are pretty to look at. (You want to know the kind of creature about to spill through that portal like a defective birth? Go read Lovecraft, a fellow magickslinger. His descriptions of Ctululu and the rest are based on fact.)
So this was it. The last stand before the world ended. Me against my demon father and an ancient being with power beyond imagination. You gotta love those odds.
I wasn’t even sure at the time what I was going to do to stop Mr Black. There was no real plan in my head, so I decided just to go with the flow and see what happened, although it did occur to me that fighting against Mr Black and his dark power wouldn’t get me anywhere and would only exacerbate the problem. The more I fought against him, the stronger Mr Black seemed to get. So now it was time to go all Gandhi on his ass and see where that got me.
The words of my family were still fresh in my head, telling me to tap into that love and compassion that kept us all together when we were younger. The more I focused on this, the more I remembered the terrific strength and bond that came with those feelings we had for each other, especially in the face of my father’s tyrannical and abusive behavior.
“Father!” I shouted, refusing to let any fear arise in me. Even when Mr Black spun around to glare at me, I focused on maintaining that sense of love and inner calm that I felt in the presence of my family just moments ago. And I knew, above all else, I had to trust in those feelings, the way I used to trust them as a kid, trusting that the light was always there for me to turn to, even when there was darkness all around.
Mr Black's leather smock billowed underneath him in the tornado-like winds that were gathering pace outside. His face changed when he realized there was something different about me. Which there was.
I was no longer afraid of him.
“Boy!” he shouted, his face twisting in anger. “Why do you never learn?”
I smiled at him then. “See, that’s always been your problem, father,” I said. “You always thought I didn’t learn anything. But I did learn. I learned exactly what kind of man you were. I learned about everything you are doing now. But most of all father, I have learned how to finally defeat you.”
Mr Black glared at me for another few seconds, then let out a scream of pure rage as he came barreling down through the air towards me, his hands thrust out so he could direct his dark energy right into me. And when the dark magick infiltrated, I made no move to fight against it or to counter the attack with one of my own. A part of me wanted to, of course, the part of me that wanted to react only out of fear, but I wouldn’t let it. The only thing I focused on was the light inside me, the light that grew from my love for my family, and from my joy at seeing them again after all those years. My father could never break that love when he was still human, even when he sacrificed my mother and brother and sister to that demon. He may have destroyed their bodies, but their love remained.
Inside of me.
A black mass of undulating energy was beginning to build up around me as Mr Black continued to fuel it with his rage. A dark, wet mass that spread up over my body like a rapidly growing fungus. “May the darkness consume you…son,” Mr Black said with a sneer on his face. A sneer that almost disappeared once I smiled calmly back at him.
“Creed!”
The shout came from behind me, and I recognized the voice instantly. It was Leona. Somehow she had found me.
I quickly turned around to see where she was before the dark mass running up my whole body prevented me from doing so. And there she was, standing just past the doors, her two Berettas pointed out in front of her, her face constantly changing as she tried to take in what was happening to me. When she realized I would soon be overcome by the dark mass enveloping me, her face relayed her devastation as she realized I was going to die.
Then, before I knew it, the creeping blackness had reached my face, and I was trapped in that twisted position as I looked around at the woman I loved more than anyone else in the world. I took that love, and I added it to the beacon of light within me, making it stronger, brighter.
"Creed," Leona mouthed again, tears streaming down her face.
I continued to smile, and then I became engulfed completely by the black, suffocating mass.
56
Light Against Dark
TRAPPED IN THAT thick mass of undulating darkness, I felt it worm its way into my every pore as it tried to consume every part of me, including my immortal soul.
And I let it. I let the darkness seep into me. Resisting it would have made it stronger while also weakening the light magick that continued to grow in me.
So I merely relaxed (which wasn't so easy, given I that was trapped in a suffocating cocoon) and trusted that the light magick would save me.
The whole time, I focused on a mental picture of my mother and brother and sister, as well as Leona. All the people that I loved the most in the world (I think even Uncle Ray was in that mental picture somewhere, skulking reluctantly in the background with Sanaka like reluctant subjects in a family photo).
Then I felt it. A steady vibration that seemed to emanate from my core as the light magick finally opened itself up and began to break down the darkness all around me as it extinguished it all with its divine illumination.
The dark magick resisted, screeching and squirming all around me, but the more it resisted, the deeper the light magick penetrated into it, eventually neutralizing and consuming it like it had never been brought forth in the first place.
At some point, I opened my eyes to find myself standing within a sphere of utterly beautiful bright light that had all sorts of colors (cobalt blues, sparkling reds, deep yellows and purples and oranges) swirling and crackling through it. It was like I was standing within the source of all creation, the source of all love in the universe. My soul cried out in joy as the light seemed to heal me on every level.
And then my eyes fell upon Leona, who was still standing by the doors, crying, a look of disbelief on her face, but also unmistakable joy and relief that I was alive. More than alive. Illuminated. A conduit for the divine, and no doubt a beautiful sight.
Then I turned around to face the biggest source of darkness and pain I had ever known.
My father.
Mr Black.
He was no longer in his demon form. Instead, he had taken on his old form of Christopher McCreedy, the tall, gray-haired man in the dark suit that I always remembered him to be. His face was full of fear. “My boy,” he said, flabbergasted by what was happening, by the power of the light issuing from me. It killed him even to look at me as the darkness in him was so repulsed by the light magick. Eve
n Rloth increased the frequency and pitch of his ear-splitting roars. The ancient being of darkness could sense the light below it, and it was afraid of its power.
I held my hands out. "Come to me, father," I said with only love in my voice. "Come to me, and we can end this darkness."
My father shook his head. “No! Never! Rloth will come! The world will end! I shall ascend as a higher power!”
The placid smile on my face widened. “No, father. You won’t.”
Tendrils of arcing light suddenly sprang forth from me like vines from a tree, attaching themselves to the body of my father, who screamed and struggled and tried to bring forth his dark magick again. But whenever he did, the magick was immediately snuffed out by the greater force of mine. The tendrils of light then pulled my father towards me, holding him at arm's length.
"Please, August," he said, genuinely afraid now. "I'm your father. Please don't do this."
Reaching out a hand, I gently stroked his cheek. "I should probably thank you. If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have gotten a visit from Mother and Fergal and Roisin.”
His eyes widened, and I thought I saw a hint of guilt in them, something I had never seen them before. “You saw them?”
I nodded. "They convinced me I could defeat you. And I have."
Before he even realized what I was doing, my hand had slipped gently inside his chest, emerging a few seconds later with a hard ball of darkness in the palm of my hand.
My father’s blackened soul.
He looked aghast when he saw his own soul held up before his eyes, and he started shaking his head, even tried to grab it back. But a tendril of light entwined around his wrist and stopped him.
“What goes around, comes around, father,” I said. “With all your power and knowledge, you would think you would know that.”
“August, please!” It was the first time I had ever seen him truly afraid. His normal psychopathic confidence had been shattered, and it rattled him to the core to see that I held his very life and soul in my hand. He had been on the cusp of gaining unimaginable power, and now it was all about to be taken away from him.
A terrifically bright white light began to beam from the palm of my hand so it could engulf the blackened thing I held. My father screamed as the light began to eat at his soul. "I do this out of love, father," I said. "Not for you, but for Mother, Fergal, Roisin and all the other innocent souls you murdered since.”
"NO!" Rays of bright white light began to shoot out of my father's body. The more of his soul that disappeared, the more light erupted from him, until all at once, his entire body exploded in a massive flash of blinding brightness, just as his soul did the same in my hand as it was finally reduced to nothingness.
I could hardly believe it, but my father and his rancid soul were now wiped out of existence.
Forever.
57
Resurrection
NEEDLESS TO SAY, the great Rloth roared out his dissent (to put it mildly) as soon as the monster realized its portal to Earth would be snuffed out of existence along with the power that was keeping it open in the first place. And as I stared up through the huge hole in the roof at the tumultuous sky and the swirling portal directly above me, I couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief when I saw that gigantic black tentacle begin to retract back inside the portal as the portal itself started to shrink in size.
Better luck next time, Rloth.
"Creed!" Leona ran up and threw her arms around me, and I hugged her tight as I shut my eyes, so glad to have her in my embrace again. Something that, for a while there, I thought I would never do again.
When she finally broke our embrace, Leona stared up into the sky through the gaping hole in the roof, a look of near wonder on her face as she tried to comprehend the otherworldliness of what she was seeing. “Is it going back to where it came from?”
“Yes,” I said. “Without He Who Shall Not Be Named around anymore, the portal can’t stay open. Thankfully, for us.”
She smiled and then suddenly pounded me on the chest with both fists. “That’s for going in here alone and not even telling me where you were going.”
“He would have killed you, Leona. You know that.”
She shook her head. “When we get out of here, I’m having a drink with you.”
“A real one?”
She nodded. “I think I’ve earned it after surviving this shitstorm.”
I went to smile, but a sudden thought kept the smile from my face. “Blaez!” I said, suddenly remembering the Garra Wolf.
Before I could run to find my loyal companion, however, Leona grabbed my arm. “Creed.” She shook her head. “I don’t think he’s—”
“No.” I emphatically shook my head. “Not Blaez. He’s stronger than that. No way.”
Pulling out of her grip, I hurriedly crossed the factory floor to the far end of the room where Blaez still lay motionless, the trident that had stabbed him now gone along with all other traces of Mr Black (except for the devastation the bastard left behind).
Tendrils of smoke still rose off Blaez's lifeless body. Blood that was a dark orange color pooled around the floor, seeping out of the three large holes on either side of his ribs. Staring down at the wolf, it felt like my guts spilt out onto the floor when I realized with sickening certainty that Blaez was dead.
"I'm sorry, Creed," Leona said, her hand on my shoulder. "I know how much he meant to you."
“How much he means to me,” I said, steadfastly refusing to accept the fact that there wasn’t something I could do to bring Blaez back. It was my fault he was dead, and he died protecting and serving me, the person who was supposed to keep him safe. “I’m not letting him go. Not like this. He deserved better.”
“He died defending you.”
“Exactly.” I stared down at Blaez’s unmoving body as a sense of stubborn determination began to fill me. “Leona, go check on the portal, see if it’s still closing.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to bring my friend back to life.”
Leona said nothing as she nodded and walked away, though I knew she thought I was being overoptimistic out of grief. Maybe so, but I couldn't just let Blaez die without at least trying to bring him back. I owed the wolf that much.
Kneeling on the floor, I reached out and gently stroked Blaez's still warm body, unable to keep from sighing when I felt how lifeless he was. "Don't worry, Blaez," I whispered. "I'm gonna bring you back, buddy. It's just you and me against the world, remember? I need you back here with me, buddy…okay?"
I wiped away the tears streaming down my cheeks as I forced myself to focus on the magick still flowing through me, the same light magick I had used to defeat Mr Black earlier. If I could channel some of that same magick into Blaez before it dissipated altogether (as it surely would, for such powerful magick does not hang around for long), I thought there might be a good chance of saving my once faithful companion. Bringing a body back to life again was not something I had ever done. It wasn’t the same thing as reanimating a corpse after the soul had departed the body, as with Necromancy. That was just like turning on a machine. Restoring life to a body in which the soul still resided was a different matter. Too much could go wrong (changes in the mind of the recipient usually, and not good ones), which is why I had always refrained from trying it.
Closing my eyes, I entered the Chaosphere and quickly went about channeling and shaping the magick into the form I needed it to be in. At the same time, I began chanting the words to the spell. The spell itself was Japanese in origin, so that's the language I spoke it in while I continued to focus everything I had on shaping the remaining light magick that still resided in me. Then, when I was ready, and the magick was formed, I allowed it to course out through my hands and directly into Blaez's dead body.
The magick itself was invigorating, so full of life and brimming with the possibilities of creation. A blissful smile appeared on my face, despite the grief I was trying to keep down.
When such powerful light magick flowed freely through you, it felt like you were channeling the source of all creation and that there was nothing you couldn’t do with it. Even bring life back to the dead.
When I had said the last few words of the spell, I opened my eyes and concentrated further on the bluish-white energy coursing out of my hands, and which now surrounded Blaez’s body, contrasting sharply with the deep orange blood still on the floor.
Then after a moment, I felt something.
Blaez's body bucked slightly as if I had just given him a jolt of electricity. Then it bucked again, more violently this time, so hard that I had to hold him down. "Come on, Blaez! You can do this! Come back to me, buddy!"
I watched in joyful wonder as the wounds in his side started to close over until they disappeared like they were never there in the first place, and I thought to myself, Yes, he’s alive again, he’s come back to me!
But then Blaez’s body went suddenly still again. “NO!”
“Did it work?” Leona asked, now standing behind me.
I shook my head in confusion as I took my hands off Blaez's body, the last of the light magick now gone from me. It didn't make sense. The spell should have worked. The magick should have worked! It was working, so what happened? I clamped both hands over my mouth and nose, unable to understand why I had failed.
Then, just as tears stung at my eyes again, Blaez moved, his ribs rising almost imperceptibly at first, then more noticeably as air began to fill his lungs. "Blaez!" I put my head down next to his just as the wolf opened its eyes. "Yes, Blaez, you're alive, buddy, you came back to me, Oh God, you came back…"
A huge smile appeared on my face as joy flooded into me. The big Garra Wolf rolled over and then stood up as if it hadn't just been dead a moment ago and was now looking at us wondering what all the fuss was about. As Blaez came forward, he put his head on my shoulder, rubbing his fur against my face in a gesture of gratitude. Throwing my arms around the wolf, I hugged it tight for a moment. "Welcome back, old friend," I said. "I thought I'd lost you there for a while."
