9 Levels of Hell: Volume 1

by Static, E. C.

  Clint gaped at him. “You can see them?”

  “I can see all sorts of things.”

  “We’re going to run.” Malina hurried back to Clint’s side. “Now. We’ll find another time and another way and we’ll get back here—”

  “There’s no coming back here if they see us.” Clint scowled at her. “If the entry to Level 2 is in this building, we either get through it now, or we never do.”

  Malina made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob. “Or we just die here.”

  “If we miss our chance to get through, we really will die here.”

  Malina just glared at him, her eyes bright with furious tears. She blinked, and they were gone, but it still made guilt coil around Clint’s heart anyway.

  “Look,” he said, “I don’t want to die either. But running because you’re scared is a great way to get shot.”

  “I’m not scared of anything. But I’m not going to let you kill my son.”

  She punched his bandaged shoulder so hard that Clint swore and nearly heaved the book at her. He clenched his fists, barely kept his cool.

  “This is excellent drama,” the kid informed them, his brown eyes gleaming. He had even materialized a little carnival container of popcorn to munch on. “I’m so curious what you’ll choose to do.”

  Malina whirled on him, fire in her eyes. “Then help us out, you little asshole. What kind of guide are you?”

  “The kind who listens to nice words.”

  Malina growled into her palms, then stormed off down the hall.

  “Malina!” Clint called after her. “Come back.”

  “Never split the party!” Virgil hollered. He gripped the air behind him like it was the edge of an invisible stage and pulled himself up onto it. The kid sat there, now slightly taller than Clint, and gazed down at him. He swirled his toes in the air lazily.

  “What are you going to do about that?” Virgil asked.

  “I’m going to look for clues in this before she leaves,” he said, thumbing through the pages, hunting for annotations.

  The boy seethed through his teeth. The missing tooth made a small whistling sound. If he wasn’t so fucking annoying, he might have looked cute.

  “Well, I hope you read fast. They’re just about here.”

  Clint glanced up from the book. The car engine had stopped outside before he even noticed. Now there was only the sound of rain, his heartbeat, Malina’s feet pounding down the stairs.

  Eerie silence outside, like the calm before war.

  “Who’s they?” he asked.

  “Who else? Florence and her buddies.” The boy’s pupils lit with that impossible internal glow again. His face cracked in a huge grin. “And she looks pissed.”

  CHAPTER 25

  B

  OOTS WASN’T REALLY DRUNK. HIS HUD even confirmed it. The status notification under his player stats said, Buzzed (+25% to all NRG losses).

  But, once he made his way to the edge of the track field and saw the look on his teammate’s face, he felt grimly sober. He didn’t know the kid well. Young guy, barely seventeen or eighteen. Malaysian or something. He spoke English better than Boots, but Boots didn’t need language to read the kid’s expression.

  He was pale as he offered Boots the binoculars. Terrified. The kid really thought he could go a few hours in Hell without fearing for his life.

  “Look,” he whispered. “They’re right there.”

  Boots squinted through the binoculars. The kid was right. A trio of silhouettes were visible through one of the upstairs windows.

  He clapped a heavy hand on the kid’s shoulder and said, simply, “Is okay.”

  The rain pelted down on both of them, cooling the back of Boots’s neck, grounding him. He felt like a cat watching a pair of mice scamper in the pantry—lazy, bored, confident he could kill the little rodents without a real fight.

  Still, Boots handed the binoculars back to the kid and tapped his radio. “Florence,” he said, which was enough for the kid to get what he meant.

  While the kid pulled his radio from his belt, Boots made his way through the hole they’d cut in the track field’s fence. He heard the kid hollering after him, but Boots just turned, put a finger to his lips, and kept going.

  As he walked, he eased his rifle off his back. The lower corner of his HUD lit up: AK-47 ( x30). He had a spare magazine stuffed in the side pocket of his backpack, but he wouldn’t need it.

  If he was quiet enough, he could sneak up and stab whatever silly low-level bastards were stupid enough to expect to leave Florence’s base alive.

  Boots slipped through the hedge separating the library from the school grounds.

  The leaves clung to him, drawing wet lines across his uniform. The mud sucked at his boots, and he grimaced down at it. He’d have to wipe them off before going inside.

  Imagine, being killed over a fucking mudprint trail.

  He crept up to one of the lower library windows and peered through with a single eye. Boots only let enough of his head show to get a glimpse of the inside.

  There was the lower floor of the library. Dusty study tables were marshaled between rows of library books on either side. Boots could just barely see the stairway leading up.

  Someone was running up the stairs. A woman, carrying a shotgun almost half as tall as her.

  Boots had seen her only once before, when she was charging across the street, lobbing a grenade at his teammates. He smirked.

  For someone who played as well as she did, coming here was a profound miscalculation. He didn’t even mind that she killed a few members of his party. Having fewer competitors was better, in the long run.

  And now she was going to get herself killed. A moth too close to the flame.

  Boots couldn’t help his grin. If someone had to get the XP boost for stealth-killing someone at her level, it might as well be him.

  He switched his radio off. If there was new intel, he would miss it, but that was better than being betrayed by the sudden crackle of an incoming message.

  As Boots stalked forward, around the building, every sound became amplified: the squelching mud, the pattering rain, the soft but distinct sound of voices inside. When he rounded the corner, the south-facing side of the building only had two windows, but they were massive, floor-to-ceiling.

  Boots craned his neck up to see one was still intact, but the other only had a few shards of unbroken glass dangling from the frame.

  The voices filtered through more clearly now. A man’s voice, calling something that was either a warning or a name: Malina, Malina.

  But Boots heard something else, too.

  A boy’s voice. That husky edge just before any boy’s first voice drop. He sounded smug and eager, even if his words were too indistinct for Boots to make sense of them.

  Boots dared a glance through the window, only showing a sliver of his face.

  There was that low-level bastard. Boots remembered his name instantly: Clint. The one who got under Florence’s skin, just for the insult of killing so many of her soldiers.

  Clint stood there, thumbing through a book, while some dark-haired Asian kid hovered beside him, sprawled on the open air like a particularly bored cat.

  Definitely not a player. Boots had never seen an NPC behave that way, even before Florence killed them all. Who the hell was that?

  Boots flattened himself back against the wall, out of sight, his heart pulsing fast in his throat. All the pieces slipped into place, and he realized those two weren’t as stupid as he thought.

  Of course. There was a reason they were willing to risk getting devoured by coming this close to the lion’s den: they’d found the way into Level 2. His theory was right.

  All this time, it had been sitting just a few hundred feet from their main base.

  Boots paused, weighing his options. He glanced back at the other guard by the fence. If he hadn’t just told the little bastard to call Florence, he would
simply knock the kid out and switch parties, if Clint and Malina would take him. Kill them if they wouldn’t.

  By the time Florence figured it out, he could be all the way to Level 2.

  He kicked the empty air and mouthed to himself, “Blyad.”

  There was only one good choice left now. And it was even better than killing Clint to win Florence’s favor.

  He could give her the chance to kill them both herself. Sacrifice the XP for the benefit of her smug approval. Maybe even get credit for discovering the way to Level 2, if he played it just right.

  Boots turned back and retreated the way he’d come, ducking low so he couldn’t be seen through any of the windows. He dared a glance through one just as the woman stormed back down the stairwell, facing toward him.

  For a moment, Boots was convinced she was about to lock eyes with him and point that shotgun straight at his fucking head.

  But she kept moving, down the stairs.

  Boots bolted back up the hill and through the fence, just in time to see Florence roll an armored humvee to a rubber-burning stop in the middle of the track field. She threw the truck into park and leapt out of the cab, her rifle already in her hands.

  Four of her highest-level players (minus Atlas, who was almost certainly passed out somewhere, napping off his drunk-effect right now) tumbled out of the truck after her.

  Including fucking Jeffery.

  Boots instantly scowled. Jeffery’s skin still looked a little reddish, and the grenade had burnt off his eyebrows, but the dick was up and moving.

  Florence must have burned a Full Heal on him, an item so rare Florence kept it in a safe not even Atlas knew the code for.

  A complete waste. Jeffery was one of the highest-level players in their party, but he was about as useful as a swimsuit in Siberia.

  Jeffery, as if sensing Boots’s irritation, gave him an insipid little wave.

  Boots just glared at him.

  “Are they still inside?” Florence snapped.

  The other guard looked at Boots uncertainly.

  Boots nodded, forcing his breath to even out.

  Fuck Jeffery. Fuck the irritation. At the very least, now he could watch Jeffery shake with envy when Florence realized what Boots had found for her.

  “No kill. They know.” He held up two fingers and grinned. “Level 2.”

  Florence’s smile matched his. It was manic and thorny as a wild rose.

  “Show me,” she said.

  Boots gestured over his shoulder and put a finger to his lips. He led the party down the slope.

  For a moment, he was lost in an old memory that never lost its edge: back when he was just a teenager, so scared and skinny his bulletproof vest looked like it was once his father’s, and Chechnya’s capital city burned all around him.

  That day, he learned the only truth that could carry him through life and death. You kill or you get killed. There is no other option.

  Boots held his gun like an old friend as he led the charge forward, into the library.

  CHAPTER 26

  T

  HIS WAS THE ONLY USEFUL thing college ever prepared Clint for: the maddest skim-reading session of his life.

  Clint’s hands shuddered as he turned pages wildly, looking for something, anything, that could be a usable clue. He could feel the kid hovering over his shoulder like a little sprite, clicking his tongue and urging him every few seconds with, “That’s definitely not it,” or “You’d better hurry.”

  “I am,” Clint snapped at him. He rubbed at his forehead, hard, trying to clear away the fog of frustration. “Sorry. You’re just not helping, doing that kinda shit.”

  “Do you want my help? All you have to do is ask.”

  Clint looked over his shoulder at the kid, who was sprawled out on his back in the open air, watching Clint with upside-down curiosity. Virgil looked like he was suspended by nothing at all; even his sweatshirt hung loose from his narrow back.

  “I thought you said you couldn’t tell us where Level 2 is.”

  “I did. But I didn’t say you can’t ask about something else.”

  “Think you could narrow down where the hell I’m supposed to look?” Clint said. Then, remembering Virgil’s comment about nice words, he added, “Please?”

  “Try the fifth canto.” Virgil grinned. “But that’s all you’re getting out of me this level. You know, the first girl who got through didn’t even need me to tell her.”

  Clint’s stomach burned at that. Something like jealousy. More like anger at himself for not piecing things together sooner.

  He flipped through pages until he saw a flash of pencil marks in the page margin. The barest annotation, something he never would have seen on his own before Florence filled him with bullets.

  A small, pale bracket framed the section’s first stanza:

  Thus I descended from the first circle

  Down into the second...

  There stands Minos, snarling, terrible

  He examines each offender at the entrance

  judges and dispatches as he encoils himself.

  “Minos,” Clint repeated. “We have to find Minos.” He snapped his head toward Virgil. “Who the fuck is Minos?”

  “What the fuck may be more accurate. But I already told you. No more hints.” Virgil rolled upright and looked him over smugly. “Except that one.”

  Clint rattled his brain as his stare skittered down the page, hunting for an easy answer.

  The description was vague and unhelpful. The rest of the page only said that Minos wrapped his tail around sinners to dictate which level of Hell they were destined for.

  “Minos is a snake? I have to find some sort of snake?”

  “Eh… kind of. Let’s call it close enough. You are a good reader,” Virgil praised him, sarcastically. “Death will be pleased.”

  Well, there sure weren’t any snakes in a fucking library. If they survived this, Malina would never stop reminding him, I told you we should’ve run.

  Clint swung his backpack off, ignoring the singing pain in his shoulder. He crammed the book into his backpack, then bolted down the hall.

  His gun banged against his left hip, and he fumbled blindly to feel that the safety was still firmly flipped up. Now would be the worst time to quite literally shoot himself in the foot.

  When he reached the end of the great hall of books, he froze. There, down the long corridor of the library’s entryway, he heard the low growl of a stranger’s voice. A woman, her voice as jagged as the broken windows.

  Florence. Fuck.

  Clint froze, already piecing together whatever shambling strategy he could. There wasn’t a shred of doubt in his mind: he couldn’t leave Malina here to die. Not after everything she’d risked for him.

  Florence snarled, “Tell me what the hell you found in here.”

  Malina spat back, “You can just go ahead and shoot me, because I’m not telling you shit.”

  Clint ducked down behind the nearest shelf.

  Virgil was already crouched there waiting for him, as if he had materialized the second Clint made up his mind to huddle down low.

  “I knew they’d get her,” he admitted to Clint.

  “What?” he hissed back. “And you didn’t stop her?”

  “Why would I?” Virgil blinked back at him with perfect confusion. “That would spoil all the fun.”

  “What fun?”

  “Watching you figure it out.” The kid’s grin was fierce and flickering as fire. “I never know exactly what’s going to happen until you make that last choice. And that’s the fun part.”

  A thousand questions leapt to Clint’s mind, but he had no time for any of them. He heard the crack of something heavy striking against skin and bone.

  Malina grunted and swore, but she said nothing else.

  Florence said, “This is your last chance to tell me.”

  Clint grabbed his rifle to double-check the ammunition i
n his HUD (x23), then gripped the Beretta holstered at his hip (x15). It would have to be enough to face down the war dogs of Hell.

  He slipped off his backpack and deposited it on the floor beside Virgil. “Could you watch this for me?” he whispered.

  “I won’t stop anyone from taking it, if that’s what you mean.”

  Clint paused. He swiped the irritation from his face and tried again.

  “Could you please watch this for me?”

  Virgil smirked. “Well when you put it that way… sure.”

  Perhaps if Malina weren’t staring down who-knew-how-many guns, Clint would have found the kid endearing. He pushed himself to his feet and padded down the rows of bookshelves, sticking close to the furthest wall, where he couldn’t be seen from the first floor.

  Clint moved on the balls of his feet, trying to lighten his weight. The sky overhead thundered and roared, and the constant patter of the rain was just loud enough that Clint prayed no one could hear the occasional dull creak of the floorboards beneath him.

  He eased closer and closer to the top of the stairs. No way to sneak down those. Clint crept to the end of the last shelf, held his breath, and then dared to lean forward until he could see the library’s entryway.

  Malina was on her knees, her hands pressed to the back of her head.

  Before her, Florence stood in a black leather jacket and a pair of tall boots. Her dense afro was dampened from the rain, but her eyes were taloned and gleaming in the darkness. She pressed an antique, gold-plated revolver to Malina’s forehead.

  Four other players gathered behind Florence, armed and armored for war.

  “I’ll give you one more chance,” Florence said.

  Clint raised his rifle and aimed down the sight at her. He inhaled, slowly, trying to make his gun as still as he could. He’d only have one good shot.

  The cold muzzle of a pistol bit into his neck. It felt heavy as a grave and just as chilling.

  Clint half-turned his head, just enough to see a man behind him, in his peripheral vision. He recognized those burning blue eyes, even in a fleeting glance.