Devil's Kiss (38 page)

Chester floorboarded the truck, roaring toward the ranch yard filled with Satan-worshippers. As the last explosions faded, the pickup shot into the yard. Three sticks of dynamite sputtered in Sam's hand. Chester was sweating as he stole a glance at the lighted charges. Sam appeared calm. He casually tossed the dynamite in the middle of a startled group of men and women.

“Hard left!” he yelled, and Chester spun the wheel.

The explosions rocked the truck, sending bits of dirt and rock flying around them, along with various parts of human bodies. Sam tossed more dynamite as Chester completed the circle, returning to the scene of confusion, dust, and death.

The yard was in chaos, the moaning and yelling and deafening eruptions confusing the men and women. Sam let fly four more sticks of dynamite, blowing a half dozen members of Wilder's Coven to Hell—to the arms of their newly-adopted Master.

“May you live in eternal agony,” Sam muttered, then yelled, “Hard right! When you get to the far out-building, stop—we'll go it on foot.”

“Yes, Sergeant York,” Chester mumbled, spinning the wheel.

The yard was a smoking, dusty deathtrap. At the out-building, the men jumped out, automatic weapons yammering, singing a metallic death song set in .45 caliber tempo.

They left no survivors. Sam went to each downed, moaning, cursing person, ending their life here on earth, sending them to their dubious pleasures.

Then the yard was silent, the stink of death heavy/sweet in the dust.

The house was noiseless as Sam looked at it.

“There will probably be at least one of the Undead in there,” he said, touching a stake shoved behind his belt, “hiding in a dark place. Get a vial of Holy Water from the truck, Ches. I'll check the other buildings before we go into the house.”

With a fresh clip in the belly of the Thompson, Sam carefully checked the large garage, the barn, and the bunkhouse. All empty of any kind of life. Back in the yard, a half-naked woman, stunning and cursing, crawled toward a pistol on the ground, beside a dead man. She looked up at Sam with eyes that burned black hate. She cursed him loudly.

Knowing he was allowing a small meanness to grow in him, Sam let the woman crawl until her hand touched the butt of the gun. A half-second burst from the SMG lifted her off the ground, turning her, twisting her sideways, slamming her back, dead in the dirt, her bare legs spread obscenely.

The yard was silent, the air filled with the odor of blood and the sharp stink of relaxing bladders.

“I'll go in,” Sam said, refilling the clip with cartridges from his pockets. “Get this over with. We've got to get out of here. Those explosions will surely draw some unwelcome company this way.”

“You want me to go with you?”

“No. You watch for company. I'll do this.”

Sam slipped into the house, walking carefully from room to room, inspecting all the closets, all the bedrooms—nothing. In the kitchen, he found the door to the basement locked.

He knew, then, where he would find the Undead, and Sam was not at all happy at the prospect of venturing down into that darkness.

Taking a deep breath, he kicked in the door with his heavy Jump Boots, then fumbled on the side wall for the light switch. The basement burst into light, flooding the darkness with brilliance. Sam moved slowly down the steps, his eyes shifting from side to side, taking in all he could see of the cluttered basement. Behind a packing crate, in the far corner of the dirty basement, he saw legs protruding from behind the crate. Sam touched the stake in his belt and moved toward the legs.

The lights went out, plunging the basement into darkness.

A hiss and a moan from behind the crate, and Sam knew he was almost out of time. The Undead had sensed danger, coming to life in the dark as his Master turned out the lights. Sam heard the sound of feet shuffling on the floor. He fumbled for his Zippo, sparking the lighter into flame. The Undead hissed at the flickering glow, moving toward Sam, its mouth open, exposing fanged teeth and a blood-red tongue, grotesque in its thickness.

Sam sat the lighter on a box, lifted the Thompson, and pulled the trigger, holding it back. He started the burst at ankle level, the rise of the weapon lifting to the creature's face. Sam fought the Thompson, attempting to keep the line of fire from going too far to the right, the natural rise of the weapon in the hands of a right-handed shooter.

Sam literally blew the Undead to bits. Its left leg was shredded, dangling. One shoulder was gapped, pieces of meat and bone scattered about the basement. Half its face, its jaw, was missing from the impact of the heavy slugs.

And still, Bill Mathis, the high school principal, dragged its macabre being toward Sam, hissing and snarling and yowling, the hands outstretched, fingers working.

Sam fumbled for the canteen hooked onto his web belt, practically tearing the cap off in his haste. He doused the thing with Holy Water, and it screamed in pain as the water, blessed by Father Dubois, boiled on impact with Godless flesh, searing the dead meat, exposing the whiteness of bone.

Sam dropped the empty Thompson on the box, jerked the stake from his belt, and ran toward the thrashing creature, driving the stake deep in its chest. A horrible howling ripped from the mouth of the Undead. A stench filled the dark, musty basement as pus erupted from its throat, spraying Sam with foulness. Using both hands, Sam worked the stake deeper, until he pierced the heart. The un-Godly squalled in pain as it fell back against a wall, moaning and kicking as it died.

The lights came back on.

Sam stood panting, his chest heaving from fright and rattled nerves. He watched the metamorphosis take place as Bill Mathis finally died, the creature working its way back through time—only God and Satan knowing just how far back. Within seconds, only a rotting pile of stinking rags marked the spot where Godless met Godly.

Sam picked up his Thompson and his Zippo, bending down to ignite the pile of newspapers, watching them roar into flames. He walked up the steps, his back tingling, as if expecting a blow. He met Chester at the top of the stairs.

“I never heardsuch howling in my life. What in God's name was that?”

“Bill Mathis. He was one of them. Like Michelle.”

“Might account for so many of the kids going over to Satan's side.”

“Yeah.” His eyes touched Chester's. “I know, Chester, I stink. Come on, let's drag these bodies into the house. Burn them. That way we'll know they can't become what I just destroyed.”

As they dragged the twisted, mangled, broken bodies into the smoky house, Chester said, “I wish there was some other way. Can't people like these be helped, Sam? Isn't there some way we can undo what has been done to them?”

“I don't know how to exorcise an entire county, Ches. I really don't understand exorcism to begin with. But I do know it's got to be done one on one.” He piled another bloody corpse in the living room. The floor was beginning to get hot from the flames in the basement. “Unless God intervenes, I'm afraid this is the only way.”

Outside, the men stood away from the house, watching it explode into flames, the roof caving in.

“Don't feel sorry for them, Ches—they knew what they were doing; what they were accepting. They had a choice. It's nobody's fault but their own.

“Maybe somebody will see the smoke,” Chester said, watching the smoke soar into the sky. “Come to help us.”

“No,” Sam said. “Nobody will see it. A plane could fly a hundred feet off the ground, right over it, and would not see it. Their Master has taken care of that. We're in this alone, Ches. Better accept that fact.”

Driving away from the smoking ruins, Sam said, “Yes, Ches, they can be helped—but they've got to
want
that help. God does not expect man to be perfect, but He does expect man to try. Our God is a vengeful God, Ches. It's not wise to cross Him.”

“After we pick up the extra gas cans,” Chester said, “we'll stop at that old dump, pick up a couple dozen empty whiskey bottles. They make dandy Molotov cocktails.”

“Yeah,” the preacher smiled. “Mix a little flour with the gas and you've got homemade napalm.”

 

“I don't like the idea of you going out alone and—headhunting,” Wade said. “I think it best we stay together from now on.”

Late afternoon in Fork County, the shadows beginning to paint the rolling hills and prairies with a darker brush, the deepening gray reminding them all that night would soon be on them, and the evil that would surface with the darkness.

“I agree with Wade,” Miles said. “I think we'd all be safer in a—a—”

“Wolf pack?” Sam finished the sentence.

“Yes,” Tony said. “If that's what you want to call it.”

Sam rose from his squatting position, a freshly sharpened stake in his hand. “None of you realizes what you're in for—what you're saying. But perhaps you're right. We'll do this together.” He searched the prairie in all directions.

“What are you looking for, Sam?” Jane Ann asked.

“Some of the Undead. They're out there. I can feel them.”

The small group looked around them, fear touching each heart, brows wrinkling with concern. Hands unknowingly went to weapons, as if the lethal steel or the smooth stock or butt of the weapon would somehow comfort them.

“I don't feel anything out of the ordinary,” Jimmy said, but his hand did not leave the butt of the .38 belted around his waist.

“That pistol won't do you much good against the Undead,” Sam told him. “I put thirty rounds of .45 caliber ammunition into Bill Mathis. I literally blew him to bits with this Thompson. But he kept coming. They are not human, you all must remember that. They are not human, and they are not animal—they're dead people walking upright. I want you all to keep a canteen of Holy Water with you at all times. And a stake.” His eyes touched them all. “We took the fight to them this morning; we hit them where they live, and they can't allow us to get away with that. So they'll be coming at us tonight. For now, you all had better get some rest. Go on, I'll take the watch.”

He walked up the small hill above the cottonwoods where they made camp. He stood alone on the hill.

“I feel as though I should be up there with him,” Jane Ann said. “But I also feel he would send me right back down here.”

“He would,” Anita agreed. “Sam looks upon this as
his
battle—
his
fight. We're just his soldiers.”

“You should have seen him this afternoon,” Chester spoke from the shade of his pickup. “He moves like a cat. I did some work with Marine Raiders once; Sam is as good and probably better than those guys. I didn't believe anyone could come up behind me without my knowing it, but Sam did. And damn near scared me out of my pants doing it. But Wade is right: we're going to have to stay together.”

One by one they drifted off to sleep in the late afternoon. Jane Ann was the last one to slip into the silence of deep rest. When she finally closed her eyes, the thing she remembered was the outline of her man, alone on the hill, with his weapon, his stake, his Holy Water, and his God, watching over them all. Sam, calm, sure, strong—waiting for the night to bring the fight to him.

And the thought came to her: Sam would willingly die to save them.

She slept restlessly.

 

Sam touched her on the shoulder, bringing her out of sleep, her heart pounding. Full dark on the prairie. She could see only the bulk of him.

“They're coming,” he told her. “I've told the others. Get ready.” He was gone into the night.

Sam had changed clothing, into black, to blend into the night.

“We're awake, Janey,” Faye said.
I saw Sam, but I'll be darned if I saw where he went when he left you. The man moves like a ghost.”

A scream cut the night. A horrible choking sound; a cry of pure anguish, tapering off into a blubber of pain. Silence. They heard Sam laughing in the darkness.

“He's deliberately goading them!” Peter said. “He's killing them, then taunting them.”

Miles suddenly ran to the edge of the camp, a stake in his hand. “They're all around us!” he shouted. He stepped into the blackness.

A hissing in the night. A coughing thud. The thump of something heavy falling to the ground.

“MILES!” Doris shouted.

Screaming from out of the darkness, ending with a strangling sound. Miles backed into his circle of friends, his hands shaking.

“I killed one of—Them!” he said. “Oh, my God!”

The yammer of Sam's Thompson split the night. Things ran away into the blackness.