Spirit Breaker (3 page)

The bonfire reminded her that she wasn’t alone in the desolate shopping center. A shudder passed through her and the sense of terror returned. They’d brought her to this forsaken place for a reason. Somewhere in the darkened concourse, her abductors lurked.
 

And this made her think of Gary, his face covered in a mask of blood. Oh God, what had they done to him? Tears welled up at the thought of her boyfriend’s blood-streaked features and she stifled a sob. No, she couldn’t let them see her break down like this, wouldn’t give those bastards the satisfaction.

Her eyes bored into the darkness. There was no sign of her hooded abductors. Karen expected her kidnappers to show themselves and make their move any moment now, but the mall remained eerily still.

What the hell are they waiting for?

The answer to the question popped into her mind a second later:
They’re drawing it out, playing with me. This is some sick game to them.

God, she’d somehow stumbled into her own personal horror show.

Karen took a few cautious, wobbly steps, legs trembling beneath her, muscles still stiff from the Taser attack and prolonged period of inactivity. Her shoes clacked against the stone floor, echoing creepily in the cavernous space. With an unsteady gait, she approached the bonfire, the flames casting a hypnotic spell. Fire was greedily consuming her personal belongings: her Coach purse, Sephora makeup kit, Tiffany necklace, and iPhone.

“Why are you doing this to me?”
 

There was no force to her words, her voice breathless with terror. She paused, not really expecting an answer, and was rewarded with the explosive hiss of an aerosol spray can.
 

She pivoted, eyes searching, trying to determine the direction the sound was coming from.
 

Her eyes landed on a human silhouette. The figure lurked about thirty feet away, a shadow in the dark mall. The stranger just stood there.
 

Watching.
 

Biding his time.

Karen began to retreat, putting some distance between herself and the kidnapper. She reached a stone column and stumbled upon a message scrawled in bright red graffiti:
 

I SHOP THEREFORE I AM.
 

The paint bleeding down the wall was still fresh.
 

Karen shifted her attention back to the ominous figure in the hoodie, but he’d vanished.
 

Terror mounting, Karen continued walking away from the food court toward a row of shops. She vaguely recalled the main exits being inside JC Penney and Sears. If she could make it to either end of the mall…
 

Who was she kidding? They would never let her get away. Better to just stay put and face what was coming with open eyes. They were in control here, whoever they might be.

Another hiss emanated from a shadowy corner behind her.
 

A dark realization clawed itself into her manic thoughts: she was dealing with multiple stalkers!
 

She bit her lip to stave off her panic and tasted coppery blood. Words tore through her mind, and Karen realized it was a prayer.
 

Her pace picking up, she stumbled deeper into the former shopping center, catching a glimpse of another graffiti message. A skull. But there was something strange about the image. Where the teeth should be, there was a pattern of parallel lines of varying widths. Beneath the row of alternating thick and thin bars, she made out a series of numbers. Understanding flooded her scared face. The skull’s jaw was a barcode.

Karen remembered seeing this barcode skull on the news a few years back. Knew the deeper significance of the symbol.
 

Oh God, this couldn’t be happening to her.
 

She shook with panic as she yelled, “What the hell do you want from me?”

There was no answer. Instead wheels rippled over the stone floor, and two men in hoodies shot from the darkness on skateboards. The urban monks cut off Karen's escape, forcing her to retrace her steps.

A third hoodie stepped into the ragged patch of moonlight behind her, blocking the concourse. He was decked out in a spray-painter's mask—Darth Vader aiming for street cred.

Karen let out a choked scream when she spotted the long, curved knife in the hooded tagger’s hand.

The figure took another step toward her.
 

Karen snapped, adrenaline and fear propelling her into motion. She whirled around and broke into a run. She had almost reached the escalators when an invisible force stopped her dead in her tracks and whipped her back, sending her flying.
 

For a moment, she was airborne. Then she hit the ground hard, the world spinning around her. Stunned, she craned her neck upward, expecting to see hooded faces leering down at her. But she was…alone.

There was no trace of a human presence.
 

Her breath clouded in the air before her and she shivered. The temperature must’ve dropped by at least ten degrees. She crawled back to her feet and inspected her shirt. The strange collision had shredded the fabric. The skin beneath the torn blouse was mottled by a series of black burn marks, sensitive to the touch. Adrenaline was keeping the pain at bay, but Karen knew it wouldn’t last.
 

What was happening here?

Karen turned and saw that the hoodies had returned. They loomed in the near distance, outlined in the pale moonlight, a ring of wraiths barring her escape. Why had they given up the chase? Had they tired of this horrible game? And what had tripped her in such a violent manner?

A chilling whisper interrupted her racing thoughts.

“Death is only the beginning.”

Her heart pounding in a deafening drumbeat, she tilted her gaze toward the ceiling. She could feel her face twisting with horror, her lips distorting into a scream.

A vaguely human form hung upside down from the mall ceiling, suspended like a spider.

With a guttural shriek, the apparition launched toward Karen, bony hands hurtling toward her throat.

Karen screamed.
 

C
HAPTER
T
HREE

TALON WAS A man without a home. He constantly traveled the globe, devoted to his personal quest of keeping mankind safe from occult enemies. Before signing up for the dark missions that now defined his life, he’d been a Delta Operator and his work had kept him on the go in a similar fashion. In a way, this had always been his reality. His calling.
 

After dealing with Espinoza, the question was where he should head next. The world was his oyster nowadays. Every month, Casca transferred $25,000 into his bank account, payment for services rendered. The military had taken care of his needs for the last ten years, and Casca was fulfilling the same role now—albeit at a higher income bracket. Talon didn’t obsess about material wealth; he never would’ve become a professional soldier if money were that important to him. Nevertheless, he appreciated the freedom to go wherever he damned pleased.
 

For a moment he considered San Francisco. Staying close to Casca for when duty would call again might be a smart move. But San Francisco was filled with memories of Michelle, and he was just managing to put a little distance between his past and the present. Instead he decided to book a flight to Sarasota, where his old Army buddy Rob had embarked on a promising career in law enforcement.
 

The next day, Talon arrived in Florida and checked in at his hotel. Rob had invited him for dinner that night, and he was a little bit nervous about spending time with Rob’s wife and four-year-old son. He had originally figured they would grab some drinks the way they had back in the old days, but Rob wanted him to meet his clan. Talon couldn’t show up at his friend’s house empty-handed, so he proceeded to stop off at the local Toys “R” Us before dinner. Walking into the store, he was confronted with a new challenge: what to get a kid in 2015? He settled on a couple of Star Wars action figures.
 

Ringing Rob’s doorbell, Talon felt more nervous than he had when facing down the army of thugs in Mexico City. He could hit a moving target at 1000 yards but this social gathering was making him break into a sweat – he’d been out of the game too long. A dinner with Rob’s family should’ve been the most normal activity in the world, but over the last few months Talon’s definition of normal had irrevocably changed. His nerves calmed slightly the moment the door opened and Rob smiled at him. The sandy-haired baby-face clashed with the 220-pound frame, which now leaned in to give him a hearty bro hug.
 

“Man, it’s great to see you. Come on in.”
 

Stepping into Rob’s home, meeting his lovely wife Maria and his adorable kid, felt surreal. After months of wearing his armor, it was difficult for Talon to just sit down and fall back into the rhythm of civilian life. His friends had no idea about the occult war he was waging nowadays, but Rob knew first-hand the challenges returning soldiers faced. Thankfully, Maria turned out to be a delightful hostess and the kid was thrilled about the present. Two beers and a shot of Jack finally took the edge off the social gathering, and after dinner Talon and Rob relaxed in the living room while they watched the kid give the action figures a workout.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Rob told him.

“Someone has to keep the galaxy safe.”

Rob offered him another beer, and Talon popped it open.
 

“Thanks.”
 

They sipped in silence for a moment.

“Look at you,” Talon said. “You got it all. The wife, the kid, the picket fence. Who would’ve thought that crazy punk I met ten years ago would ever grow up?”

“Hey, I’m not that grown up. I got tickets to the Metallica concert next month.”

Talon grinned. They had bonded over their love of the hard rock back in the Army. Two wild kids ready to protect the world and make a difference. In their own way, they were still doing so.

In the days that followed, Talon and Rob tried to hit up every watering hole in town while reminiscing about the past. During the day while Rob was at work, Talon visited Siesta Key beach for long walks and even longer swims. The Gulf of Mexico was warm, the salt water soothing his injury. While he sliced through the bobbing waves with powerful strokes, the ocean stinging his eyes and the sun beating down on him, he let his thoughts wander. For a moment, the horrors seemed far away. The natural beauty of this tropical paradise didn’t seem to allow for the existence of demonic villainy. Talon knew it was an illusion, but he welcomed it anyway.
 

He also couldn’t help but notice the tanned, bikini-clad beauties who filled the beach at all times of the day. The week he spent with Kristin in Norway had reminded him that he was still a man with needs. Even though his heart would always belong to Michelle, he could allow himself to draw momentary comfort in the arms of another.

After a week of the lazy life, he returned to his hotel one day to find a message on his cellphone. Casca had left instructions to check out a few Internet links he’d forwarded to Talon’s email account. Judging from the urgent tone in the billionaire’s voice, the lull in the fighting was over.
 

C
HAPTER
F
OUR

AS SOON AS Talon finished listening to Casca’s message, he checked his email and clicked the links in question. They routed him to three videos hosted on a website that showcased material too edgy and dangerous for YouTube.
 

Talon played the first video. A skull and crossbones image flickered against a black background, and Talon noticed that the skull’s teeth had been replaced with a barcode. A beat later, a shot of a parked Mercedes filled the screen. Three guys decked out in faceless hoodies sporting crowbars and baseball bats closed in on the luxury car and went medieval on the vehicle. The car alarm wailed. The sheer aggression on display was raw and real and in your face. Metal twisted, glass spiderwebbed. Canisters of spray paint hissed, streaks of color bleeding over the luxury vehicle, leaving behind crude graffiti of pentagrams and inverted crosses.
 

The camera zoomed in on the Mercedes and revealed a screaming driver cuffed to his steering wheel. One hoodie liberally sprayed him with lighter fluid while another tossed a match into the car, igniting the driver. The bone-chilling screams of the human torch echoed.
 

Part of Talon wanted nothing more in the world than to kill the video. But he forced himself to endure it to the bitter end. Casca had sent him the link for a reason. He needed to know who his new enemy was.

The next video showed variations on the same barbaric theme. A group of ratty skater punks circled two terrified men dressed in expensive suits. They projected an air of wealth and power, and Talon thought they looked like they might be bankers or lawyers. The hoodies destroyed their cell phones, Rolex watches, and tablets before turning their attention toward the well-heeled professionals themselves. The video spared no details as aluminum bats connected with the hapless victims. Pitiful pleas for mercy alternated with grunts of pain.