The Brimstone Network (Brimstone Network Trilogy) (23 page)

“We have to figure out a way to keep the casing from breaking down,” Bram announced, sparks of magickal energy flying harmlessly through his ghostly form.

Stitch came closer.

“Maybe a containment spell.”

The patchwork man grunted suddenly; his clothing was singed by the supernatural energy, his pale flesh starting to be burned away.

“Get back,” Bram ordered. “It’s too late for that now.”

The situation was going from bad to worse, the surface of the case now bubbling like candle wax.

Think, Abraham, think.

Through the wavering energy thrown from the surface of the case he saw Bogey attempting to come closer.

“Maybe we should get the heck out of here!” the boggart yelled in panic as he started the process of weaving an exit for them.

It then dawned on Bram, the pieces of the puzzle suddenly falling into place. It would be a long shot, but maybe …

“Dez!” Bram called. The wheelchair-bound boy didn’t look so well, his face beneath the nose stained with dried blood.

He pushed himself up in the chair, listening.

“I need you to lift this,” Bram told him, pointing toward the deteriorating case. “Can you do that?”

Dez looked to his father, who was shaking his head, trying to convince him otherwise.

“Yeah,” Dez finally answered, ignoring his father’s pleas. “Yeah, I can. Where do you want me to put it?”

He held up a ghostly finger signaling for him to wait.

“Bogey can you open a doorway to a place where this won’t do any harm?”

The boggart’s already large eyes became enormous. “I … I don’t …”

“C’mon, think of a place. You had to have come across a dead world in your travels. It’s our last chance.”

The tiny creature snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it. Went there on one of my first rifting trips, didn’t know what I was doing or where I was going. Nasty place that died a long time ago after some big war or something. My people call it the Bleak.”

More and more of the deadly supernatural energy was
escaping. It wouldn’t be long now until the entire surface of the case melted and broke away, exposing the dangerous contents to the outside world.

“Do it,” Bram ordered. “Open a rift to the Bleak.…”

He looked over at Dez.

“Now!” he ordered.

The boy closed his eyes, concentrating on the metal case.

At first, Bram didn’t think it was working, that for some reason Dez was unable to lift the case, but it started to move, lifting up from the platform.

“That’s it,” Bram said.

He looked over to see that Bogey had opened the portal. Bram caught a brief glimpse of the world on the other side—the world called the Bleak—and he understood why it was called that. It was an ugly, cold-looking world with gray skies and a barren landscape.

There wasn’t a sign of life anywhere.

Perfect.

The floating crystal case started to vibrate, streams of white-hot energy escaping from its pocked and melting surface. They had to do this quickly; it wouldn’t be long before the child’s full power was unleashed upon the world.

And then Bram caught sight of the little girl’s face
through the glass of the cracked and singed portal on the front of the containment shell. She couldn’t have been any more than eight years old.

“Bram!” Dez screamed. He was sitting rigid in his wheelchair, his father’s hand clamped firmly upon his shoulder. “Where do you want me to put this thing?” he asked, his face strained with exertion. His nose was bleeding, running down his face to stain the front of his shirt.

Bram pointed to the rift. “Hurry, Dez,” he urged.

They were running out of time. Large cracks had started to appear in the surface of the container. Bolts of power like lightning shot through the jagged fissures incinerating the platform wherever they touched.

The case began to glide toward the open rift.

This just might work
, Bram thought. He stepped back and tried to relax enough to return to his material form.

The case was inches from the opening now.

“You’re doing great, Dez. Almost there … ,” Bram encouraged.

“No … pressure,” the boy grunted. The blood from his nose was flowing faster.

It was hurting him, but Bram could see no other choice. He would just have to hurt for a little bit longer and then …

Something exploded up through the center of the platform, and it couldn’t have come at a worse moment.

Tobias and Crowley spun through the air, locked in combat, magickal force blasting from their hands as they fought to the death.

“Keep going!” Bram screamed, running toward Dez.

Stray bolts of magickal fury rained down upon the platform and the floor in front of Dez’s chair exploded with such force that both he and his father were violently tossed back. The case dropped to the floor, shattering the remains of the fragile shell.

A pitiful cry drifted out of the case as the child within slowly sat up, looking around with fear-filled eyes. “Tobias?” she called. “Tobias, where are you?”

Distracted by the wailing sound of his sister’s voice, Tobias turned away from his battle with the black mage. Bram immediately saw the look on Crowley’s battered features; a look that said his moment to strike had come.

“Tobias, look out!” Bram yelled, but it was too late.

Crowley’s clawed spider limbs moved with incredible speed, slicing through the back of the unsuspecting magick user.

Tobias dropped down to the platform and lay very still.

Purely on instinct, Bram released his physical form and drifted up to float before the black magician. “This is done now.”

“It’s only just begun.” Crowley had spun to face Bram, a smug smile on his battle-ravaged face. But his expression quickly turned to one of disbelief as he gazed down to find that Bram’s hand had ghosted through his robes and into his chest.

“For you, it’s done.” Bram solidified his hand within the sorcerer’s chest, squeezing the monster’s black heart with all his might. He’d never touched anything that had felt so foul before.

Crowley’s eyes rolled back into his head and he dropped from the air, no chance even to scream.

Still floating in the air, his body no more substantial than a cloud, Bram watched as the evil sorcerer’s body tumbled downward, falling through the gaping hole in the platform to be swallowed up by the waiting desert beneath.

Bram stared at his hand, and he wished that his father were here—to tell him that he’d done the right thing.

I have done the right thing, haven’t I?

“Abraham!” Stitch’s voice pulled Bram from his doubts,
and he allowed his body to become whole again, dropping to the platform, careful to avoid the jagged hole in the flooring.

“Is everybody all right?” he asked.

“The team is fine but …”

Bram’s eyes traveled across to the platform to the sight of Tobias and his sister. The child had completely emerged from the containment shell, into her brother’s embrace.

They glowed like the sun.

As Bram approached them he could hear Tobias speaking to her, whispering in her ear as he rocked her.

“Everything … everything is going to be all right, I’m here. There’s no need to be … afraid.”

“It hurts, Toby,” the little girl cried. “It wants to come out … the bad stuff inside me wants to come out.”

The supernatural power radiating from the duo was so intense that Bram couldn’t take even one step closer. “What should I do?” he asked, shielding his eyes with his hand.

Tobias looked up, his sister still in his arms. “There’s nothing you can do … nothing that anybody can do,” he said. “You need to go … you and your people.…”

The child was crying harder now as the unearthly light
from her body grew all the more intense. Tobias pulled her closer, continuing to whisper soothing words in her ear.

“We have to try something,” Bram said, desperation in his voice.

“Please, you need to leave now. I’m not sure how much longer I can contain her power.”

Bram reluctantly began to back up, bumping into Stitch, who had come up behind him. The others were there as well; they had his back.

Just as a team should.

“Go!” Tobias barked; his face twisted in pain. “After this … the world … the world is going to need you more than ever.”

He held the crying child closer, rocking her to a lullaby that only he could hear. Bolts of multicolored energy leaped from their bodies, reaching up into the desert sky, like licks of solar flame exploding from the surface of the sun.

“We have to leave now,” Stitch said, squeezing Bram’s shoulder in a powerful grip.

The platform had begun to shake violently, the entire structure moaning as if in the throes of pain. Bram squinted his eyes, still wanting to look at Tobias and his sister. He wracked his brain for something—anything—
that could help, that might change what appeared to be an inevitable outcome.

But there was nothing.

He turned to find Bogey, to tell him to rift them a passage out, but saw that the little creature had already done it. Bram moved toward the opening that would take them to another—safer—place. The others had already started to go through, Emily first, followed by Douglas pushing Desmond in his chair, Bogey, and then Stitch.

“Bram,” Stitch called.

He backed up toward the passage, but realized he wasn’t ready to leave yet.

“I’m sorry,” Bram called to Tobias. “Sorry that it has to end like this.”

The unearthly power surged from the little girl, the sudden flash so intense that Bram’s flesh tingled painfully. He felt Stitch’s powerful hands grab hold of his clothing and yank him into the passage.

And as he was transported from here to there, Bram thought he heard Tobias’s voice screaming through the nearly deafening explosion of supernatural force.

“Your father would have been proud.”

T
obias held his sister tightly as they died together, their flesh and bones dissolved in an explosion of energy so intense that it changed the world.

But as he passed from life, he knew there was no need to worry.

The Brimstone Network would keep the world safe.

E
verything changed that night, and the sun rose on a new, more dangerous world.

Bogey’s rift had returned the team to Stitch’s birthplace beneath the ancient monastery at Lindesfarne. He had made them tea. Even Bogey had some, although he would have preferred something sweet with bubbles. And then they’d sat around an old-fashioned radio that Stitch had found in one of the storage closets.

They were all quiet, each with his own thoughts. They’d beaten the bad guy—sort of—but they hadn’t been able to prevent the energy within Claire Blaylock from reaching critical mass and changing the world.

They listened to news broadcasts from around the globe, listened to the various reporters talking about the bizarre explosion of energy that was so intense, it was
seen everywhere. It was a phenomenon that the world’s greatest minds had yet to explain.

And Bram doubted that they ever would.

At first the news reports were focused on the explosion, but within hours there were new stories sprinkling in amongst the local news, sports, and weather.

It was what they had feared, what they had been waiting for.

The release of Claire Blaylock’s supernatural energy hadn’t been as devastating as Crowley had intended, but it still had had an effect on the barriers that kept the earth separate from other worlds.

The stories were small at first, vague reports of strange occurrences and sightings of bizarre creatures. But they soon began to grow, and from the sounds of the reporters’ voices, panic was beginning to set in. And on more than one occasion, someone bemoaned the loss of Elijah Stone and his Brimstone Network.

Bram and his team sat around the old radio, sipping their tea, feeling as though they could sleep for a month, and said nothing.

But all of them secretly wondering …

Where do we go from here?

EPILOGUE
THE RAT DEMONS, SENSING AN OPPORTUNITY
to hunt in the place of humans, found the tear in the dimensional barrier between worlds and used it to cross over.

They had heard whispers of humanity, but it had been a very long time since their kind had hunted those of the soft, tasty pink flesh. The barriers had kept them separated from other worlds, but now, something had happened to the walls of magick.

And they were free to hunt wherever they pleased.

The leader of the rats—a most hungry and feral demon who was called Laxitus by those of his swarm—moved through the thick underbrush, leading his followers in a hunt for food.

The scents around them were overwhelming, and Laxitus decided that he and his kind would make their new home here in this place of delicious smells, where their
bellies could grow large from the flesh of humanity.

The sounds of the human language drew him and his swarm toward what would be the first of many meals.

Squatting in the darkness he saw two of their kind—two human boys—as they hurried down a deserted patch of road, their voices raised in argument.

“I can’t believe we missed the bus, Jonah,” one of the young humans yelled as they walked. “If I don’t get back before my mom gets home from work, I’m going to be grounded to infinity.”

“I thought the last bus was at eleven thirty-five. They must’ve changed the schedule,” the other male human said. “Don’t worry, we’ll get you home with time to spare. Have I ever let you down before, Mikey?”

Mikey looked at him. “You let me down when there was no bus. I never would’ve gone to the later movie if …”

The rat demon’s stomach grumbled loudly with hunger.

The human Mikey stopped walking, searching his surroundings for the source of the sound.

“Did you hear that?” Mikey asked.

“Yeah, probably nothing,” Jonah said. “Look, if you want to get home before your mother, we better keep walking.”

Laxitus watched the boy from the darkness at the side
of the road. A new smell had been added to the delicious aromas that flowed from the two, a smell of fear.