The Edge of Temptation: Gods of the Undead 2 A Post-Apocalyptic Epic (12 page)

Guns blasted from every direction, but nothing seemed to happen. The air shimmered around the creature as the bullets seemed to snag on nothing and drop, steaming to the cold desert floor. Holy water was thrown by Father Timmons. It struck the same invisible force, this time with a shock of white light.

It thinned the barrier and maybe another bottle or two might have brought it down, only the creature wasn’t going to wait around for that to happen. It raised both of its huge hands, giving Jack a perfect view of the right one; on it glowed a glyph etched in blue light. Jack knew the glyph and knew what was going to happen.

Unfortunately, he was still struggling to breathe and could do nothing but try to get to his hands and knees. The creature was too fast for anyone to do anything. It brought its hands together in a great burst of sound and light, like a thunderbolt exploding. Those who were close to the beast were either blinded, stunned or outright killed.

Thirty feet away, Cyn was thrown off her feet and was lying on her back, one hand patting the dirt, her head going this way and that as if she was confused where she was.

Jack began crawling to her. He was finally able to breathe, but standing was out of the question at the moment. He crawled, furious with himself. This was his fault. He had been too eager to see what was in the coffin. He should have left it for someone else to have opened it. But who? And where?

No answer came to him as he watched the creature pause for a moment. Jack saw that it was tiring. He could feel it weaken and it was no wonder. It had warped time, erected a shield to absorb the energy from twenty guns, and expended enough energy in a single blast to stun or kill forty people.

Now would have been the time for Jack to strike back with some energy of his own, but he was still too shaken and he had to wonder what sort of power could stop the creature...wait, not creature...this was some sort of man. Jack saw the terrible humanity in it as it bent and went lip to lip with Father Timmons. The priest flung out his hands as the light in his eyes dimmed to nothing. His soul had been sucked from in seconds.

Now Jack knew what he was facing: this was a necromancer, one that was thousands of years old. It was impossible.

Jack crawled faster to Cyn. The creature dropped Timmons and strode toward her. It saw in her a rival that had to be destroyed before it got too strong. On the way, it stopped to replenish its strength, feeding on those stunned individuals that were still alive between it and her.

Some of the soldiers gathered their wits and fired their guns, while Metzger threw Holy Water, but the spell warding the necromancer was stronger now and the bullets fell harmlessly and the water splashed onto the ground wasted.

And then it was almost on top of Cyn, who was firing her shotgun and slowly backing away. Jack got to her first, knife in hand, blood already dripping from his palm. He cast his
Holding
spell at the necromancer, which made it laugh.

Jack’s strength was nothing compared to it. The necromancer shot out white blobs of ball lightning with one hand, blasting the remaining soldiers
,
some of whom were bravely charging while others were scrambling to get to their feet. At the same time, the creature reached out and began burning through Jack’s spell.

It was a battle of magical strength and will, and though Jack was full of fight, his strength ran out of him as though he had sprung a hundred holes. Thirty seconds was all he could give before he was wiped out and his soul bled dry. But then Cyn was there at his side, her own hand bleeding. She had never cast a spell before and it would have been a waste to start right then.

She knew this as well as he did and so she did something even better. She clasped his hand, their blood mingling, her body open and her soul a live wire. It burned into Jack as though she were on fire inside.

Her gift to him, freely given and not stolen was power Jack had never felt before. It roared in him like a dragon, like a volcano...but still it wasn’t enough. The necromancer was ancient and vastly more powerful. With everyone stunned, unconscious or dead, the necromancer focused completely on Jack.

With energy blasting into him from two direction, Jack thought that he would split in two or go up in flames himself.

Then, in seconds, Cyn fell away, utterly drained, her eyes staring up at the night blinking slowly, her brain trying to force herself back into the fight. Seconds later, Jack was on the ground next to her, his insides empty save the tiniest wisp; once again, he had gone to the very edge.

For a few moments, the ancient necromancer stood over them, gloating, his ancient teeth showing in a grin—his teeth were black and glistened in the light, but the tongue that ran over them was shockingly pink.

Jack turned away. There was absolutely nothing between them and death. What was left of his team consisted only of Captain Metzger and he was lying on the ground looking as though he was trying to find out which way up was. Jordan was dead; his face charred into ruin and there was smoke rising out of the remains of Father Timmons.

The
Knights
were mostly dead. Their bodies littered the grounds around the pyramid. There were three still firing sporadically, and someone was saying something in a soft voice about not being able to see.

The last of the
Raiders
were running for their lives and Jack did not blame them. If he could have run, he probably would have, but he had Cyn and he wouldn’t let her die alone.

And they would die. They were utterly powerless now…they didn’t even have souls left to drain. That thought struck Jack as important, just as he heard the cavalry arrive in the form of the US Army.

Chapter 11

Meroe, Sudan

Jack Dreyden

In case things went to hell, the American helicopters had been parked a half mile away, their rotors whipping the air, ready to go at the first sign of trouble. Trouble came so quickly that they almost missed it. The battle in front of
Beg 22
was short and savage.

Eager to get into the action, the choppers spun up into the air, unmasking their 30mm M230 Chain Guns. The battlefield was lit by blue-white explosions and muzzle blasts going in every direction, but the eight-foot monster smack dab in the middle of the carnage wasn’t easy to miss. The first pilot centered his cross hairs on it and caressed the trigger, giving it just a gentle squeeze, sending sixty hand-sized rounds right on target. He was good and did not miss. The rounds could tear an infantry carrier to pieces and yet, after the air blurred and dust rose, the monster was still standing.

The pilot hit it again and there was so much flame and flying lead that he didn’t see the beast raise a glowing hand. Just like that, the pilot’s field of vision was suddenly warped; it looked as though the ground was rushing up at him. Thousands of stones of every size raced up as if fired from a gun and pelted his bird. Some of the stones could fit in the palm of his hand, others were bigger than his head. The rotors, circling at 800 RPM, were brittle; a sparrow could chip them at that speed.

The rocks turned them to dust and the chopper abruptly turned over in the air and dropped straight into the earth. It exploded in a fireball when it crashed, as did the other three as more rocks flew through the air so fast that they were nothing but a blur.

Jack watched with a cold heart, a dead heart. His chest was empty of feeling. Even Cyn barely gave him a stir. It was the consequence of being soulless. In this situation it had its benefits. He was able to see past the blood and the moans and the soldier wondering aloud what had happened to his eyes.

He was able to see past his friendship with Metzger, who really was a good guy and who always did his best. Jack’s eyes weren’t dimmed by any of this. He was able to see the truth of their situation.

The necromancer wasn’t an all-powerful creature. He wasn’t a demon whose energy, whether strong or weak, was a constant thing. The necromancer was alive, likely some form of a human—a strange, magic-warped being, but a human, nonetheless. His strength ebbed and flowed, and just then it was ebbing big time.

Jack and Cyn had weakened it and the helicopter with its 30mm Chain Gun had done a number on it. Now, after hurling half the desert into the air, it was nearly spent.

And yet it could recharge just by lifting out its hand.

Jack couldn’t let that happen.

The necromancer reached out to Metzger. The soldier’s face twisted and started to pull in on itself. His soul was being ripped from the core of his being, but Jack saved him. Snatching up Cyn’s forgotten shotgun, Jack calmly aimed and blasted Captain Metzger in the head, sending brains, red and grey sheeting onto the desert floor.

Cheated of the soul, the necromancer roared and spun to face Jack and so Jack shot him, too. Though the air shimmered and the buckshot fell harmlessly, the balance of power was now in Jack’s favor. Modern weapons were far stronger than the necromancer could have ever imagined.

Jack blasted the creature again and again, not giving it a moment’s respite. Finally, it threw up a wall of darkness between them. It was a weak spell from a weakened creature and Jack charged right through it, knowing it wasn’t likely very deep, just enough to hide the beast.

It would hide and try to feed and that meant it would need warm bodies. “Come on, Cyn!” Jack yelled, orienting on the feel of the beast and the sudden screech of one of the soldiers. Jack found three
Knights
cowering before the necromancer, their great courage finally undone.

With the necromancer draining them, Jack shot them like dogs. It was sad and yet Jack wasn’t sad because he didn’t care. Not having a soul meant not having to care. It really was as simple as that. But he would care later if he lived. What he was doing would haunt his dreams and keep him far from the confessional even though what he had done was wholly justified.

He committed murder in order to stop the necromancer. Jack killed everyone within reach and when there was no one left for the necromancer to feed off of, Jack grinned. The necromancer was failing. It tried to run, but bullets were faster and it no longer had the power left to stop time. Jack pumped full loads of buckshot into it until the shimmering in the air was thin as a whisper.

Cyn had come to stand next to him by then, a found gun in her hands, its barrel smoking. Her eyes had never been so cold. She was so white, Jack wondered briefly if she would pass out. He really didn’t care about that either. She wasn’t going to die and that’s what mattered, or so he guessed.

As the necromancer faltered, Jack’s gun dropped to the sand and his sword rang as he swept it out; the smell of the Holy Oil on it was like perfume. He could have killed the necromancer with the gun, but that would’ve been wrong. The sword had meaning. He would
grow
using the sword. His power would double at the least.

“On your knees,” Jack said, knowing that the necromancer would never agree. There was five thousand years between them, but they were very much alike. They would fight to the death. They would hold onto every second.

The beast charged and raked with its long claws, but Jack was ready for it; he knew its strength, just as he knew that the necromancer was no warrior. As impressive as it was in size and fantastic in its bearing, it was a creature of magic, and without magic it was just another enemy waiting to die.

It tried, however. It loved its life above all else and the closer to death it came the more desperate it became, but against an opponent who was both warrior and sorcerer, it did not stand a chance.

The edge of Jack’s sword was far more keen than the necromancer had ever faced; his armor lighter and yet tougher than anything found in antiquity, and Jack trained constantly, daily, sometimes twice if he had the energy. Jack trained because he had known there would be days in which he would be pitted against some five thousand year old monster.

That day had come once again and Jack’s blade was swirling madness. He gave the necromancer no let up, hacking limbs uncaring of the sluggish grey blood that dribbled or the outlandish rotting smell that soured the air when he sliced open the belly of the beast.

All he cared about was that final killing stroke. He could have taken it three different times, but Jack was an artist who craved perfection and got it when he sliced the head of the beast right off its neck. It was a perfect stroke.

When the head with its now dull eyes thumped onto the ground, the monster toppled and Jack grinned. The grin lasted for all of ten seconds and then it faded away to nothing, and nothing was all he felt. Even when he looked at Cyn, he was empty.

She had watched the battle with her gun at the ready. Now she shrugged in an odd sort of way and gazed down at the dead necromancer for a few seconds before staring around at the battlefield and the strewn bodies of forty-five trained men. “Timmons was a good guy,” she said, absently as though trying to remember what it meant to feel.

“And Metzger,” Jack added. They were silent for a few minutes and then Jack said: “Remember Father Paul?”

“A little,” she answered.

“They never found his body. He could still be alive.”

“Yeah? That’s good.” Listless, she walked over to where Ringo laid sprawled. His life had been sucked out of him, his face shrunken and pulled tight to his bones. “I don’t like this, Jack. I can’t feel that I don’t like this, but I know I don’t. It’s weird.”

They were silent again.

“We should look for survivors,” he said after a time.

“There are none…I would know.”

He knew what she meant. She was empty inside and unlike Jack, she could fix that in seconds; she was a necromancer by birth and she could feel the souls. They were hot in a universe of ice. A shiver ran up her. “They’re all gone, except those guys who ran away; they’re probably embarrassed.”

Another moment, long this time, and then Jack took Cyn by the hand until he found her pack, which had been left forgotten, leaning against the side of
Beg 22
. Inside were two boxes of
Junior Mints
. They shared them as they stood over the necromancer; neither really trusted a dead body anymore—sometimes they came back to life.

When it didn’t stir, Jack went to Ringo’s Volvo. There was a radio inside, crackling and spitting out words of worry. When Jack didn’t immediately answer it, Cyn said: “We’ll need a cleanup crew here. I don’t think we should leave this for the locals to find. Who knows what they’ll think. And maybe we should go after the survivors. I think there were three or four of them. It was hard to tell with so much going on. Jack? Are you listening to me?”

He had been staring at the radio. “I’m listening.” He hadn’t been; his mind was far away trying to piece together the cunning trap that had been set for him. It was so intricate and detailed that it was hard to wrap his mind around it. “Go on,” he said to her.

“Go on? What do you mean? I said that we should go after those guys who ran away, though I don’t know where they might be heading. Shendi? If they regained their senses they’d go to Shendi. If not, they’re somewhere in this bleedin’ desert.”

“Right, the desert.
”
The radio crackled out more anxious questions. Cyn reached for it, but Jack grabbed it first and tossed it into the sand. “I think we need to disappear. Robert has us dialed in. He knows us and he’s playing us. He allowed Truong to find him just so he could set this up, just so he could kill us.”

Cyn looked down at the radio with just the slightest hint of worry in her eyes. “And he almost succeeded. But what about those men? Shouldn’t we care? They could die out there.”

Jack knew that they should care and in a day or two he would, in the meantime he would rationalize: “They’re all trained men and really, it’s hard to get lost in this part of the Sudan. There’s only one road that runs to Khartoum. It’s just west of here. And the sun will be up soon. If they can’t figure out which way west is by the stars, then the sun will clue them in.”

And dry them out and shrivel them up and kill them if they don’t get picked up or find shelter. Jack shoved those thoughts away. Finding and killing Robert was bigger than the lives of a few men, no matter who they were.

“They’ll be fine,” he added, partly to mollify his own conscience; it didn’t take much.

“What are we going to do with that?” Cyn asked, pointing at the body of the necromancer.

Jack hated the idea of leaving it for the government to find. Whatever secrets the body held were best lost for all time. And then there was the sarcophagus...it had not just imprisoned the creature, it had hidden it from both Cyn and Jack.

“I think we need to take a closer look at the sarcophagus,” Jack said. He took up one of the discarded flashlights and went to the coffin. It was indeed solid gold; easily a thousand pounds. Inside it were glyphs; he wasn’t surprised.

“A binding spell,” Cyn said, taking pictures with her phone. They both looked back at the necromancer. “A binding spell
inside
a sarcophagus? Maybe it’s not as dead as we think. I mean, it won’t re-grow its head will it?”

Jack went back to the body. It hadn’t budged. He poked it with a finger. “It is truly dead, I believe. I used a Holy Sword. It unbound whatever evil was holding the thing together.” He didn’t add:
I hope
. “Just in case, we should burn it.”

They cast about for a fuel source and saw only rocks and sand. In the end, they gathered Holy Oil from the bodies of the dead. It amounted to only about a quart, and yet the corpse was rendered to ash as if a bonfire had been set.

Next, Jack went to each of the deceased and rifled their pockets for cash; they would need to disappear and that meant they couldn’t use credit cards and it also meant bribes at border crossings.

Lastly, he dragged the bodies of his team, Metzger, Timmons and Jordan to one side and prayed over them: “Lord, please bless their souls. They were good men and each deserves Heaven as a final reward for their efforts.”

There was silence for a minute and then Cyn, who looked like a blank slate, said: “I wish I could cry for them.”

“You will,” Jack replied. “It’ll come, don’t worry.
”
He would cry when no one was around and he would hurt, and he would dream of the men he had killed and he would tell himself that he had saved their souls; and he had. Of course he had also saved his own skin in the process and when he cried he would know the truth: he hadn’t killed to save any soul but his own.

“Let’s get moving,” he said, heading for the Volvo. “We should try to make it to Wadi Halfa by morning.”