by Shannon West
When Luke heard his voice, he looked confused and then glanced back up at Logan as his eyes changed again. The same look of dazed hatred came over his face and he snarled at Logan. Logan’s right hand grabbed his own bicep, placed his left hand behind Luke’s head and began to apply the deadly pressure on his neck, from the radius bone and the biceps. He only had to put both elbows together and keep them there long enough for Luke to pass out, because he knew now without a shadow of a doubt in his mind that Luke was being influenced like Jackson had been. He had the same look in his eyes as Jackson had during his fight with the young boy, a kind of mindless malevolence.
With every passing second of the choke hold, Luke seemed to weaken. A lesser man would have already been unconscious. Logan tightened his arm and kissed the side of Luke’s face.
“I’m sorry. Lights out, sweetheart,” he said, as Luke’s eyes rolled back in his head and he went limp in Logan’s arms.
The crowd was cheering so loudly, it was amazing that Logan could hear at all, but he clearly heard Dread’s laughter and saw him clapping his hands in delight.
“Finish him!” he cried out as Logan bent over Luke, still holding him in his arms. The crowd took up the words, chanting them along with “Kill him! Kill him! Kill him!”
Logan stood up, guarding Luke’s body with his own. He glanced around at the savage crowd. They wanted violence. He’d give it to them.
He glanced back at the thing inhabiting Dread’s body. Smiling at it, he motioned it to come a little closer. It took a few steps toward him, grinning wide with Dread’s white shark teeth.
“Fuck you,” Logan said as he got within a yard of him. “Fuck you runnin’ you son-of-a-bitch!”
Logan leaped for him then, tackling him to the ground and grinding the heel of his hand into Dread’s windpipe, trying his best to kill the evil bastard. Dread’s face grew alarmingly red, but Logan kept up the pressure, his entire body feeling icy cold despite the press of the crowd around him and closeness of the crowded room. The crowd was going wild.
Logan could feel a cold rage filling him again, just like it had when he’d killed Kowalski. Bands like gray and blue and silver ice stretched out before his eyes and the colors mingled together covering his vision in a swirling mist. Vaguely he could hear screaming coming from somewhere close by. He glanced up, his perception clearing and saw Jake hovering over him, pulling on his arm.
“Stop Logan! You’re only giving it more power! It’s getting stronger!”
Shocked, Logan let his hands fall away and looked down at Dread’s crushed windpipe, the eyes bulging from his dead face. As he stared down at the body in horror, a black mist swirled up out of Dread’s body. Logan staggered backward and fell on his ass. The mist churned upward toward the ceiling, in a roiling, chaotic and ever-growing cloud, hovering over the center of the ring. The air filled with a noxious smell of blood and dust and gunpowder and smoke, making everyone turn to run, choking on the foulness.
Logan got to his feet and retreated back behind the outer barricade, taking Luke’s unconscious body with him. Jackson and Jake crowded close beside him. Only Perry wandered out toward the center of the ring, looking up at the cloud in awe.
Logan watched it in horror as it grew larger and larger, then began to take on a form. A long, narrow neck stretched upward, topped by a serpent’s head. Out of the smoke and dust grew a pair of black wings and a body like that of a Chinese dragon, as much snake as anything else. It had horns on its head and the eyes of a demon, and as Logan watched, it became flesh. The body was covered in silver scales and had four small legs. Its feet were tipped with long, prominent claws. A slow flap of the creature’s black wings caused a wind to sweep through the basement, stirring up bits of paper and beer cans and dirt and still the wings kept flapping. It opened its mouth showing its terrible, jagged teeth, drew in a mighty breath, then with a roar, it exhaled, fire and lightning shooting from its mouth. The blast incinerated everything in its path.
The dragon thing turned on the crowds of people, torching them and turning the basement into Hell on Earth as those who weren’t paralyzed by fear tried to run from the crackling flames. Most never made it more than a few steps before catching fire. Perry’s body went up like a torch. The dragon laid down a wall of fire in front of the people stampeding from the room, and they fell back screaming and beating at themselves, as others ran for the only other exit, the side door to the alley. A few of them made it to the doors, but most died when they burst into flames. The thwack of its wings was still sounding overhead, and Logan could smell the sickening odor of flesh burning even above the acrid smoke of Dragon fire all around them. The dragon shrieked its vengeance and rage as it hurled down fire at everyone below.
Logan felt frost forming over his body and welcomed it, no longer fighting the power sweeping over him. He was holding a still unconscious Luke tightly in his arms, hunched over him, trying to protect him. He motioned for Jackson and Jake to come closer to him and yelled at Perry, who somehow heard him above the noise and turned his shocked face toward him.
“Get over here, damn it!” Logan yelled, and he stumbled toward them, sinking down beside Jake.
All of the men were huddled next to Logan’s body and he slammed his hands down onto the barricade and it was immediately encased in ice. He put his hands out in front of him and saw that they were covered in ice as well, thick slabs of it. The ice began to flow over him, like liquid, and he concentrated on projecting it outward, trying to build wall of ice between them and the serpent dragon.
He heard the heavy thump of the thing’s body as it landed on the heavily scorched floor in front of them and it directed a stream of its fire toward the flimsy barricade and its thin covering of ice. The ice melted under the dragon fire and as Jackson, Perry and Jake screamed in horror behind him, Logan lowered his face to Luke’s hoping to have time for one last kiss before dying.
Chapter Eleven
Hiding his face against Luke’s, Logan missed the dramatic entrance of the archangel. At least upon later reflection, that’s what he thought the creature must be. After the dragon melted the ice from the barricade, he heard a terrible roar from its throat and thought he’d feel the flames incinerating him any second. Instead there was another loud thumping sound on the floor in front of them, and he glanced up to see a figure straight out of a dream standing over them.
It was shaped like a man, but huge, and dressed in some kind of golden armor. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the figure was his wings, spreading out on either side of him with a span of at least six feet on either side. They were white wings and enormous, though not as clean as an angel’s wings should have been, he thought. The man himself, though, was beautiful. He stood around seven feet tall and had long, flowing blond hair and white skin. His eyes glowed red and in his hand, he held a sword that was literally on fire, but didn’t burn him. He had it drawn back as if ready to cut off the dragon’s head.
When Logan was a kid, his parents had made him go to church every Sunday. The preacher of their southern Baptist congregation was a hellfire and brimstone firebrand named Reverend Adams. He was big on quoting Revelations, a Book of the Bible which Logan had never completely understood and never really cared for much because it was so obscure. From his Sunday School lessons, he knew that Revelations was the final book of the New Testament and it was John's visions about Jesus overcoming evil by his death and resurrection. But there was only one passage from the Book that truly stood out in his memory. It was one the preacher talked about a lot—maybe because it was his favorite too. Logan remembered it vividly because it was all about a big war in heaven.
Logan was only a kid, and like most boys he loved stories of adventure, so maybe it was the idea of heaven being a place that could have wars was the thing that caught his attention. His Sunday School teachers mostly talked about streets of gold, where everyone was singing and praising the Lord all the time. It all sounded kind of boring, actually. Until the preacher star
ted quoting Revelations.
He could still remember sitting on the hard bench near the back of the church where his father insisted on sitting on the Sundays when his mom was keeping the church nursery. Mostly, Logan thought, so he could doze in the stifling heat. Logan was usually squirming in the summer heat too, writing notes to his friend Billy, who sat beside him, on the back of his church program and wishing the service would be over, so he could go home and eat his mama’s fried chicken and gravy dinner. Assuming, of course that Reverend Adams would ever shut up. The preacher was thundering away in his pulpit, though, showing no sign of letting up, when he said something that made Logan sit up straighter and listen.
“A war broke out in heaven!” Reverend Adams shouted, holding up his Bible and quoting from memory. “And Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But the dragon wasn’t strong enough, and they lost!” The preacher wiped his forehead and shifted into high gear. “The great dragon, the serpent was hurled down…he was hurled down to the Earth! There was no longer any place for him in heaven. Did you hear that? That ancient serpent…that deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down, and his angels were thrown down with him!”
Somebody in the front row yelled out, “Amen!” and the preacher raised up his fist and smacked it onto the podium. “Praise Jesus! The serpent was hurled down to the Earth! Halleluiah! And his angels along with him…” He glanced down at the passage in his hand. “Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven, wrapped in a cloud, with a rainbow over his head, and his face was like the sun, and his legs like pillars of fire.”
That would be Michael, the archangel, who had those pillar-of-fire legs—Logan looked it up when he got home—Michael was the leader of the angels in their fight against Lucifer. The man in front of them fit the description, other than the legs. No rainbow over his head either, nor cloud wrappings, but if this was indeed the archangel and he’d come to save them, then Logan wasn’t going to quibble over details.
Logan watched the angel in fascination, wondering if this was a mass hallucination or only meant for him. The archangel never so much as glanced back at any of them, though, after that first time and instead concentrated on the dragon in front of him. The dragon roared at the figure, who brandished his weapon at it and shouted something back in a voice so loud it shook the building. The language was one that Logan didn’t recognize.
The dragon blew a lot more smoke and flames, but they didn’t seem to burn the angel one bit, and though they blew over and around him, they stopped before they got to Logan and the others. The angel roared out another long string of words and the dragon simply…faded away, still roaring and huffing out gouts of fire.
The silence afterward was profound—everyone in the place was dead, of course, except for Logan, Luke, and the other members of the team. And the archangel. The figure turned to gaze down at Logan. Its voice was as deep as a rumble of thunder, but if he concentrated, he could understand what he was saying. Not in the words, but in his demeanor and tone. Logan got the clear impression the angel was telling him to get the hell out of there and not to come back. He didn’t have to ask him twice.
****
Logan stumbled out through the side door into the alley and a scene of complete chaos. The dead and wounded were lying sprawled everywhere and the sounds of sirens pierced the air. Blue and red lights were beginning to be splashed over the street as the rescue units and fire trucks arrived. All around them were the sound of radios and men shouting and women screaming. Jake was mostly ambulatory but disoriented and confused. Logan had him by the arm to help him and he was pulling a dazed and groggy Luke along beside him, tucked to his side. Perry and Jackson were helping each other behind them. No one paid them much attention as they walked out of the alley, simply because there were so many people in need of help and so few ambulances yet on the scene. The fire department was trying to set up their equipment but the building was surely a lost cause and by now fully engaged.
Logan concentrated on getting one foot in front of the other and making it to the parking deck, at the end of the block. When they finally reached his truck, he helped Luke and Jake climb in beside him and Perry and Jackson got in the back. Logan started up the truck and drove slowly out of the deck to the street below, managing to get out of the side entrance that faced Ponce de Leon. From there it was a fairly uneventful ride to I75 heading north.
Neither of the men inside the cab said a word to Logan and he was glad, because he wasn’t a hundred percent sure he could have answered them if they had. They rode in almost complete silence—except for Jake’s heavy breathing. At one point, Logan thought he might have to pull over and find a paper bag for him to breathe into, but as they got farther and farther away, he seemed to calm down., or at least his breathing did. Luke was staring straight ahead and not talking at all either, though his hand was tightly gripping Logan’s knee. The men in the back must have been freezing wearing only their boxing trunks, but they both sat up near the back glass and never made a sound of complaint.
The hour was late when they got to the hotel room Logan had rented at the La Quinta Inn north of Atlanta. Hard to believe it had only been a few hours since he’d left. He pulled into a spot near the side door and used his key to get in. Luckily, they didn’t encounter anyone on the way up in the elevator, considering how they were all dressed, and when Logan let them into the room, Rio ran over to meet them, happy to see them like he always was. Luke knelt down beside him and buried his face in his fur for a long time, while the others got settled inside.
“I only got the one king-sized bed, so some of you will be sleeping on the floor or in the chair or whatever,” Logan said as the silence stretched out. He had used the remote to turn on the tv, because he needed to hear the sound of something or someone normal, if only on television. “I have most of your bags, I think, except for you, Jackson.”
Jackson nodded absently and collapsed in the armchair, putting his head back and closing his eyes. Jake sat down on the side of the bed and Perry leaned against the wall.
“Are we not going to talk about this?” Perry said softly. “Not at all?”
“I don’t think I can, right now,” Jake replied and Logan nodded.
“I’m going with hallucination right now,” Logan said. “And if you have other theories, save them for morning. I’m not sure I can take much more tonight.”
“But…”
“Perry, seriously. We need to wait, because I’m pretty sure my head would explode if we try to figure this out tonight.” Logan went over to Luke and pulled him off the floor, prepared to make him come if he tried to resist. He surprised Logan by getting gracefully to his feet and allowing Logan to lead him to the bed and push him down without a word of complaint. Rio followed and jumped up on the foot of the bed.
“If it’s all the same to you guys, I believe I’ll leave the light on tonight.” He threw a pillow and the comforter toward Perry. “Make yourselves as comfortable as you can, and we can talk in the morning.”
Perry looked dubiously at the floor and then shrugged. “I guess I’ve slept on worse.”
If any of the others said anything, Logan didn’t hear them. He turned toward Luke and pulled him close, noticing as he did, the trembling in Luke’s body. Luke put his face in the hollow of Logan’s throat and Logan pulled the cover over them and closed his eyes. That was the last thing he remembered until morning.
****
Even during his time in the army, Logan had never been one for getting up early, especially in these last few weeks when he more often than not woke up with his arms full of Luke. He opened his eyes reluctantly then when he heard a crash in the room, followed by Perry cussing under his breath as he hopped around on one foot.
“What the fuck, Perry?”
“I can’t see a thing in here,” he complained, limping toward the bathroom. “I think I broke my goddamn toe.”
A lamp clicked on across the r
oom and Jackson rubbed his eyes and passed a hand over his face.
“Shit, I think I must have passed out. What time is it?”
“Seven o’clock,” Logan said, rolling to sit up and peering at the bedside clock. “Way too fucking early.” He fell back against the pillows and Luke poked him in the side.
“We need to get up and get out of this town. I don’t want to be here a minute longer than we have to.”
“I’ll second that,” Jake said, from the other side of the bed.
Logan leaned up on one elbow. “Get the fuck out of my bed, Jake! What are you doing over there?”
“Damn it, Logan, that floor’s hard, and you and Luke were sleeping all hugged up together and half this king-sized bed going to waste. Besides, hell, I ain’t got no cooties.”
“So you say…” Logan grumbled, falling out on his side of the bed and stretching. “Okay, let’s get cleaned up and see what they got downstairs that we can eat.”
He pulled on his jeans and went over to the closet where he’d stashed their bags. “Your stuff is in here. Luke, can you loan Jackson some clothes until we can pick up his stuff? You’re about the same size.”
“Sure,” said, and went over to rummage through his bags.
For the next twenty minutes, they got dressed, mostly getting in each other’s way, the room far too small for all five men. Finally, Luke took Rio outside for a quick walk, Jackson stepped out to smoke and the others finished getting shaved and cleaned up. By the time Luke came back up, Jackson had returned and Logan was pacing up and down in the corridor, unable to stay inside the crowded room a second longer.
Since the hotel didn’t know about the other men, they couldn’t very well go down to eat, but Logan promised he’d bring something up for them when he came. As he and Luke walked down to the elevator, Luke slipped his hand inside Logan’s.