Consequence

by C R Langille

  Chapter Fourteen

  Doyle couldn’t see anything at all, just orange. The color even pushed through when he closed his eyes. It didn’t matter though. Orange, ancient creatures hell bent on the world’s destruction, watermelons—bullets didn’t care.

  Doyle raised the gun and squeezed the trigger. The familiar tingle ran up his arm as the projectile traveled through the barrel and woke the runes along the way. The blue light of the sigils mixed with the orange, and for a moment, his world turned brown as the colors fought for dominancy.

  The colors vanished, and the creature roared, which set his ears ringing. Doyle blinked to clear his vision and wiped at his eyes. The euniphrite lay on the ground and clutched at its chest. Dark ginger blood poured from the wound and slid through the thing’s claws. It pooled on the ground and sent streamers of smoke as the blood sizzled on contact with the stone. The acrid smell hit Doyle making him gag.

  “Well, that was easy.”

  Doyle brought the barrel of the gun up to his mouth and blew the residual smoke away.

  The creature choked and grunted at him. It looked up at Doyle with a large grin. The choking turned into something reminiscent of laughter. Doyle pointed the weapon at it again and pulled the hammer back.

  It spoke to him. He couldn’t understand it, but the words bit into his head, and his vision blurred. The pressure slipped away. The thing continued to laugh.

  “What’s funny? Do I have something on my face? You’ve got something on yours.”

  Doyle squeezed the trigger and planted a bullet in its head. The impact split the creature’s skull like a dropped egg and sent a glob of black brain matter across the ground.

  Doyle had seen too many horror flicks to let the ruse fool him. He pulled a machete out from the inside of his coat and jogged up to the creature’s side. Doyle put his arm up in front of his face and gagged again.

  “I thought they smelled bad on the outside.”

  He took a deep breath and brought the machete down in a quick stroke. It took two more whacks, and then he kicked the thing’s head away. Doyle brought the blade up above his head and then slashed it downward and twisted the blade counter-clockwise. The euniphrite’s orange blood flicked away as he performed a Chiburi that would impress any Iaijutsu Sensei. Doyle put the machete away and turned to leave.

  As he neared the exit of the ancient room, all the glyphs and sigils came to life, filling the chamber in a bright mix of red and blue. A deep voice boomed from high in the room.

  “What have you done?”

  “My job,” Doyle replied.

  Bright white light blinded him and filled him with warmth. His thoughts cleared, and he found order in the chaos that usually dominated his mind. It was amazing and scary at the same time. He forgot what it was like to think in such a clear, cohesive way. Doyle looked at the room as if it were the first time he saw it. He studied the sigil-marked walls like an archaeologist unearthing a new find. Then, he found the coat he wore. Doyle ran one hand down the duct tape sleeve.

  “You cannot kill the euniphrites. Each surviving one grows in strength when one dies.”

  “It seems imprisoning them worked very well, didn’t it?”

  “Insolence will not be tolerated, not even from the likes of you. Especially from the likes of you.”

  The words drove Doyle to his knees. The warmth surrounding him turned hot. He tried to think, tried to speak, but nothing but pain filled his mind and body. Another presence entered the chamber.

  “Stop this!”

  The newcomer’s voice held a lighter tone than the first, yet it held a quality found in great generals and leaders—a quality full of experience and demanded respect. The bright light dimmed. Doyle could think again.

  “This thing has killed one of seven. He must be punished for his transgression,” the first voice said.

  “I’m aware of what he has done, brother. Leave his punishment to me.”

  “But—”

  Doyle still couldn’t see anything, but the room went hot, and the light flared to life once again. It didn’t hurt him this time. It faded as quickly as it flashed.

  “Disobey me again and reap the consequences. Now leave us.” Never once did the tone change, but Doyle got the sense the newcomer meant business.

  “As you command.”

  As if it never existed in the first place, the first presence disappeared, and Doyle could see again. A tall man with blonde shoulder-length hair stood before him. The man wore a dark suit with a hand-tailored quality to it. He completed the ensemble with a white tie decorated with a blue sapphire tie-tack.

  “You’ll have to forgive him. He can be hasty,” the man said.

  He extended a well-manicured hand. Doyle took the hand, got to his feet, and nodded thanks to the stranger.

  “So, you flyboys finally got the message of the breakout, eh?” Doyle said.

  “We knew the moment it occurred. We’ve been busy with other issues.”

  “Yeah, well don’t worry, I’m on it.”

  The man walked a circle around the fallen euniphrite, his hands clasped behind his back. He studied the corpse as an art major would study a new piece at a gallery.

  “My compatriot was correct. They will grow stronger as you kill them. It will make exterminating all them,” he ran a hand through his hair, “difficult.”

  “Well, is your kind going to help or just watch from the nosebleed seats like you always do?”

  “I don’t know. I’m still awaiting orders.”

  “You keep waiting. I’ve got evil creatures to kill. It ain’t easy, but someone’s got to do it.”

  “Always the warrior. Your race did have a tendency towards violence.”

  Doyle turned to leave again, and the man appeared in front of him.

  “Tricksy, it is,” Doyle said.

  The man smiled. It was contagious, and Doyle smiled back.

  “Never caught your name,” Doyle said.

  “Mike.”

  “Well, Mike, I’ve got to go. Please step aside.”

  Mike stepped to the left and swept his arm out in a grand gesture. As he did, the angelic symbols burned hot and lit the room with an azure luminescence.

  Doyle tipped an imaginary hat at the man and walked past. He reloaded his weapon as he did.

  “Just like your father. Always charging headfirst.”

  Doyle stopped and turned back toward Mike. He finished reloading and slapped the cylinder back into place.

  “You knew my father?”

  “Yes, of course I did. He was my brother.”

  Doyle stared at the ground for a moment. He scratched at his pate.

  “And my mother, did you know her as well?”

  Mike smiled again, but his eyes didn’t hold the same mirth. He put his hands behind his back and appeared at Doyle’s side.

  “Yes, I met her once. She was a kind soul,” Mike said. “Be careful out there. Other forces are after you now. There are those on both sides that believe to kill the euniphrites will bring about the destruction of the universe.”

  Doyle put the gun back in his coat.

  “And what do you think?”

  “We should have destroyed them when we first had the chance.”

  Mike disappeared, and the warmth of his presence left as well. Doyle shivered and pulled his coat about his body. A twitch appeared above his eye, and the clarity of his thoughts turned to mush.

  “Gotta go, gotta go. Gotta clean up the mess.”

  Doyle ran back through the cavern until he popped out in the sinkhole. A bloody hard hat sat in the dirt next to his foot. Dark liquid, bits of flesh that looked like raw chicken, and hair sat in a small pool at the bottom of the hat. He grabbed his gun and skirted along the rock wall.

  He kept the weapon steadied in front of him as h
e circled around a pile of destroyed bricks and plaster. Something wet ran down the wall from the other side and puddled in the dirt. Doyle stepped to the side until he came around and had a good view. The yellow wallpaper stared back. One of the workers protruded from the wall as if he tried to run through from the other side. The man’s head, torso, and one arm lay limp. Blood poured from where the body stuck out and turned the yellow wallpaper a horrible pink.

  Doyle stepped back to the other side and tried to see the rest of the body. Nothing but brick and dust. He took a step closer and wished his Eagle Eyes still worked.

  “Not good, not good. Sir? Do you need assistance? This is Special Agent Doyle L. Johnson, ID Hannah-Papa-Limburger, 3-15-3.”

  The body spasmed as if hit by a million volts of electricity. The man’s hand clenched and unclenched and grabbed at some imaginary object. The head rolled on the neck loosely and lolled about unable to look up. Doyle was about to say something else when the man let out a low moan. It sounded like a dying cow he had once encountered on a field trip at a dairy farm. Well, he wasn’t exactly on a field trip, and the dairy farm looked an awful lot like an underground government laboratory, but the low moo definitely sounded the same.

  The man shook and blood and bile spewed from his mouth. A rip sounded in the air and echoed off the sinkhole’s walls. The yellow wallpaper split lengthwise and opened up into a dark hole. The body fell away—what was left of it anyway. The man’s legs and arms were gone, cut as if a giant meat cleaver had hacked them away. The body spasmed once more and then lay still.

  Doyle backed up until he tripped over a broken piece of dinner table. Faint voices came from the hole, the voices of the remaining workers. He couldn’t tell what they said, but he got the gist. Something along the lines of “oh god help” or close to it.

  “No time.”

  He turned to leave, and a scream emanated from the wall. Doyle let out a sigh. Just because it was hopeless, and Fate was a bitch, didn’t mean he couldn’t try. He tucked the gun under one arm, spit in both his hands and slicked back what remaining hair he had.

  “Hi-ho Silver, away!”

  Doyle ran straight at the wall and jumped headfirst. The cool air turned hot and humid as he passed through the tear. The worker’s screams amplified as he crossed through the threshold. Even though he couldn’t see too well in the darkness, Doyle sensed something else was in here with them, something big and hungry.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Toby stopped as he crested a hill and sat on a fallen tree. While most of the pain had disappeared thanks to Rusty, some of it still lurked in the background. The pain was a stranger who lurked in the dark and stalked its prey, patient, with all the time in the world. Whenever he moved too fast or tried to over-exert himself, the stranger returned and grabbed at his chest just behind the dark spot. Toby rubbed at it off and on, amazed how it was sometimes hot, other times colder than a river in December.

  He took a drink from one of the remaining water bottles. The water slid past his parched lips and down his throat. Even though it was lukewarm, it refreshed and reinvigorated him. As the last drop fell from the plastic container into his mouth, he made a mental note to search the couple’s campsite after he found the keys to the Jeep. There were only two bottles left in his makeshift pack. He didn’t want to run out. Be prepared and get back to his family—those were the dominating thoughts in his mind.

  The sun pounded overhead and reinforced the urge to find more water. Sweat beaded on his brow and flowed down into eyes. The salty fluid caused his eyes to water. It took several wipes with his shirtsleeve to ease the sting. He thought back to something his instructor told him during survival training. Every little thing compiles on each other. You’re only as good as the moment the shit hit the fan, then it’s all downhill.

  Toby rolled everything into the blanket and stood up. The stranger in the dark took a newfound interest in its prey as old bruises sprang to life in Toby’s chest. He let out a groan and rubbed at his side. At this rate, it would take a week to get back home.

  Three hours had passed since the lion killed the man, and Toby still couldn’t find Donna. He’d stopped calling out for her every minute a long time ago. At the moment, he’d be happy to find her bloody corpse. Toby tracked her the first hour, but then the trail went cold. Now it turned into a game of luck. If he didn’t find those keys, it would be that much longer before he could get back home. The keys meant salvation—his family’s salvation.

  “Donna!”

  Nothing but the sounds of the wilderness replied: a couple of birds in conversation, the wind and leaves as they played with one another, but no Donna. He didn’t have time to stroll around the woods looking for this woman.

  Damn her for running off like a crazy bitch.

  He stopped. Where were these thoughts coming from? He never thought about such things before. Never before would he have been happy find a corpse. Toby tried to dismiss it as stress, but something lingered in the back of his mind. Something raw and visceral and not entirely uninviting.

  Toby walked down the hill. He purposely stepped on every branch he could. Maybe it would alert Donna to his presence. Toby hoped it wouldn’t attract the wrong kind of attention, but it was a chance he was willing to take.

  “Donna! You’re safer with me. Come out and we can get out of here.”

  A flash of blue caught his eye. He turned just in time. Donna bolted from behind a tree and instinct took over. Toby charged after her.

  “Stop, I’m not going to hurt you!”

  She looked back at him with big doe eyes and then tripped across a rock. Donna careened down the hill.

  Toby ran after her and hoped for the best. Soft sobs emanated from Donna’s location as he neared and dashed those hopes against a rock-strewn shore. When he crested the hill, Fate answered his fears.

  Donna lay on her side, rolled into the fetal position. Her hands clutched her shin. Her body shook. Blood seeped through the fabric of her jeans.

  Fuck a duck! Really?

  Toby ran to her side. Her eyes grew wide. She tried to scramble away, but when she moved, a cry of pain escaped her lips and she fell on her back.

  Toby leaned his muzzleloader up against a tree and put his hands out in front of him.

  “Hey, I’m here to help.”

  “I saw what you did. You’re one of them.”

  “For fuck’s sake. I’m just trying to get home to my family. Now let me help you and we can get the hell out of here.”

  “What happened to Ross?” she asked.

  His name was Ross. Toby liked it better when he didn’t know. He must have had a certain look on his face, because Donna’s cries turned from pain to sorrow.

  “I’m sorry,” Toby said.

  He moved closer to her and knelt. She shrank away from him as if he were a leper when he moved to inspect her shin.

  “I’ve got to see how bad it is,” he said. Even though his voice came out soft, it held a sharp edge.

  Tears streamed down her face in rivulets, and she bit her lip. When Toby reached for her leg again, she kept still.

  He started to roll her pant leg up, and she helped. As the fabric pulled away, so did his hopes of returning to the Jeep soon. The lower part of her leg lay at an odd angle and sent a horrible tingle through his senses. A small jagged piece of bone peeked out through a torn bit of flesh. Blood seeped out from the wound in a slow stream.

  Donna let out a low cry and lay back onto the dirt. She stared up into the sky and cried. Toby sat back and tried to remember his first aid skills the Air Force taught him.

  “We’re going to have the splint it.”

  As he stood, his ribs stole some of his air in protest. He didn’t have time for this. She cried as he walked off to find suitable branches for a splint. Toby wanted to take the keys and leave her. She did this to herself in any case. Or, i
f he wanted to be merciful, he could plant a bullet in her skull and end her suffering. It would be kinder than letting one of those creatures find her.

  Toby stopped and rubbed at his temples. Fireworks went off in his head, and he almost threw up. It took a few moments before he caught his breath and could move again. Something was wrong inside him. It was getting worse. The pain in his chest deepened.

  Toby tried to occupy himself with the task at hand. He found a couple of small branches and used his knife to shape them. Some strips of cloth from his wool blanket sealed the deal, and he was ready to splint her wound.

  When Toby returned, he found her where he left her, on the ground with an arm draped over her eyes. Her chest shuddered as she breathed, but at least she’d stopped crying.

  “This is going to hurt,” Toby said.

  She sat up, which elicited a new round of snivels. He laid all the supplies out in front of him.

  “Why is this happening?”

  “Does it look like I know the answers? I’m just trying to get home, lady.” Toby stopped his preparations. “You do have keys to the Jeep, right?”

  Her eyes narrowed, but she nodded her head. Toby looked away from her and returned to his materials.

  “Where are they?” He grabbed one of the splint sticks.

  “Are you going to leave me here?” The question came out as a squeak.

  His knuckles turned white, and the sharp burrs of the stick bit into his hand. Toby didn’t notice until blood ran from his palm and on to the ground. He let the stick go.

  “Would I be trying to fix you up if I was going to leave you here? We’re going to need the keys to get out of here alive,” he said. The words came out quiet and strained—each syllable enunciated with care. “You’re in no condition to drive.”

  She kept a knowing look trained on him while she dug the keys out of her pants pocket. For a moment, she held them close to her chest, and debate flooded into her facial expression. Finally, she tossed the keys to him. He snatched them out of the air. Toby fought to keep the smile hidden behind his face.

  It would be so easy to leave her there now. He had what he needed.