by Tim Marquitz
“Get that sonsabitch Mares,” Clay shouted at me. “We’ll hold these things off.” He shot another of the spirits as I watched before turning back to me. “Go on, now, boy. Get!”
I lingered for another couple of seconds but what Clay wanted me to do made sense. If Mares was the shaman controlling the Manitou, then stopping him would probably release the spirits. That thought in my head, I glanced over the edge to confirm there weren’t any more bogeys waiting down there, and then dropped between the cars. My feet hit the platform with a loud, metallic clang, but luck was with me. The Manitou swarmed just the other side of the windowed door but none came storming out.
Time against me, I pulled open the door to the next car and ducked low, slipping inside with my gun leading the way. The cold steel of a gun barrel was pressed against my skull just as I cleared the door.
“”We meet again, heathen. Drop the gun.” There was no mistaking the Reverend’s gritty voice or the righteous fury in it.
I straightened slowly after setting the pistol on the floor. “You don’t actually believe your daughter was a virgin before I came across her, do you?”
The trigger creaked under Ansell’s finger. Maybe that wasn’t the smartest thing to say right then. I glanced over at him to see his forehead and nose swollen and red, both eyes yellowed with the hint of bruising. His cheeks were flushed with anger.
“You will not cast aspersions on my daughter’s innocence ever again.” He pressed the barrel harder against my skull, and I could hear his teeth grinding. “I’ll be certain to thank Mr. Mares for the opportunity to mete out justice.”
The good old Reverend hadn’t learned his lesson the last time. I twisted my head just as he squeezed the trigger. The gun roared beside my ear, deafening me, but that was better than having my brains splattered across the windows.
A sweep of my hand knocked the Reverend’s pistol clear, and I drew my second gun, slamming the barrel into his throat. He urked and dropped to a knee. I grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and lifted him to his feet, placing my gun against the base of his skull.
“Relax, Reverend, and you’ll live to go home to your family.”
Ansell grunted something noncommittal, probably because he was still choking on the insides of his throat, but I didn’t give him time to find his pride. I thumbed the hammer back, and he stiffened.
Last thing I wanted to do was kill the man. He might well be a gullible father twisted around the finger of his little girl, but that wasn’t anything to die over. He’d been fooled but it hadn’t been by me. If he’d be reasonable for just a couple minutes, we’d both walk away with all our pieces.
I nudged him forward, still clutching to his neck. “Let’s go talk to Mares and get this bucket of bolts slowed down so I can let you off to go about your business. How’s that sound?”
It wasn’t the Reverend that answered.
“That’s not going to happen, demon spawn.”
I looked past the preacher’s shoulder to see an older man slip through the far door. Dressed in all black, a flowing duster was draped over his shoulders. His eyes glinted with a subtle blue. The casual waft of magic that tingled against my senses confirmed what I’d already guessed. This was Mares. His hand hovered near his waist, his pistol pointed my direction.
“Easy with the name calling, wizard,” I answered. “I’m a might sensitive. Wouldn’t want me to have to shoot someone because you hurt my feelings, now would you? That would weigh on your conscience something fierce, I imagine.”
Mares chuckled, the sound setting his Adam’s apple bouncing in his throat. His gray eyebrows narrowed as he stared at me, his age-lined but clean shaven face contorted into a look of disdain and amusement all at the same time. It was impressive, I had to admit.
He grinned. “Not hardly.” A shot burst from his revolver.
The Reverend’s solid frame in front , I just ducked a little lower figuring Mares wouldn’t blast his own flunky just to get little old me. And I was right—
—sort of.
The bullet that flew from his gun glowed with a cerulean brilliance. Before I could figure out what he’d done, the bullet dodged around the Reverend and hit me in the gut. The blow knocked me back. I slammed into the door, glass shattering, just as the pain of the shot registered. Ansell stumbled forward, my restraining grip gone. My eyes darted to my stomach to see blood and black ooze gush from the wound. I could taste copper, fog crowding the inside of my skull.
A blur of motion in front of me drew my gaze back to Mares and the Reverend. Ansell grinned, having collected the pistol I’d laid on the floor. The ugly black O of the revolver spit fire. Two shots slammed into my chest. The wall creaked behind me as my full weight was knocked into it, but its support kept me standing. Agony seared through my veins, but it was nothing compared to the rage that followed.
Reverend Ansell stood with a crooked smirk, confident in his aim as he waited for me to die. He had every right to be, too. Both bullets had hit center mass, punching holes in my chest, one reaching as far as my lung. Blood filled my mouth with every breath, the searing ache of hot lead buried in the meat of me. Unfortunately for the good Reverend, though, his bullets weren’t magical.
“Gonna take more than that, Rev,” I told him as I fired. The shot took him right in the face, obliterating his smugness and replacing it with a shower of red and gray and bits of hair.
Fully aware of what Mares could do now, I forced myself to move before he picked me apart. I stepped forward and put a foot in the Reverend’s sagging chest, booting him down the aisle. A barrage of bullets followed the instant Mares slid into my line of vision. He cursed and went to fire back but my volley got there first.
Blood painted the wall beside him as the first shot tore through flesh, though I didn’t see where I’d hit him. He spun away with a shout, the other bullets ripping divots in the wall where he’d just stood. Mares kicked the connecting door open and dove through it, my last couple shots pecking holes in the glass at his back. I was after him in a heartbeat, only pausing long enough to snatch up the Reverend’s pistol as I passed his limp body.
I burst through the door and leapt across the intervening space between cars, rolling into the one where Mares had run. A scream bubbled out of my mouth as I staggered to my feet. As many times as I’ve been shot and stabbed, you’d think I’d remember not to do acrobatics right after, but I never learn. I spit a mouthful of blood just as Mares fired at me again. This time I was prepared for his fancy hoodoo.
I waited just an instant longer than good sense dictated when being shot at, and then dove aside, returning fire. Mares’ bullet swerved at the last second, but it was too late. The shot veered past me and punched a hole in one of the side windows. My own bullets ripped up the wall where Mares had just been, the wizard already through the far door and vaulting across to the next car. I got to my feet, cursing the oozing hole in my gut. My lung had already sealed the puncture left behind by the Reverend’s bullet, so at least I could breathe. It still stung like a pride of lions were scratching at my insides, but there was nothing I could do about it. Once Mares was resting comfortably in Hell, Uncle Lou would treat me to a healing and a cold beer.
The latter spurred me on.
I did the math—a couple of times since I suck with numbers—and realized we’d come to the end of the train. There was only the next car before the coal car and engine. Mares was running out of places to go. To get any further, he’d have to run out in the open, and I didn’t imagine anyone thought that would be a good idea. There was no cover along the coal car railing.
Confident I had him cornered, I dove inside the open door of the last car. Able to hit me while I peeked around the frame, there wasn’t any point in lingering. Surprise and pressure were the best bet. Too bad I didn’t have much of the former.
Another of Mares’ magical bullets creased my shoulder as I stormed inside returning fire. There was a metallic ping of a ricochet, and the lovely sound of lead mee
ting meat, then both were superseded by the waspy buzz of magical energy. I saw Mares drop out of sight and got ready to dodge his next attack, but that was when I realized the magic wasn’t coming from him. It was coming from the thing he was hiding behind: a golden sarcophagus.
“Stay where you are, demon, or I’ll destroy Lucifer’s prize.” There was an unhealthy quaver to Mares’ voice that made the vindictive part of me happy. The memory of my mother nagged me to behave, but I couldn’t help myself.
The fucker had shot me.
“You don’t want to do that,” I replied hoping to sound confident while I checked my pistol load and snapped off a shot. He could hit me from where he was and I couldn’t get him, not without accumulating a bunch more holes in my ass. I needed him nervous.
“You can’t stop me.” His voice drifted over the large coffin, my eyes unconsciously tracing the intricate knot work of sigils and symbols that had been meticulously carved into its face.
“I don’t need to, Mares,” I lied. “All I need to do is hold you a little longer and the portal my buddies are connecting will teleport us all straight into Hell. You can explain this to the old man yourself here in a few minutes.”
There was a moment of silence where I held my fire, willing him to believe me. I almost shit myself when his head and pistol popped up over the sarcophagus. He glared at me through reddened eyes, both our guns aimed at one another. Still I stood my ground. There was nowhere for me to hide. If Mares starting shooting, I was gonna eat mystical lead. My only other option was to rush him, but he had cover and I didn’t.
“You’re lying,” he said, hoping to call my bluff.
I shrugged and let my gun arm drop, the barrel sighting the floor. “You think so?” I forced a smile.
The wizard glared for a moment, clearly torn between his desire to shoot me and the consequences of the time he was wasting. His decision flashed across his eyes, and I stiffened, getting ready to get shot. He dropped behind the sarcophagus and fired. I ducked, bracing, but the bluish glint of his shot flew out from the cover of the coffin…headed the opposite direction.
I stared at the glow as it ripped through the glass and disappeared over the coal cart. There was a sharp clang of something metal being struck by the bullet, and the train shuddered. The smokestack hissed and the ground flew out from beneath my feet. I hit the floor and slid into the nearby wall. The whole car trembled as the world outside blurred past the windows. It hit me then what Mares had done.
The train rocketed forward out of control.
I scrambled to my feet, but the wizard was quicker. He’d known what was coming. Mares sprinted out from behind the sarcophagus and whipped the door aside, bolting to the coal car. I tried to get a bead on him, but the shaking of the train threw my aim off. My shot went wide, pinging off the coal bin. Bloodied across his chest, his left arm hanging limp, Mares climbed to the edge of the car and jumped, snatched from view by the merciless wind.
“Nitis!”
I spun and nearly shot Mika as he clung to the door frame behind me. His eyes were wide,
“The train—”
“I know,” I answered, cutting him off. “We need to see if—”
“No!” He cut me off in turn, pointing in the direction of the coal car. “We crash.”
My eyes followed his finger, and though it was hard to see anything past the whipping clouds of black smoke and piled coal, I spotted the sudden rise of hills that signaled a sharp turn of the rails.
“Oh…hell.”
Mika nodded and stepped deeper into the car. The train bounced beneath us, ready to take flight. There was no time for us to jump free. It was too late.
A thought hit me then.
It was as ugly and stupid a thought as I’d ever had, and there had been a lot of stupid thoughts over the years, but it was our only chance. No time to think it through, or to even shit my pants, I grabbed Mika by the arm and ran to the sarcophagus. He started at me as though I was stupid, and I couldn’t argue.
Three thick, heavy latches sealed the ornate coffin. I popped all three as the train danced under our feet and muscled the huge sarcophagus open.
“What are you doing?” Mika screamed, but I wasn’t listening.
I tossed him into the casket alongside the emaciated body already there and crawled in behind him, letting the weight of the lid slam down. I heard the latches snap shut like I’d hoped, but there was no time to celebrate the Pyrrhic victory.
“Still no wampum rubbing,” Mika cautioned, which I thought was rather heartless given it was likely our last moment on Earth.
I didn’t get the chance to complain, though. The train gave one last shake—the engine hitting the curve, I imagined—and chaos took a turn with my ass.
We were tossed about inside the coffin, our corpse-buddy joining us in a way that I’m sure would have sent me to Hell if I hadn’t already been related to the Devil. Shrieks of tearing metal erupted around us, the sound so loud I couldn’t even hear my own screams inside my head. My heart palpitated so hard I was sure it would slip between my ribs.
Over and over we toppled until I drowned in a blur of sensory overkill. There was nothing but me and the hazy memory of what was going on. And then there was the ground.
The mean and way too solid ground.
Oh how I hate that thing.
The fugue of motion was instantly replaced by the jarring crash of reality. Stone and iron ruptured at the impact. There was a flash of light—dim night brilliant after the confines of the coffin—and we were flung free of the morbid embrace, two leaves and a corpse cast from the wreckage of the sarcophagus. And then there was the ground again…and again…and maybe a dozen times after that. I lost count after the second bounce.
Darkness found me sometime after that.
#
“Nitis?” a soft voice pried at my ears, tugging on my consciousness.
My eyes fluttered open to see the battered and bruised face of my guide, looking like his old raccoon self.
“This clearly isn’t Heaven,” I muttered, scraping my tongue across chipped and broken teeth. “The women there are much better looking.”
“He is fine.” Mika grunted and sat back, clearing my view. The rest of the freakish foursome filled my view. The guide helped me to sit up.
“That was one hell of a show you put on there, boy,” Clay told me with a chuckle. “I figured we’d be scraping bits of you out of the hill for weeks just so we’d get paid.” May Lin and Unktowa hovered at his back. They were a little worse for wear than I recalled the last time I’d seen them, but they were in better shape than I was.
“Nice to see you care,” I said, bloody strings of drool streaming down my chin. The red pattered the dirt between my legs. The mangled remains of the body I’d been hugging lay beneath me.
“You get what you need?” Cletus asked, dollar signs emphasizing his question.
I stared at the desiccated skull whose black pits stared back, feeling the gentle waft of magical energy that prickled my skin. A crack in its forehead glistened with ruby brilliance. The energy leaked from there in slow, steady waves. It hadn’t been the sarcophagus Uncle Lou was after, but the brain of the corpse inside it. I sighed.
“Yeah, think so.”
Clay, his hat missing, swiped a hand through his hair in a useless effort to tame it, and grinned. “Good, then I reckon we’re done.”
“Wait. What?” I staggered to my feet, pulling the mummified body with me, every mile ridden and injury earned flaring up across my nerves at once.
“Yeah,” Cletus answered for his brother. “Ciepher paid us to help you reclaim his property. We done did that.”
I clutched to the body. “But…but…”
“See you round, boy.” Clay lifted his chin and snorted in some kind of redneck farewell I’d never understand. “Or as the Chinee here says, ‘sayonara.’”
May Lin bowed shallow as my gaze shifted to her. Unktowa smiled with his monstrous mouth and said some
thing to Mika.
“Unktowa say you very brave for having such tiny acorns.”
I glanced down to see that I’d lost my pants somewhere along the way. I slid the corpse in front of my crotch as the group laughed and started off across the desert. Mika looked form the dead body to my face and back again.
“You pale skins have strange ways.” He shook his head and started off after the others, leaving me behind.
“Wait! A little help here.”
About the Author
Tim Marquitz is the author of the Demon Squad series, the Blood War Trilogy, co-author of the Dead West series, as well as several standalone books, and numerous anthology appearances including Triumph Over Tragedy, Corrupts Absolutely?, Demonic Dolls, Neverland's Library, and the forthcoming No Place Like Home and Blackguards.
Co-owner and Editor in Chief of Ragnarok Publications, Tim most recently compiled and edited the Angelic Knight Press anthologies, Fading Light: An Anthology of the Monstrous and Manifesto: UF, as well as Ragnarok Publications’ Kaiju Rising: Age of Monsters.
www.tmarquitz.com
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