The Last Line Series One

by David Elias Jenkins

  A flutter of money exchanged hands all around the arena, champagne was poured and glasses were cheered as Usher was dragged to the edge and thrown in face first.

  He landed well, falling into a well-trained roll, taking out most of the impact, but then he faltered and crumpled in a heap in the centre of the pit. The crowd gave a disapproving oooh, and a few comments were made in Dmitri’s direction. Another man stepped forward, tall and bald in a black overcoat. In a thick Russian accent he spoke.

  “Dmitri, what is this? I ask you to provide suitable fighters, and you give me a used punch bag. This is not good.”

  Sarkhov spat on the concrete at the other mafia boss. “Do not speak to me this way in front of audience. Just make your bets and wait.”

  In the pit, Usher felt another man jump down onto the concrete floor. Raising his head, he saw a pair of huge steel toed combat boots standing in front of him. He took a deep breath into his lungs, astounded that his damaged ribs now expanded with ease, but he had not recovered yet. He tried to push himself up onto his feet but before he knew it a pair of huge square hands was clamped onto his shoulders, dragging him upright.

  Usher hung there in the man’s grip like a broken ragdoll, staring into a face that he instantly knew belonged to a killer. He could see this fighter’s life written in his scarred face.

  Dmitri called down to him from above. “This is Kirill. He has served mother Russia in Spetsnaz GRU, in Chechnya, in Afghanistan, and now he serves my esteemed colleague here, in London, for better money, better food and better women. Sometimes they even say yes these days. Isn’t that right Kirill you fat rapist of Chechens? ”

  Usher spat his own blood into Kirill’s scarred and brutal face. He saw clearly the rage of the Feral in the big man’s face. The eyes were filling with crimson hate and black veins mapped his clammy skin. The muscles were growing even as he held Usher as effortless as if he were a child.

  It was obvious what they had done, how they had stacked the odds. They had given Usher just enough of the Feral to get him functional, heal his broken body. This man in front of him was as saturated with the battle drug as the terrorists who had committed the Canary Wharf attack. The humanity faded before Usher’s eyes leaving only a hungry beast.

  Sarkhov felt confident enough to give Usher a taste of the Feral, because he was certain that his fighter would take Usher out in no time.

  Usher had no doubt that he was probably right.

  Nevertheless, he had to buy his friends as much time as he could, and maybe, just maybe get lucky in the process.

  Besides, Usher knew that this was in all likelihood his final fight, so he decided to go down swinging.

  He tried to loosen the big Russian’s fingers but they were gripping him like a python around the throat. In a rasping voice Usher managed to speak.

  “Go on then big fella. Kiss me.”

  Dmitri smiled, and passed a fat money clip of crisp fifty pound notes to a bookkeeper. “Ladies and gentlemen, let the fight begin. And remember, Mr Punch bag, you fight to save your friend’s life, and for a quick death yourself.”

  Usher was suddenly doubled over as Kirill’s rock hard knees were driven up into his stomach, expelling all the air from his lungs like a bellows. A scarred fist hooked around and crashed into Usher’s jaw, sending him careering over to the other side of the pit. He fell to his knees, his head spinning, desperately trying to suck air back into his battered body.

  Yet beneath it, like a gradually rising tide, he felt strength returning to his body, felt flesh and bone actually knitting together inside him. It was extraordinary.

  Above him, Dmitri smiled a knowing smile, and looked down at Usher with a cocked head, as if he were a mysterious new creature, a science experiment.

  Kirill grabbed a handful of Usher’s bloodied hair and dragged him across the rubble strewn floor of the pit. Usher took in a lungful of dust and began a coughing fit, trying all the time to raise himself up onto his feet. Kirill stood him up, head butted him square in the face, and then slammed an elbow into his chest, sending Usher flying backwards to land flat out amongst the broken concrete.

  The Feral was fully upon the big Russian now, he had almost doubled in size and padded around the makeshift arena as graceful and deadly as a lion. His eyes were bright red and flashed at the crowd. Kirill seemed almost overwhelmed by his new strength and ferocity.

  Usher lay there on the concrete, bright lights flashing in front of his eyes. He was semi-conscious, and almost glad of the end. His mind swam back over all the hard won battles he had fought over the past seven years. So many close calls, so many victories won by pure luck and grit.

  He was vaguely aware of the monster Kirill standing above him, holding a broken lump of concrete above his head, looking around at the crowd with a triumphant grin on his brutal face. Usher took one final deep breath, closed his eyes, waited for the impact.

  Then he felt an explosion of energy inside his heart.

  The blood in his veins effervesced. The pain in his battered flesh turned into electric shocks of joy, and his brain was suddenly able to process everything around him at once.

  The Feral had suddenly kicked in, flooding his system like liquid fireworks. His thoughts formed with such speed and precision that the world around seemed to fall into slow motion.

  His vision took on a red mist and he could smell the blood of the crowd. His entire form became as coiled as an industrial spring desperate to explosively expand. He suddenly wanted to do one thing and one thing alone, a Universal purpose felt with perfect clarity.

  Kill.

  Usher’s leg shot out, cracking Kirill’s kneecap and snapping his cruciate ligaments. The big Russian let out a cry of shock more than pain, his leg suddenly buckled at a horrific angle. He dropped the lump of concrete and staggered back, as Usher slowly got to his feet, grinning at him like a hungry wolf.

  Kirill stood bent over and snarled in pain. In a swift movement he grabbed his leg and snapped the kneecap back into place. He stood up and shook out the leg a couple of times, making sure it could take his weight.

  Then he pushed forward on his good leg, throwing a heavy right cross at Usher. Usher brought his elbow sharply up into a guard position, and the Russian’s punch connected with the tip of this hard bone, crushing three of his fingers in an audible snap. Kirill roared in pain and drew his hand back as if it were burned. The fingers stood out at an unsettling angle.

  Kirill rushed at Usher like a charging bull, spittle running from his chin. Usher leapt up and around the concrete wall of the arena as if it were a wall of death. The huge Russian hurtled headlong into the wall, cracking it in an explosion of grey powder. The giant went down to his knees, shaking his skull like a stunned animal. His cheeks and skull were badly fractured, one of his eye sockets broken causing his red eyes to offset. Usher watched in macabre fascination as the bones of Kirill’s skull shifted like tectonic plates and realigned.

  Usher circled his much larger opponent, sizing him up. He knew he could not out-heal this man, there was too much of the Feral in him. He could not overpower him, even without the battle drug Kirill was twice as strong as Usher. With it there was no contest, the man could tear him apart.

  What he also saw clearly however, was that to the uninitiated, the sheer blood rage of the Feral was overwhelming. What it gave in strength and resilience it took away in judgement and reason in direct proportion to dosage.

  Usher could not win this with strength, so he had to fight clever and that meant utilizing the techniques he had always specialized in. Brazilian Jujitsu, an art specifically designed to allow a smaller weaker man to overpower a far larger stronger opponent. It had worked on natural fighters many times, Usher only hoped the principles would stand when fighting this supernaturally enhanced monster.

  The crowd above them gasped in amazement and excited squeamishness at the sight of Kirill’s head injuries, watching in horror as they healed. The big berserker stood up and rushed Usher agai
n but this time he was ready.

  Usher jumped and threw his feet backwards, pushing his weight down in a sprawl on top of Kirill, preventing the big man from taking him down.

  Kirill roared in indignation and grabbed Usher by the shirt with both fists, allowing Usher to roll backwards and end up in a closed guard position with both his legs wrapped around Kirill’s back.

  The crowd cheered and gasped to see the Usher seemingly pinned on his back vulnerable with the huge Russian on top. They didn’t understand the advantage Usher had.

  When Kirill tried to make a grab for Usher’s throat, Usher grabbed the wrist then hooked his leg over Kirill’s neck and raised his hips, trying to get an arm bar from the guard position. Against a creature so strong it took all Usher’s enhanced power to do it but finally he heard the big man’s elbow snap. Kirill howled in pain, but Usher didn’t dare stop there.

  He knew that the wound would begin to heal in no time, so slipped around like an anaconda and altered his guard position, pulling up Kirill’s knee, grabbing the heel of his foot and pushing his hips upwards then locking his hands together and twisting, executing a heel hook technique.

  Although weaker than Kirill, Usher’s inhuman strength gave extra power to the leverage of his techniques, and the kneecap snapped at the same moment as the shin bone, which burst through the skin with a loud crack.

  The excited gasps of the crowd began to slowly turn to noises of disgust, even revulsion and fear, but Usher knew he could not stop to catch his breath.

  He quickly slipped around into side guard, lying across Kirill as tight and close as two coats of paint, then when his opponent tried to roll away, Usher slipped around behind him and slid his arm under the chin. Kirill seemed to realize what was happening and began to writhe and struggle with all he had, but his broken arm and leg offered him no leverage.

  Usher knew this advantage would not last however, so adjusted his position and squeezed, performing a read naked choke that cut off Kirill’s blood supply. Usher did not know what changes in physiology they had both undergone since taking the Feral, but he hoped at least for the moment that Kirill still needed to get some form of blood supply to his brain. Kirill struggled with all his unnaturally borrowed strength, and when he felt the power, Usher suddenly doubted he would be able to hold on. He began to panic as he knew he would not get a second chance to defeat this monster. He felt Kirill begin to gain a little leverage, inch his way out of the hold.

  Usher took a deep breath and renewed his grip, choking the big Russian out with everything he had. Kirill’s red eyes began to bulge, his tongue turning purple and a horrible wheezing issued from his thick throat.

  Above him on all sides the crowd began to murmur in discontentment. They had paid to see Usher destroyed, they wanted flamboyance and showmanship, not this underhand form of fighting.

  Usher was not here to put on a show, he was here to get a job done.

  He expanded his chest and squeezed, then felt Kirill go limp in his arms. Without hesitating, Usher roared and with every ounce of strength he had he broke the big man’s neck.

  He regained some awareness of himself, caught his breath, and looked down in amazement at his defeated opponent. Already Usher could see the bones of his arms and legs mending, but Kirill had not regained consciousness. His body was struggling to cope with the stress of mending his complicated nervous system as well as his limbs. He was twitching and spasming as the Feral attempted its repair job.

  Usher had learned something. They were tough, becoming less human with increased dosage but less smart as well. They were resilient and could heal from most wounds, but they were vulnerable if the spinal cord was damaged, it took time to heal.

  Time enough for Usher’s crude coup de grace. He picked up the lump of concrete Kirill had earlier meant for him and with a snarl he brought it down again and again.

  Usher did not know how long he struck with the improvised weapon, for a time he became lost in the blood dream himself, as the Feral spiked in his system. He felt free and liberated on the wings of pure violent rage. Then the red mist cleared and he felt himself diminish a little as the lower dosage in him began to ebb.

  He looked down, breathing hard.

  Kirill’s head had been utterly caved in, like a watermelon hit with a sledgehammer. Through his pulped and shattered jaw, a few raggedy breaths exuded, followed by a shudder, then stillness.

  Usher stared at what he had done in horror.

  He had always been able to fight, had trained for years in Muay Thai, Krav Maga, JuJitsu, police and military forms of combat. He had fought in rings, in back alleys, in desert ruins, and had killed men before, but never like this. Owen Sibelius had been one thing, a foul denizen of the Unseelie Court, as much to blame for the loss of Usher’s family as anyone, but this had been a man. Kirill had been a violent, brutish man who deserved little sympathy but he was a man all the same.

  Usher felt a deep revulsion rise up inside him, disgust at the battle thrill he had felt caving the Russian’s head to a pulp. He hated it because he had enjoyed it so much. The Feral had set him free of conscience and mercy and all kindness, leaving only a predator.

  Whatever the source of this berserker elixir, it had to be stopped. Usher had seen the attack in London, seen what they had done to the STG. He could not imagine fighting an entire army of these things. He stood in the middle of the arena with the baying crowd above him, the unnatural strength still ebbing and flowing in his veins.

  What had they done to him?

  In a flash Usher arrived at the only answer he cared about.

  Given him a way out.

  Above him, Sarkhov glared down at him balefully. Usher realized that he had probably just lost the mafia boss a great deal of money.

  No one had been betting on Usher. Sarkhov spat onto the arena floor then drew the Sig from his overcoat and brought it up on Usher.

  On fire with his new found energy, Usher reached down and grabbed the bloodied lump of concrete Kirill had held over him, still dripping with his pulped brain, and threw it like an Olympic discus directly at Sarkhov.

  It hit the Russian square in the face, shattering his thick rimmed glasses and his skull in one sickening crunch. The stricken mafia boss fell forward, crumpling into the pit to land awkwardly on his head, his neck twisting and cracking at an angle. Before he even hit the ground, Usher had leapt forward and grabbed the Sig Sauer from his paralyzed hand.

  Twisting onto his knees, he fired two shots in quick succession at Dmitri’s bodyguard, one of the men who had tortured Usher for hours. The double tap hit the big man through the centre of his face just below the nose, destroying part of the medulla area of the brainstem and causing him to drop like a puppet with the strings cut.

  The assembled crowd scattered in panic, screaming and tottering on broken high heels as they dashed back to their cars to escape the mayhem. Through the crowd, Usher saw another tall Russian in a dark suit, trying to find a clear aim past the desperate spectators. Usher sprinted forward and leapt up, parkour style, onto the rim of the pit, holding onto the edge with one hand and firing at his assailant through the legs of the running crowd. His bullet struck the man in the left knee, shattering the patella and ricocheting up into his quadriceps, exiting through his right hip and severing the femoral artery along the way. The man fell to his good knee, dropping his weapon as he bled out. With shocked eyes he looked up in time to see Usher climb out of the pit and walk calmly towards him. He spat at him and hissed in broken English.

  “You….will never get out of here.”

  Usher put the barrel of the Sig between the Russian’s teeth, realized that this was the man that had spent the last six hours beating him half to death, and pulled the trigger, spraying the content of the man’s skull out over the glaring headlights of a spectator’s Mercedes.

  “Always a way out.”

  Usher scanned the rest of the area, discounted everyone without a weapon, saw no immediate threats, and then dash
ed back to the stairwell.

  When he opened the door he was greeted by another of Sarkhov’s bodyguards, a man in a dark suit with a machine pistol slung casually over his shoulder.

  He looked up as Usher opened the door, raised his eyebrows in confusion.

  Before any thought could register, Usher had delivered a palm heel up into the man’s nose, breaking it and causing his eyes to flood with water. Usher spun him around and locked his forearm across the man’s chin, applying pressure until he heard cartilage start to pop. Holding the bodyguard close, Usher spoke into his ear.

  “Are my friends alive?”

  Usher loosened his grip enough to allow the man to reply, but he only groaned and shook his head in confusion. Usher extended his pistol arm and shot off two the Russian’s pleading fingers.

  “Are they alive?”

  The man screamed and struggled as blood poured out of the stumps but desperately nodded.

  “Take me to them now.”

  Usher frogmarched the guard up a flight of stairs streaked with blood. Usher realized it was his own, leaking from him as he had been dragged down to the arena half-conscious before the fight. Now it was like a trail of breadcrumbs leading him back to his friends.

  They rounded a corner and came face to face with a single sentry outside a rusted steel door.

  Usher put two in the side of his head before he even had time to register, and then spoke to the restrained guard in his arms.

  “In there?”

  The man nodded, and then Usher cupped his jaw and slammed his head into the wall.

  Usher realized that surprise was not an option, so he smashed open the door and advanced inside. Hugging the wall he scanned the room with his weapon as he went.

  He breathed a sigh of relief.

  Sitting down tied to chairs, bruised and bloody but clearly alive and intact, were the rest of Empire One.