by Hunter Blain
“EEERRRRAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!” I shouted into the night, rage and frustration trying to escape through my skin, making my flesh crawl.
Joey chuffed once, turned toward the screams, and took off.
I ran alongside him, heading toward the edge of the city. Spotlights were coming to life on top of buildings, pointing toward a central location.
“I don’t see Asmodeus,” I called over the wailing wind to Joey. He looked at me with his yellow eyes and nodded once in agreement. This was a good sign. But it also meant the gunfire was directed toward something else. Depweg.
We reached the edge of the city and I sprouted wings before shooting into the air. I brought Mjolnir up when I was a few hundred feet in the air, focused on all the spotlights, and sent out a flash of lightning to slam into the fixtures. They burst in an explosion of sparks and the city was bathed in darkness. A couple forks were unsatisfied with their victory and arced into local windows. I was relieved not to hear any screams, but flames did start pouring out of the homes and shops.
“Shit,” I drawled in disappointment at my lack of control of the magical hammer. Innocent people’s domiciles were being consumed by unforgiving flames due to my overzealous desire for punishment and destruction of my enemy.
A cry of warning from one of the combatants brought me back to reality.
I let Mjolnir return to my side and used my predatory eyes to lock onto the soldiers. There were clusters atop several buildings, with rifles pointed toward the ground. The cry of warning had been about something below. Whether it had been Joey or Depweg, I didn’t know, but either way I had to act.
I landed on the roof behind a group of them while willing several bloodwhips out of each palm. Lashing out, each rope found the bare neck of a gasping soldier and I willed razors down each length, piercing tender flesh and exsanguinating precious blood. The bestial hunger inside me roared in eager anticipation.
A moan escaped my lips as my eyes rolled back in their sockets from the pure elation I was experiencing from the collective blood intake. It felt as if a gentle swarm of butterflies was trying to glide up my spine, sending shivers down my limbs. My skin prickled and my hair stood on end as wave after wave of pleasure made my knees want to turn to taffy.
A soldier with the wherewithal to regain his composure turned to follow the ropes and brought an automatic rifle to point to where I stood, aiming from the hip. A finger squeezed the trigger and an entire magazine was emptied in seconds, a few of the silver rounds crashing into my body.
My ankle, shin, knee, and thigh exploded with the gunfire as the soldier dropped his weapon, his strength diminishing as I drank him dry. I screamed, electrified by the white-hot pain, as the nerves running up the entire side of my body all locked hands and started to sing like the citizens of Whoville at the end of The Grinch. I collapsed to the ground, writhing in teeth-shattering anguish as a small portion of my mind continued to draw the last of the blood into myself.
White faces with blue lips let eyes roll back in their sockets as I willed my bloodwhips back into my palms. Limp bodies smacked onto the roof with the sound of dull thuds and the rustling of equipment as the dead soldiers landed on one another in an impromptu dog pile.
“Fuck!” I cried out, knowing I was going to have to cut off my leg and use a portion of the blood energy I had just sucked in to heal it. “Stupid, stupid, STUPID,” I chastised myself.
I willed a giant pair of now-familiar bolt cutters and placed them above my thigh, which seeped precious blood precipitously. An idea sprang to mind, and I used one hand to undo my belt and fly before lowering the jeans just below where I needed to cut. I grabbed both handles and slammed them together, severing the appendage. No sense in walking around in a pair of jeans with only one pant leg.
For some reason, whenever I had to cut off a piece of my body, it didn’t hurt anywhere near as bad as when someone else did the deed. I didn’t know why, and I didn’t care right then.
My leg grew back, siphoning the fresh energy I had just consumed, and pushed the old limb out of the pant leg. Sucking the bolt cutter back into my palm, I zipped my fly, redid my button, and fastened my belt. Picking up the detached limb, I took off the boot and sock and replaced them on my brand-new foot.
I dropped my old leg—which was really less than a year old if I recalled correctly—and willed Mjolnir into my hand. Pointing the hammer down at my detached appendage, I willed elemental fire to coat the flesh and erase all evidence of my existence. Honestly, it was a habit I should have gotten into a long time ago.
I let my hammer fly back to my hip as I watched the limb flash as if soaked in an accelerant before smoldering and turning to ash.
Once satisfied, I leaped to the next roof and tackled the men on top as I landed. I used dual bloodgladius blades to cut off the arms of every man on the roof in a blur of motion before focusing on the spurting blood and willing it to flow into my mouth. I kept my eyes open, hard as it was to not let myself go and fall back into the purest bliss blood brought, and watched out for another surprise volley of gunfire. I focused my mind on Depweg, making it easier to fight the titillation as gallons of precious crimson life flowed from heaving, armless torsos and into my mouth. One dying man let out a weakened, “Por favor,” before collapsing with his friends.
From somewhere behind me and below on ground level, I could hear the familiar sound of a were taking out targets, and decided it was best to focus on the men on the rooftops. That should prevent a rainfall of silver rounds on top of my companions.
I sprang forth bloodwings and sailed into the air toward were I thought Joey was methodically taking out the ground soldiers. I dared a glance at the street and saw the black were doing his thing. I was incredibly impressed at the efficiency with which the quick wolf tore out throats, cleaved away limbs, and spilled entrails. The thought came that he wasn’t actually being efficient; he was allowing his rage to boil over and spill into his actions. I said a silent prayer, hoping his activities were cathartic. I knew forgiveness of oneself was a difficult road to travel and held numerous pitfalls that one would have to climb back out of. Let him have his rage, as long as it wasn’t pointed at himself any longer.
A dark feeling whispered from the depths of my mind, slowly opening a faucet that dripped worry into my guts. Would Father Thomes approve of the slaughter of all these military men whose only crime was defending their nation?
“Fuuuuuuuuck,” I forcibly exhaled as I squeezed my eyes shut in frustration. There was no way in hell this was going to fly with the father, no matter how I spun it. Joey and I were further damning our souls to save Depweg, and I knew it.
Unless…Unless I looked at it like taking out these armed men would help save the entire world by having Depweg by my side when I faced Satan. Yeah. The needs of the many and all that jazz.
Then why do I feel like I’m lying to myself?
A warm wind slid down my leg where the bullets had ripped holes in my jeans, breaking me from my internal debate. I forced the negative thoughts to the back of my skull, like shoving a king-size comforter into an already full linen closet—needless to say, a lot of cursing and punching was involved. To look on the bright side of things, though, at least when future me went to open said closet, the comforter would come flying out with ease.
As my hand explored the blood-soaked holes, I rolled my eyes and admitted that, even if I did look fabulous, I should wear Taylor’s custom-made armor clothes.
On the next roof, I came upon men sighting on Joey. I willed a saw blade and threw it, still attached to my body via a bloodrope. I suppose I had made up my mind in regard to the soldiers’ lives, but at this point, in for a penny, in for a pound played true.
The saw cut through a third of the men’s necks, sending heads tumbling to the ground with sickening crunches and wet thuds. I pulled it back and took out another third. Extending my free hand, I willed the spurting blood to glide through the air and into my mouth as twitching bodies collapsed. It
took a handful of heartbeats for a few of the remaining men to notice the collapsing bodies, then they started screaming as crimson geysers flowed by their faces in gravity-defying streams. One more skilled toss of the blade, and the rest of the heads were removed, like a proud dad cutting his grass at five in the morning on a Sunday.
On a side note, who does that? I mean, seriously. It’s five in the morning, which is late even for me!
A howl pierced the night that was like nothing I had ever heard, making me shift to a defensive stance as I sucked in a sharp breath and looked around nervously.
“Cheese and rice, what the fuck was that?” I asked the dead men in a pitch a little too high for comfort. It had sounded like a haunted train with a dual-tone to it, but the two keys being hit hadn’t been harmonized; they had been diminished, adding an uber creepy level that made goose bumps jut through my skin.
I strode to the end of the roof and looked down, peering into the dark river of shadows that flowed below. The abyss stared back in the form of two yellow orbs the size of billiard balls that squinted as they locked onto me.
“Jo-Joey?” I called out in a desperate whisper—knowing it wasn’t him—just as a monster of a wolf leaped from the ground to land in front of me. The stone of the roof cracked where the massive weight of the giant impacted. I fell backward, sliding on my butt as wide eyes regarded something from John Carpenter’s wet dream. Rasping breaths rang out as if I had been plunged into ice water.
“Jesus!” I yelped in a shrill voice.
A twelve-foot-tall bipedal wolf with muscular humanoid arms, lean wolf legs, and a jaw with teeth the size of AA batteries regarded me. Two yellow orbs with black slits down the middle locked onto me as a gore-covered muzzle dripped drool and blood in long strands. Thunder emanated from his throat in a growl that made my balls shrink into the safety of my pelvic cavity. I could almost hear them call out in unison, “Fuck this shit, I’m out.”
I noticed there were several bullet holes peppering his body, but with his size, they looked more like BB holes than the .556 wounds that they were. My hand absentmindedly stroked the sizable holes on my pant leg. It had only taken a few rounds to all but incapacitate me, versus the countless pinpricks in the terrifying werewolf that was towering over me. For some reason, my mind pictured two of me standing one on top of the other to match this wolf’s incredible height.
I scrambled to my feet, confident my best friend would recognize me, and said, “Dep—” before a hand the size of cinder blocks tipped with raptor claws smashed into my head. My skull fractured and caved in as half of my face was torn off with a ripping sensation that I both felt and heard. I was distinctly aware of the feeling of weightlessness as I plunged into the shadows below, where dirt rushed up to meet me. After the world around me tumbled like clothes in a dryer, I finally stopped rolling when a nice, helpful wall decided to halt my momentum. I lay, stunned, for several moments as the wolf roared in victory from somewhere far away.
Rolling onto my back took all my focus, and I stared up into a starlit night as I wheezed through a twisted, mangled face. My shoulder and side hurt from where the wall had stopped me in my tracks. After several nauseating moments, my head began to clear, and I drunkenly brought my hand up toward my face. I missed the first two times, but finally touched my target. I wasn’t surprised when I felt splintered bone and hot, viscous liquid where my pretty money maker had once been.
After a minute of lying on the ground, I willed my injuries to start the arduous process of healing. The pressure in my head and my reeling, unfocused mind cleared as my skull popped back into place. I cried out in pain as the bones knitted themselves together. Then the flesh grew and connected, completing my sexy mug again. My shoulder popped as did my hip bone, sending a lance of pain up my spine.
“Ow. Ow, ow, ow. Ow. Ow, ow…Ow!” was all I could say as I propped myself up on my elbows. Lilith, that had only been one hit and he had almost taken my damn head off! I stroked my beard once, feeling the thick, bristly hair matted with blood and dirt.
The unmistakable sound of two ferocious beasts battling snatched my attention, and I scrambled to my feet with a groan as my body finished repairing itself.
I sent out my senses, searching for the source of the noise. The stone walls created a labyrinth of audible distortion, bouncing the din in all directions like I was at a high-end movie theater.
I sprouted wings and shot into the air with clenched teeth, freeing my senses from the disorienting walls. Urgency injected power into my movements. There was no way Joey could last more than a few seconds against the enormous monster that was Depweg, who was standing on two legs and had hands, which gave him a combative edge against Joey’s four paws.
My eyes scanned the rooftops with the efficiency of a machine, latching first onto the plumes of dust, and then spotting them. They were at the edge of the city, Depweg chasing Joey. A corner of my mouth tugged upward as I realized that the four paws gave Joey a speed advantage.
Depweg grabbed a wooden pole that provided the city’s power, and pushed it over as easily as knocking over a precariously tall stack of red plastic cups.
The lines sparked to life as they separated from their connecting brethren, and the pit of my stomach dropped out as I saw the pole’s trajectory.
“JOEY!” I cried out with an extended hand, helpless to stop his fate. The world slowed to a crawl as sparking power lines fell in such a way that they seemed to be reaching out for the black were with the white patch on his eye.
No. No, I was not helpless.
I willed Mjolnir to fly into my outstretched hand and I pointed it toward the falling power lines, willing the electricity to arc to me. The snaking vines straightened as the power was pulled in my direction, effectively halting the pole’s descent upon my friend.
The feral wolf revealed his presence of mind then when he turned, grabbed the pole that was basically floating like a javelin, and lobbed it at me. As it approached, I released my hammer, replacing it with a bloodshield that took the full brunt of the rocketing power pole. It exploded into splinters as I was sent hurtling through the air tits over toes to land—gracefully, I might add—on top of a building.
After a few moments I grabbed my foot, which was touching my face, and bent my leg back in the direction it was supposed to go. Surprisingly, it hurt. Two hands were on the same side of my body, and I grunted more in annoyance than pain as the hand that was supposed to be on that side grabbed the rogue arm and tugged it back into place with a pop that I felt more than heard.
I sat up and looked down to see my own sweet, sweet ass.
“Whatthefuh?” I said in cursive, my words tying together.
I turned my head to look over my shoulder and saw one of my legs sticking out and understood the mix up. I grabbed my hip with one hand while grabbing an exhaust vent with the other, and twisted back into place. That’s when I had to laugh at my predicament as the leg I had already bent back into place, needed to be bent back-back into place. It had been the heel of my boot touching my face, and I had broken my own damn knee trying to fix the problem—typical guy, am I right? Measure nonce and cut as many times as needed.
There was a thump in the distance that I was only vaguely aware of.
After my Mr. Potato Head was back in position to match the front of the box it had come in I stood up, only to be knocked off the roof by an earsplitting explosion. Heat enveloped my body as my forearms raced to shield the face I had just grown back.
There was a follow-up thump in the distance as another artillery round was shot down range.
I landed on the ground floor in a sprawl and started to run on all fours to get out of the assumed blast zone. The little building just behind me exploded in a blast of fire that sent a mini–mushroom cloud into the air, bathing the area in orange light.
Still on all fours, I galloped out of the area like a horse on steroids, moving at a blur to mortal eyes.
Three more thumps sounded within seconds of
each other, and a high-pitched whine squeezed out of my throat as the whistle of descending explosive shells came dangerously close.
A small hut to my left and a humble corner store to my right erupted into flames that jumped into the sky, singeing my hair and beard with their alarming proximity.
Instinct took over as the third shell was about to land directly on me, and I pulled my trench coat over my head as I dropped into a ball.
The military strike had been dead-on and smashed just past my juicy behind as I tumbled. I immediately understood all the comedians’ jokes about the aftermath of eating Taco Bell as flames erupted from my backside and smeared the street in fire.
I screamed in both rage and pain as another two thumps sounded in the distance.
“HOW THE HEL—” I started to scream at the universe before being cut off by, you guessed it, a calm and collected argument with the Mexican military about the do’s and don’ts of proper internet comment etiquette. Just kidding. They rained napalm on me this time, and only my epic trench coat kept me from turning into a chimi-John-ga—OH! And starting the freaking apocalypse. Dumbasses.
I willed Mjolnir into my hand, focused on a slipstream to carry me high into the air, and leaped with all my might. The stream of wind carried me like the Millennium Falcon fleeing the Empire, allowing me a reprieve to A) grow my damn hair back, especially my beard—I’m like that Samson dude in the bible, but only because I don’t have much of a chin—and 2) locate where the fuck those insanely accurate attacks were coming from. Collin was right. They must be using both science and magic to attack.
Almost a half-mile into the air, I turned to scan the horizon…and I really wished I hadn’t.
Asmodeus loomed in the distance, standing as tall as the rock formations that littered the outskirts of the desert.