Redemption of the Dead
Page 25
“This is cool in its own way, but you need to stay focused.”
Outside, lightning flickered and a black helicopter emerged in the middle of the parking lot, not affecting any of the cars around it. A few moments later, an older man with long hair and beard followed by Billie and Joe came out.
“Joe . . .” she said. She stepped forward to run to him, but stopped herself despite her heart desperately telling her otherwise.
Outside through the window, the trio spoke before Billie fell forward and sank into the sidewalk. Joe pulled her up and she started freaking out.
Thank goodness that didn’t happen to me, Tracy thought.
Soon Billie came in first and hid. Joe and August entered shortly after and started looking for her.
Joe was so handsome and put together, the long coat, the bald head with only a bit of stubble. He had a hard edge to him, the same he had when she first met him and saved his life. She wanted to go up to him, to wrap her arms around him and caution him of what was to come, but remembering the horrors of the demonic undead invasion, any wrong move on her part could destroy what she, Billie and Nathaniel came here to do. She could only hope and pray that what she was to do here would save his life in the end.
Tracy kept to herself near the brochures, pretending to be just another customer in case they saw her. She watched as Joe and August went around, looking for Billie. Joe called out her name. It was so good to hear his voice again.
An old man in a white fedora and overcoat was outside the bank, about to come in.
That’s him! she thought and ran through the bank, through the doors, straight in front of him.
He didn’t say anything, but she knew he saw her because he was looking directly into her eyes.
“Nathaniel?” she said.
He simply nodded.
“I have something for you.” She pulled out the pocket watch and gave it to him.
He took it without reaction, tipped his hat, and walked on past into the bank.
“What?” she said. “No thank you?”
Billie came around the side of the bank, alone. She gave Tracy a wave. “Done already?”
Tracy did a quick replay of the pass-off in her mind’s eye. “Yeah. Too easy. Just gave it to the old guy and—Where’s Nathaniel?”
“Said he’d be right back, wanted to check on something.” Billie’s eyes went wide in apparent realization. “You don’t think—”
“I guess we understand now, don’t we.”
“I guess, but if he has the watch and it’s intact, what is the one inside the safety deposit box?”
“Safety deposit box?”
“Yeah, that’s where the original pocket watch was, the one that he went into the private booth to reset and I interfered, thus him missing the reset time.”
Tracy waved her hands. “Wait, wait, wait. What’s that watch for?”
“You know, it’s a long story, but in the end . . . I was told that by him resetting it, that that was his assignment. He comes in and resets it every week and by doing so forbids the Doomsday Clock from rolling over and unleashing Armageddon.”
“You mean the Armageddon?”
“That’s the one.”
A series of dark shadows rose over them and when Tracy looked up, she saw a host of demons on the bank’s roof, looking right at them.
* * * *
The forces of darkness upon the roof leered at them before swarming down and surrounding the girls. They had them trapped, each of the creatures hissing and snapping as they taunted.
Tracy already had her gun drawn. Billie wished she had one of her own, not that it would do anything, but at least she’d have something.
If it’s my time to die, then I’d rather do it myself than them. “Tracy, shoot me,” Billie said, suddenly feeling like a coward.
“What?”
“It’s either us or them who decides how we die. Do you want to leave that choice in their hands?”
“Leave them in mine.” A bright golden robe with enormous wings landed in front of them, sending the demons back a step. The angel drew his long sword and got to work cutting heads, wings and bodies. Each time one of the creatures came in, he countered their attack lightning quick and removed either a limb from their body or ended them entirely.
When the blur of golden motion was over, Billie saw who had rescued them.
Michael.
“My friend has other matters to attend to,” he said.
Suddenly, scores of demons rose from the ground, weapons drawn. Michael immediately got at the ready. Surrounded by a multitude of them, Billie didn’t know if they’d make it.
From the sky, an army of angels descended and instantly the battle began.
Running for their lives, Billie and Tracy headed back into the bank and she jerked Tracy out of the way when she saw her other self pass through the wall into the booth where Nathaniel was about to reset the watch.
Not long after, her counterpart emerged with Nathaniel forcing her along, the ground shaking. The angel passed her off to August. A moment later, the two started running. At the same time the ground split open and demons began to funnel out like bees escaping a packed hive.
“We’re too late,” Billie said. The same thing that happened before was happening again. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Nathaniel was supposed to have it all in hand. Where was he? She bolted toward the privacy booth and was quickly mauled by a demon that swooped in low and fast.
She scrambled, trying to get away from its grip. Tracy fired round after round into the creature, the bullets not making a difference. Tracy hurled the gun at it in frustration.
The foul demon’s claws pierced Billie’s legs; she screamed, and in an instant the evil creature swallowed up her body underneath.
Hissing, it whispered its victory, then ran its claws through her neck.
* * * *
Landing on the demon’s back, Tracy beat on it. “Get off her!”
Billie’s limp form lay beneath the creature, most of her head detached from her body. The demon fluttered its leathery wings and sent her flying off its back into the air, and into Nathaniel, who had now changed into his angelic form and was fighting off the demons.
He pulled her to her feet, but her shaking legs gave out and she collapsed.
“Billie . . .” she said, looking into the angel’s eyes.
With a look of sadness which quickly turned to red-hot fury, Nathaniel fought through the packs of demons, Michael coming to join him, the large angel cutting at the swarm of demons flying through the hole in the bank floor, through the walls and into the world.
The Rain. “Joe,” Tracy said quietly.
“Gone already,” Nathaniel said, running a demon through with a sword to its face.
“And me?”
“Help me.” He swiftly came beside her and stuffed something into her hand then dove right back into the fray. She opened her fingers and had the pocket watch.
“Hold it as close to the opening as possible,” he said.
The demons started to rise in a tornado, their flapping wings creating a whirlwind she was having a hard time fighting through.
“Open the watch and wind it back!” Nathaniel shouted as the demonic assault grew larger.
“Wind it back? How far?”
“Look at it!”
She read the clock’s face. It had hands like any other watch, but it wasn’t measured in minutes. It was measured in months, weeks, days. It seemed one full wind back would count for one year, but an odd three-hundred-and-sixty-day-year. “All the way?”
“All the—” A demon pounced on him and took him down. On his back, Nathaniel ran the creature through and chopped the head off another that quickly got closer.
Tracy wound back the hands. The watch face glowed white. She assumed that once she suppressed the winder, something would—she was brought down from behind, the watch falling on the floor and sliding away.
She rolled over.
; The devil stood above her.
“Tracy . . .” he hissed, his black eyes filled with malice. He drew his liquid black sword and pointed it at her throat. “I lost Joe to my Adversary. I’m not going to lose you.” With a snarl, he lashed out. The blade was deflected just inches from her face by a silver flash.
Nathaniel kicked the devil back then locked swords. “Get the watch!”
Tracy scrambled to her feet and scampered toward where the watch had slid under a chair.
A series of whooshes rose on the air then a searing pain pierced her lower back straight through to her gut. She looked down and saw almost half of the devil’s blade protruding from her abdomen. Falling on her knees, the blade causing her muscles to start locking, she strove forward inch by painful inch along the floor toward the watch.
It was in view. Hot pain ignited in her feet as a pair of sharp teeth dug into her legs. One of the demons had her.
“Help . . .” she wheezed and was alarmed when she had difficulty breathing in.
Her fingertips touched the watch as the demon crawled up her body. She pulled the watch into her hand and instantly the demon’s weight lifted. Had she suppressed the winder? She checked and it still was out, the watch face glowing. Hot pain fired up in her back and mid-section again as the sword was yanked from her body. Her blood gushed out and she could barely move. The devil stood over her and just as he reached for the pocket watch, both Nathaniel and Michael flew in from the side and pulled him away. Both the devil and the angels disappeared through the wall beside her.
Hands shaking, she pulled herself along the floor, blood filling her mouth. She coughed then gagged, and darkness started to invade her vision. Near the hole, the demonic swarm poured out, but seemed to be thinner in numbers.
Tracy reached as far forward as she could and pressed the winder.
* * * *
Epilogue
Alterations
Six Months Later . . .
Tracy walked down Main, Nathaniel guised as a young man beside her. She wore a black T-shirt, black jeans, the color something she refused to give up after what happened at the bank six months ago. As the two walked through the crowd of people, even now she still saw the city she once knew, the one ravaged and broken, with the undead at every corner. The pain, the suffering, the blood. The brown and gray sky.
And Joe. Her Joe.
After she passed out at the bank and came to later in an odd realm of golden light, she’d been told the pocket watch activated a temporal vortex which drew the demons back to the Pit, sealing them in once more. Billie hadn’t survived.
Amidst the heartache over losing her, it was a relief to know that because the timer had been reset, none of it had ever happened. Joe was alive, so was Billie—her counterpart that was not present at the bank—August, even Des, though she never met the last two.
Nathaniel had kept her company every day since the bank, had helped her heal. Aside from Michael, Nathaniel was her only friend. Once she had been feeling better, she asked specific questions about stopping the demonic assault on the Earth. She wanted to know if she was able to finally lead a normal life, even right some wrongs. It was then she found out the horrible truth.
She would never have a normal life because she never returned to her own Time. No human would ever see or hear her again. She begged Nathaniel to fly her back to Hell so they could somehow get back to their own time, activate that portal which in turn would cause the Storm of Skulls and lead her back to her present.
“It can’t be so,” he had said. “To activate the portal fueled by their evil is abominable. Lucifer was the one that powered it. Even if we did, it would quickly lead to all that we just fought to prevent.”
“Couldn’t you and your army just go down there and stop them from entering?”
“It’s not our time to fight them, not the one ordained. That is still a little ways off yet. Besides, that portal has been destroyed as was its maker after Michael and his archangels took the devil back to where he belonged. It won’t happen again.”
“What about me? Life?”
“It is the cost of changing the course of history, in your case, getting history back on course.”
“I’m doomed?”
“No, but chosen, and one day you will be rewarded by the King for your sacrifice and service. He won’t forget you, Tracy. He loves you and will one day restore you. Until then, I will remain with you until we received word as to where we are called next.”
After that conversation, she spent many nights weeping, thinking of Joe and the life they could’ve had, the bitter thought that maybe he was now with April. She couldn’t bring herself to check on him. She mourned for her family and friends who she’d never speak to again. She was assured there was a version of her here and now living in the natural realm. What that woman was doing, she wasn’t yet prepared to face. Maybe in time, maybe when things healed.
Now, looking up at the sun shining overhead, she longed to feel its warmth. Instead, she had to rely on the warmth of promise and of one day being restored. Until then, she had to bear the pain and carry her cross.
They turned a corner and started heading to the railway bridge underpass. A glimmer of gold caught her eye and she looked up. Michael stood on the bridge overhead, sword drawn, fire in his eyes.
“Come, he has been located,” Michael said.
Tracy looked at Nathaniel. “Who?”
Nathaniel’s eyes lit with a fresh burst of holy fire. “The Antichrist.”
As the angel changed form beside her, Tracy reached back over her shoulder and drew her own sword. Its energy passed through her and liquid silver armor formed over her body, delicate scripts and glyphs surfacing right after. She turned to Nathaniel, who asked, “Ready?”
“Ready,” she said, then spread her wings and rose into the air.
* * * *
About the Author
A.P. Fuchs is the author of many novels and short stories, most of which have been published. His most recent books are Redemption of the Dead, the third book in his zombie trilogy, Undead World; Axiom-man: City of Ruin; the paranormal romance series Blood of my World; and Zombie Fight Night: Battles of the Dead, in which zombies fight such classic monsters as werewolves, vampires, Bigfoot, and even go up against awesome foes like pirates, ninjas, and Bruce Lee.
Also a cartoonist, he is known for his superhero series, The Axiom-man Saga, both in novel and comic book format.
Please see www.axiom-man.com for more on this series.
Fuchs lives and writes in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and barely ever leaves the house.
Visit him on the Web at www.canisterx.com and follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/ap_fuchs
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Also by A.P. Fuchs
Blood of My World Trilogy
Discovery of Death
Memories of Death
Life of Death
Undead World Trilogy
Blood of the Dead
Possession of the Dead
Redemption of the Dead
The Axiom-man™ Saga
(listed in reading order)
Axiom-man
Episode No. 0: First Night Out
Doorway of Darkness
Episode No. 1: The Dead Land
City of Ruin
Of Magic and Men (comic book)
Other Fiction
A Stranger Dead
A Red Dark Night
April (writing as Peter Fox)
Magic Man (deluxe chapbook)
The Way of the Fog (The Ark of Light Vol. 1)
Devil’s Playground (written with Keith Gouveia)
On Hell’s Wings (written with Keith Gouveia)
Zombie Fight Night: Battles of the Dead
Magic Man Plus 15 Tales of Terror
Undeniable
Anthologies (as editor)
Dead Science
Elements of the Fantastic
Vicious Verses and Reanimated Rhymes: Zany Zombie Poetry for the Unde
ad Head
Metahumans vs the Undead
Bigfoot Terror Tales Vol. 1 (with Eric S. Brown)
Bigfoot Terror Tales Vol. 2 (with Eric S. Brown)
Non-fiction
Book Marketing for the
Financially-challenged Author
Poetry
The Hand I’ve Been Dealt
Haunted Melodies and Other Dark Poems
Still About A Girl
Go to
www.canisterx.com
&
www.undeadworldtrilogy.com
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Table of Contents
Prologue
Epilogue