“Assss youuuu wiiiiish,” Maigo said, smiling at her memory of The Princess Bride, which she had watched with Lilly, Collins and Cooper during one of their girl’s nights in. Then she pulled the trigger, unleashing six white hot lasers into the GUS’s flesh.
With her mind still in the movie, what happened next nearly made Maigo say, ‘inconceivable.’ Instead, the sight snapped her back into the vocabulary choices picked up from Hudson during similar situations. “Fuck my ass.”
14
HUDSON
“Solomon?” Rook says. “Sounds like a normal dude.”
“Would you feel better if he had a super cool code name?” I ask, eyeing the jungle around us. The foliage is thrashing like we’re surrounded by an army of monsters, but I suspect it’s just the wind, designed to keep us here.
But until what?
“He goes by many names,” Cowboy says. “King of Antarktos. The Last Hunter. Guardian of Tartarus. Demon Slayer.”
“Right,” Rook says. “Solomon, it is. You’ve met this guy before?”
Cowboy shakes his head. “Have been watching him.”
“Oh, well that’s just dandy,” Rook says. “Gonna save the world with Wet Blanket and Peeping Tom.”
“Is not like that,” Cowboy says. “I needed to—”
“There’s a projectile incoming,” Freeman says, pointing at a speck in the sky.
“I didn’t think they used technology here,” I say, looking at Cowboy.
“I’m magnifying,” Freeman says, and then he lets out a very human sounding gasp. “It’s not a missile. It’s...”
“Him,” Cowboy says.
The revelation helps me make sense of what I’m seeing. It’s a man. A flying man, his long blond hair whipping about his grim, bearded face. He’s dressed in what looks like a leather loin cloth, but he’s shirtless and barefoot—a look he pulls off, on account of being absolutely shredded. Not in an Arnold Schwarzenegger way. More like Sylvester Stallone in the first Rocky, post-montage, but with an extra foot and a half of height.
And did I mention he’s freaking flying?
He arcs toward us, wielding a long weapon that appears to be a spear on one end and a mace on the other. I’ve never seen anything like it, but I suspect it is deadly in this man’s hands—perhaps even more so than Rook’s and Cowboy’s hand cannons.
The question now is, will he hear us out before or after he kicks our collective asses?
The answer comes with a swipe of his weapon. He’s still fifty feet out, but a pressure wave rips through the air, barreling into us with a sonic boom. I sprawl back hard, my landing cushioned by David, who takes my elbow to his gut and lets out a painful wheeze. Cowboy hits his head hard, lying still, but his chest is still moving. Unconscious.
Our whole team, including the super-strong human (or not human) Freeman, is laid out, with one exception. Fiona stands rooted in place, her lips moving. I have no idea how the lithe woman stood up to the powerful gust of air, but when I see her lips moving, I’m glad she did. Three Golems rise from the earth, twenty-foot-tall rock and dirt monsters cloaked in vegetation and trees.
The first of the three golems swings out, aiming to swat the descending man from the sky. But when its hand should strike Solomon, it turns to dust instead, allowing him to land unharmed.
“You seek to turn Antarktos against me?” he asks, his voice commanding and irate. Behind him, the golems turning to attack, fall apart. And he’s not even speaking, so whatever the Mother Tongue is, he’s not using it.
“Excuse me, human,” Freeman says, sitting up. “But I—”
“Human?” Solomon says, his voice full of suspicion. “If I’m the human, what are you?” He shoves a hand out at Freeman, shoving the future-man back with a gust of wind. Freeman slams into a thick tree trunk, its roots coiling around his limbs, holding him in place.
“This really isn’t necessary,” Freeman says.
But Solomon doesn’t hear him. He turns his attention back to Fiona, who’s conjuring another Golem.
“Nephilim magic,” Solomon says, and he raises a hand toward the golem. The conjured creature’s outer layers turn to dust and fall away, but Fiona keeps right on whispering, the golem growing, and reaching.
“Nephilim,” David says, getting up, holding his side. “This man has fought the Nephilim?”
“Nephi-what?” I ask.
David cups his hand to shout at Solomon, but the battle of wills grows in volume as Solomon’s voice booms. “The whole of Antarktos is my body, and my will is the land’s. You cannot control it any more than you could control me!”
He spreads his arms wide and shouts, shattering the golem. Before anyone can get a word in, he sweeps that long weapon in an arc, which I think is more flourish than necessity, and he clobbers us with another booming pressure wave. This time, David is picked up and tossed atop me, his knee finding the soft spot between my thighs.
“Thank you for catching me,” David says, pushing himself back up.
“Don’t mention it,” I grunt, fighting against waves of nausea.
Once again, Fiona has weathered the fierce attack like it didn’t even happen, her lips a blur of ancient language, powerful enough to resist this man’s abilities.
“What are you?” Solomon asks, spinning his weapon in a blur. Apparently, he’s ready to do things the old fashioned way.
“Uh, I’m just a woman, dude,” Fiona says, “But I’ll kick your ass if you get any closer with that thing.”
“No normal woman can resist the power of Antarktos,” Solomon says, and I think he’s seconds away from striking, his eyes watching her like a bird of prey. When the strike comes, I suspect it will be faster than Fiona can handle. While I see something in him, something good, my instincts tell me this is the most dangerous man I’ve ever laid eyes on. And that means that he’s been holding back, perhaps taking stock of the people responsible for destroying the tower.
If not for Fiona’s resistance to his powers, we might have been having a nice chat by now.
David raises his hands and steps toward Solomon. “Excuse me, sir? King Solomon?”
David yelps as he floats off the ground, surrounded by a spiraling wind that whips his hair about.
Solomon glances at him. “That’s close enough. And you—” He turns his attention to Freeman, who is breaking out of his wooden restraints like they were nothing more than dry twigs. The whole tree comes to life, folding Freeman inside itself, so that only his head is free. “The next of you who moves will be buried here.”
“We—we didn’t come here to fight you,” David says, and I wonder how he ended up taking the lead on this. But Solomon hasn’t killed him yet, and seems to be willing to hear him out.
“And yet, you bring Nephilim blood to—”
“She isn’t Nephilim,” David says. “Look at her.”
Solomon gives Fiona a once over. “A Trickster, in human form. And what do you, a stranger to this land, know of the Nephilim?”
“The Nephilim were in the earth in those days, and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bore children to them; the same were the mighty men that were of old, the men of renown.”
Solomon watches David, but says nothing. I can’t say why, but it’s clear David is quoting something that the Last Hunter recognizes.
David takes a step closer on the platform of air, his body language growing casual. “And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who come of the Nephilim; and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.”
“Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light,” Solomon replies.
“I think they’re talking Bibley stuff,” Rook whispers, lying in the foliage a few feet to my right.
I nod. “Good thing we brought W.B.”
Rook thinks for a moment and then smiles. “W.B. Nice.”
“You are right about that, my friend,” David says. “I have seen it with my own eyes, an
d I have seen the Nephilim, too. Not here. And not now. But I have seen them. We are not them, nor are we allied with them. The destruction of your tower was accidental.”
“Which of you holds such power?” Solomon asks.
“It was me,” Freeman says. He’s been sucked inside a tree, like that kid in Poltergeist, but he still just seems jazzed to be with us. “My intended target was a zombie.”
“A zom...” Solomon looks like he’s about to lose his patience again.
“Solomon,” David says, and then corrects himself. “King Solomon. If you are as wise as the first man who held that title, you will hear me out.”
Solomon purses his lips, and then slowly raises the tip of his funky spear-mace, placing it just beneath David’s chin. “If I sense any deception in your words, they will be your last.”
David swallows and speaks. “I believe your powers do not work on Fiona—”
“That’s me,” Fiona says with a casual, somewhat cocky wave.
David closes his eyes, controlling his temper. “There is a spear tip at my throat, young lady. Please...”
Solomon has mercy on David, lowering the spear a bit. “Finish.”
“I believe your powers are cancelled out by hers, because they come from the same source.”
Solomon and Fiona both turn to David. “I do not know how you came about your fantastic abilities,” he says, “but if you are at war with the Nephilim and things demonic, then I suspect a higher power is involved.” David motions his hands toward Fiona, “Likewise, this young woman speaks the pre-Babel language known as the Language of God. Perhaps, like you, she was chosen to wield the power to defend those in need.”
Fiona is shaking her head. “I don’t believe—”
“Whether she believes it or not,” David finishes.
“And you?” Solomon says to David. “Who are you?”
“A time traveler,” David says plainly, like he’s just announced he was a plumber. “I have seen the flood that washed the Nephilim away. I have fought the demon Legion. And I have visited a location on this very continent, protected by one even more powerful than you.”
“You speak of the Kerubim,” Solomon says. “His name. Speak it.”
David looks a little fearful, looking back and forth, and then up at the sky. He closes his eyes, whispers something—a prayer, I think—and leans in closer to Solomon. “Adoel.”
The spear moves away from David’s neck, and the man is lowered off the platform of air to the ground. Solomon takes a step back and relaxes. The tree enveloping Freeman disgorges him, unharmed. But the jungle around us continues its manic shaking.
“It’s okay,” Solomon shouts to the jungle. “You can come out.”
I have seen some freaky shit in my day. Kaiju, aliens and now golems and robot zombies, but I come damn close to pissing myself when a dozen T-Rex sized dinosaurs with red crests atop their massive heads, slide out of the jungle, each one carrying a warrior dressed for battle.
“Thank you, Justin,” Solomon says. “I believe they mean us no harm.”
“No harm at all,” Cowboy says, sitting up and rubbing his hatless head. He picks up his Stetson, brushes it off and places it atop his head.
Solomon eyes the Czech gunslinger, seems to notice the Bell for the first time, and then surprises me by saying, “You must be Cowboy.”
15
LILLY
“Are you trying to scare me?” Crazy asked. “Because sometimes it’s hard for me to tell.”
Lilly offered a smile that showed her sharp teeth. She had been trying to intimidate the man, flexing her fingers and extending her retractable claws, giving him her best yellow-eyed predatory stare. But he was as unflinching as he claimed to be. She kind of hated him for it, in part because he said whatever came to mind, which made him a little bit of an asshole. Mostly she envied him. She had abilities that most people dreamed of having, but they came at a cost.
She looked like a cat.
Like a freak.
Not only was she covered in sleek black fur, but she also had pointy ears, a long tail, cat-like eyes and the whole retractable claw thing. And that was the normal stuff that someone who liked cats a little too much could probably get past. But she was a chimeric mix of more than a person and a panther, resulting in gills on the sides of her neck, and a long iguana tongue. French kissing was pretty much a no-go, even if she did find someone weird enough to be interested.
Or, she thought, looking Crazy over, someone with no fear.
He was twice her age, and had a ring on his finger. But...
“Now that look, I recognize,” he said. If the skin of Lilly’s face could be seen, it would have been bright red. “Funny that it’s not that different from the predatory stare.”
“Shut-up,” Lilly said, leaning back against the side wall of Future Betty’s cargo bay. As soon as Woodstock returned with the Crow’s Nest crew, Cooper had deployed Lilly and Crazy to Tucson to provide support for Maigo. Lilly wasn’t sure what the two of them could really do against a floating kaiju, but they were certainly more capable than the non-freak members of the team. That included her adoptive father, Mark Hawkins, who would have fought to join the mission, had Cooper told him about it. She’d pay money to see that impending argument, but she knew Cooper would come out on top. Cooper was the boss when Hudson wasn’t around, and Hawkins followed rules. Most of the time.
“So you’ve never done the deed,” Crazy said.
“Oh, God.” Lilly leaned her face into her hands. She’d instigated a sex talk with a man who would say and ask anything.
“It’s not worth beating yourself up over. Relationships complicate life, and I’m guessing yours is already complicated. Love is far more important than sex. And from what I’ve seen, you’ve got that in abundance. In that regard, you’re lucky.”
Lilly hid her surprise by keeping her face in her hands. Crazy was annoying because he said whatever he thought, but often, what he thought was dead on accurate.
“Plus you reproduce asexually, so it’s not like sex would serve a biological function.”
There it is, Lilly thought, rolling her eyes. Crazy had met the girls, her three feline daughters born from eggs she’d laid years ago. They were closer to pets than actual daughters, but they had come from her, and she did love them. She had given ‘birth’ to five, but two had fallen ill and died a few years back. A genetic weakness apparently. Their deaths had devastated her.
As uncomfortable as Crazy’s new thought process made her, he was, once again, as correct as he was out of line.
Lilly lifted her head and stared Crazy in the eyes, which thankfully at the moment, looked human. “Three things. One: I’m not comfortable talking to you about this, with you or pretty much anyone else. Two: If you suggest a full body Brazilian or a Nair bath, you won’t be the first. And, ouch. Three: If you make a single pussy joke, I will eviscerate you. That’s your only warning.”
Crazy smiled and nodded. “Fair enough.”
“As much as I am enjoying your conversation,” Woodstock said from the cockpit, “And I truly am— We’re almost over the DZ. So you might want to suit up. And by all means, please continue talking.”
“Thank you, Captain Crunch.” Lilly stood and picked up her parachute. The plan was to perform a low-altitude, low-opening jump that was essentially the equivalent of a base jump. They would land in the center of the city and then...who knew what. Maybe scare people into fleeing. Crazy could push fear into people, just like the Dread, and Lilly’s appearance had a similar effect. So maybe it would work.
She struggled to get the parachute over her combat armor, grunting as the straps got caught.
“I’m not trying to restart the conversation,” Crazy said. “Would probably be good if our aging pilot didn’t have a heart attack while masturbating and piloting at the same time.”
Woodstock’s hand rose up in the cockpit, his middle finger extended. Future Betty began to slow as Tucson came into view, along
with the GUS. Ahead of them, charging toward the city was Nemesis, and behind her, Hyperion was taking aim with its arm cannons.
“I’m just curious why you’re wearing all that gear?” Crazy asked, disinterested in the view.
Lilly looked down at her body, clad in standard issue FC-P combat armor.
“You are a weapon,” Crazy said. “Why contain it?”
“Have you ever fought naked?”
“I think you know the answer to that.”
Lilly shook her head. “Of course, you have.”
“DZ in twenty,” Woodstock called out, as the rear hatch lowered into position.
“But you wouldn’t be naked. You’re covered in hair. You’re sheathing the weapon. And why? So Hawkins feels like you’re safer?”
“Look,” Lilly said. “I get the point you’re trying to make, but there isn’t time for me to—”
Crazy reached out and put his hand on Lilly’s shoulder. In the blink of an eye, her combat gear disappeared, leaving her as naked as she could get, with just the parachute in her hands.
Lilly’s jaw slackened as she looked down at her body. “Okay, that’s totes inapropes. And kind of awesome. Your wife must like that trick.”
“Holy fuck cakes,” Woodstock shouted, drawing their attention forward again.
Hyperion had just fired, but that wasn’t what got Woodstock excited. It was the effect. Lilly moved toward the cockpit for a better view. She reached out for the smooth front wall, which wasn’t a window at all, but a projection of what lay ahead. It was captured by cameras lining the outer hull, allowing them to see through any portion of the vehicle. It also allowed the vehicle to become invisible, projecting the view from one side on the other. Lilly touched the display with both hands and spread them apart, zooming in on the GUS’s base.
The wound gushed black liquid, but the reaction to the injury was far greater. From all over the base, emerging from the fleshy folds, layered like an opening pinecone, fell gouts of chunky fluid.
“Is that thing taking a massive shit on the city?” Woodstock asked.
Project Legion (Nemesis Saga Book 5) Page 9