Hell, In a Troy (Lopez Time Book 2)

by Phillip S. Power

  Most of the time they wanted to get you though, making them a lot less than popular. It was the case here, so Troy couldn’t blame the woman for sounding a bit off.

  Under that… He could feel that a large and broken thing was about to take place. Even past the magic he was trying to use in order to suppress it. Troy held a hand up, his eyes going wide. For once, he meant it. He felt…

  Scared.

  The woman on the phone, the mage, sounded too smooth. There was a sense of her doing something at the same time. In the background, at least ten people were breathing heavily. There was muttering. A spell that was being chanted.

  “We met the other day, I believe? How may I help you?”

  Tran took a breath, her face seeming like she wasn’t getting what was happening. Not that he did. It was spell work and bad… Very off.

  “Officer Lopez just mentioned that we should pay our respects to Carlos. If that’s allowed. He saved our lives, even if things are a bit muddled otherwise. He saved a lot of lives.” There was a dark sincerity in her words.

  It hit Troy then that even a greater demon might not have lived through an explosion like that. He wouldn’t have. Sure, he might have outrun the blast but only if he’d tried first thing. Staying like he had… Well, the kid had really saved them with his sacrifice.

  A thing that shouldn’t have worked at all, that his will and a lot of luck had allowed Troy to protect everyone else in that moment. It was nearly a failure, even with that.

  Nodding, he waited to be told that they weren’t welcome. That being the police was a thing so dangerous or unwholesome that they needed to stay far away. The Children of Baphomet weren’t exactly the good guys, after all. The mages there might even be smart enough to get that they wouldn’t be there simply to stand over a casket.

  “How kind… The ceremony is here, in Cheyenne, at four in the afternoon tomorrow. I have directions to the cemetery. I’m sure we’d all love to see you there. Thank you. Both of you. For thinking of him. I should get with Leslie and Nevi as well. They have a right to be there. Even if they did run away with him. I honestly understand why they did it. It was misplaced but they meant well. I don’t know where they are… Well…” She made a noise that seemed sad. Almost a sob. It didn’t fit with her voice but was real, somehow. “I know where they are. Vancouver, Washington. I even have the address.”

  That part was a bit of a shock but not too much of one. She was a mage. Not a run of a mill one, either. Something had pushed her into being a lot more than most of them ever managed to dream of. He understood the amount of power that she possessed now. It was probably imagination but he could nearly feel it, in the room.

  Her presence. There was a gasp from the phone. Cheyenne, the cult leader… Laughed.

  “It is time. This is my will. The way shall be opened. The way shall be opened!”

  Building up, in a glowing orb, in front of him. There was something in it, he thought. A small point that wasn’t Cheyenne at all. It was… Darker. Alien on a level that he’d rarely felt.

  “Seriously? You’re attacking us? Now that’s just rude.”

  He waved at the spot in front of him, so that Tran could see it.

  She nodded slowly, and stood up, still holding the phone.

  “Troy. We need to leave. Now. This… It isn’t the mage. That’s Baphomet. It’s gotten free. We need to run now.”

  Denise Tran, holding her act, tried to look scared. As if she’d get what was going on. It was a huge slip. Troy wasn’t going to let go of his act nearly as easily.

  Cheyenne…

  Laughed.

  “Finally. It has happened. After all this time. I figured that we’d wait for you to get here for that. Yes… Our god has returned. You should bow down, and worship her. It might not save you but it could. I suppose you could run but you aren’t a match for us. No one is.”

  “Ann… You need to get out of here. I have this. Go now.”

  She smiled then, glancing at the light and then him.

  “You know, I used to be a god as well. Maybe you should be the one to leave?”

  That got waved away by Troy.

  “Don’t hog all the fun. Git. I have this.” That or there was going to be a dead him in a few moments. One of those two things.

  Denise Tran stepped sideways, into a rip in space. Fleeing, like a sane and sensible person.

  Troy shook his head. There, in front of him, was something that warped the fabric of the world. It wasn’t comprehensible in any real way. The being was just there, suddenly. Standing in the office and over it at the same time.

  It was tall. Larger than the sky was high, in some incomprehensible way. It was also inside the room with him. Physically there, as solid and concrete as he was. His brain burned, trying to sense it all.

  Part of him wanted to flee. There was no way he was beating the thing in a fist fight, after all. Trying that would be foolish. Starting that would be. On the great side, it also wasn’t really there. The ceiling wasn’t warping out of the way, it simply passed through it. It was there, and vast but also about six feet tall.

  Covered in brown fur, with hooved feet, ram’s horns on its head and a pointed, animalistic, face. It also had breasts, a large male member and what looked like lady bits under that. The look was baffling but not terrifying. It was, in the main, just really hard to see.

  Annoyingly so.

  Troy smiled at it.

  “Neat trick. I have one too. It isn’t as cool as yours. Would you like to see it though? Think of it as entertainment?” He didn’t expect an answer at all.

  That was wrong though, since it bowed. The voice was terrible and overawing. It felt like thunder, with a sense of something dry and made of darkness at the same time.

  “You. I had not known that I would be facing such an esteemed being in the first moments of my return. This… Is as it needs to be. Show me your trickery, then, liar.”

  Then a sense of vague interest came from it. It felt horrible, and evil but was polite, outwardly. At least it didn’t try to destroy him. Not yet. It did seem a bit mean, calling him on his bravado like it was doing at the moment. Sure, he was scared and trying to bluff his way through, but that didn't make him a liar, really.

  Perversely, the only thing that came to mind as a trick was pulling a coin from behind its ear. For a long second, nothing else came to him at all. Almost by mistake he waved his right hand, then added power to an idea of a bend in space. It took about ten seconds. It wasn’t linked to a specific spot. Not yet. It was wrapped around the thing in front of him instead.

  “One second here. I need to do this right. It’s a light show but if I mess up, I’ll destroy the building here. Possibly the city. That would be a poor trick, don’t you think? I hate it when I let things get too messy. It’s a thing that I’ve learned in the last ten years or so.”

  The thing felt bemused, but actually waited patiently, as Troy formed the other half of the link. The trick there was that both of the warps he was making had to come out in the void between worlds. If they met right there, it really would do some massive damage. Probably a good bit worse than what a few mages had nearly managed over a week before.

  That had nearly killed part of a state. This would be larger than that.

  After all, the other side of the thing was inside the sun. The pain orb itself.

  Quickly, he tried to set the god into the void, passing it off into the sun smoothly. It used up all the energy in his bones. So rapidly that it actually burned. As in, he smelled charred flesh and he was producing smoke. Especially from his legs. There was a sizzling sound at the same time, along with steam pockets popping and ripping parts of him apart.

  Baphomet, which was mainly an energy being, at least at present, screamed. That wasn’t a physical thing, so it shook the world powerfully but didn’t burst his eardrums. Thankfully. Then, making a motion that felt like it was grasping at reality…

  It settled. The warps were wiped away without even
a movement being made at all.

  Then it just looked at him. Like he’d been being an asshole, or a bad boyfriend. Not striking out at all. Not speaking, or conveying a single discernable thought. Finally, it gave a sense of nodding, though it didn’t move. Nothing happened but it was, instantly, gone. As if it had never been there.

  Troy just stood. Burning a bit still. A thing that he’d done to himself

  “I’m counting that as a win. I’m not sure why it worked but, win.” Thinking about it, he decided that the god might just have left him alive, because it thought he was cute.

  Hopefully not in a dating way. More of like an adorable puppy that had nipped it on the hand lightly. That no swat from on high had come up, left him shaking and with terror tearing through him.

  With a lot of focus, but no magic, Troy quelled that feeling, using a bit of magic to make it happen. Then a lot of power, since his mind was not clear at the moment.

  Pulling his cell phone, he dialed a number. That felt right, but wasn’t even done from memory. It was just being pulled from what was needed. In order to make reality work right in the moment. He wasn’t really certain who it was for, until he heard a voice.

  “Troy?”

  He’d kind of intended to get in touch with Darla, The Technician. She was a greater demon and it was her area. Instead he’d called a number that he didn’t know he had in his head at all. Finias. The Mind Taker. The demon that had once held him as a slave. Only it was clear to him now that it hadn’t really been like that. Even though it had been, at the same time. Why he’d do that, call that particular being, he didn’t know. Troy Lopez wasn’t a slave now. He was nearly certain of it.

  “The cage of ages is broken, Mind Taker. Baphomet just came to the police station in Lincoln. I drove it off… Possibly by amusing it. That… I tried to put it inside the sun. It nearly worked but it waved that away like it wasn’t that big of a deal. I…”

  He didn't know what to do at all. For the first time he knew about, The Mind Taker swore.

  “Fuck. That is not good. I’ll get… Everyone. Can you hang tight there? We’re coming… For all the good it will do. I’ve feared this day would come. I just hadn’t known it would be this soon. Did someone open the cage?”

  He shrugged, meaning it for once.

  “I think so. I don’t know. The mages were trying and then it happened. It… We had more time, I think. This isn’t what was supposed to happen. Who… Who would do this? Who could? The mages weren’t having much luck. It was here, though. Real. I don’t think it was just in my head. Ann… She was pretending to be my partner here. She ran into the lines, right in front of me. That means she figured it was real, right?”

  The voice on the line was dry. Also moving. Walking, most likely.

  “I don’t know. Hang in there. If you have to, flee. No one expects you to fight a god for them. Even if it does sound like you just did that. The others there won’t know it.” The line dropped then, being hung up.

  He just stood there, holding his phone. Blankly. Part of him wondered how he was still alive. The rest… The rest stirred, deep inside of him. It felt huge. Like Baphomet had been. Except… It was just him. Troy Lopez. The vampire.

  Then he started calling other people. After all, they needed to know about this. If only so they could run. Not that it would save them. Not from what he’d just faced.

  The interesting thing was that almost no one believed him. The demons did, but the rest, even the vampires, just acted like it wasn’t a real danger. That wasn’t a great sign. Anything that scared greater demons was a thing to take seriously.

  Then, for a long time, he sat. Just at his desk. In his office at the police station. Where the first act of the new war had taken place.

  There was nothing else for him to do.

  In an instant, the world had changed on him. Finally, he took a deep breath, and started to do magic.

  “I need more power. To be smarter and more creative. Do it and don’t let this take you down. You aren’t dead, yet.”

  The last word, yet, lingered in his mind for a long time, even as he focused on changing what he was. Trying to become a thing that could survive.

  Yet.

  It rang inside of him, coming back from the world like it was the sound of a bell. Unending.

  He wasn’t dead.

  Yet.

  Except that, he knew on a level that felt stark and bleak…

  He was. Troy had been for a long time.