The Mark of Chaos

by Susan D. Kalior

  Who shriveled and faded in a moment’s span.”

  The Zandron had collapsed to the ground, still as death. I touched his staunch burned wrist and felt for his pulse. None. Justice—after all. But I didn’t feel better. I felt worse, for I had become a killer. Worse still was the fact that I didn’t seem to care. I think I had that adrenaline rush people talk about when they are in survival situations. I guess that’s what happens when you don’t give up—a first for me. Moreover, I was willing to continue fighting and kill again, if it would save johnny.

  A booming clap sounded from the distant hills across the meadow where johnny and the Dark One fought. The ground beneath my feet vibrated. Before my eyes, the hills exploded. Globs of dirt and fire rocketed out every which way. Smaller chunks and sparks showered over my head.

  I crouched, afraid of what else might explode. Was johnny dead? Was the Dark One dead? Had they killed each other?

  Huge flakes of ash showered the ground like paper rain falling over the meadow—and me. Fire ignited the grassland like a golden carpet turning black, discharging smoke. This couldn’t be real! Flames gulped down the trees around me, sweeping over the Zandron’s body and inhaling the cabin. Smoke overtook the mist, stinging my eyes and sinuses, filling my lungs, making me cough and wheeze.

  Ashen powder layered the ground circling my ankles. With my hands cupped over my mouth and nose, I broke into a run, away from the fire through pockets of electrical warmth. The smoke, moving thick and black in the hot air, blinded me.

  I passed trees soon to be doomed, feeling so sorry for them. I ran into a meadow, burning low to the ground. If I ran fast enough, maybe my feet wouldn’t burn. I needed to find water. Maybe water would help protect me. I willed my legs to run faster. I screeched, halting suddenly.

  The Dark One had appeared before me. My hands flew over my heart. I had nearly crashed into him. No. It was johnny in his human form. I thought for a moment that I had seen the Dark One, but they looked similar. Divine Light still glowed about me, enabling dim vision.

  The fire vanished, as if it had lost the will to burn. Steam rose up from the ground, toasty and moist, clearing the smoke. Steam? Was that possible? I guess with a Tazmark, anything was possible.

  He said, “There are many realms and dimensions in one place. Much is hidden from the human eye.” His palm went to the back of my head, and his lips pushed forcefully against mine, soft and wet, delicious movement of tongue and mouth. And though I felt him flinching from the charge of my light, I felt sucked into the kiss, and into him. This was unfamiliar territory, and it shouldn’t have been. This wasn’t johnny. I flashed on the vision I’d had of the Dark One kissing me.

  He drew his head back. His rich voice softly touched me. “It is I . . . johnny.”

  He drew me tight to his body, his male hardness eminent. He tensed, pained by my body glow, but his embrace held firm. I knew he wasn’t johnny, but what’s that they say, ‘resistance is futile.’ I was shocked by my willingness to succumb to the enemy, shanghaied into forbidden pleasure. I hated myself, but for some reason, I couldn’t resist. What was wrong with me!

  A hand slipped over my breast. No . . . I must stop this!

  I called out with my mind, “johnny!”

  “I am he,” he said softly, apparently reading my thoughts.

  I tried to step back, but he wouldn’t let me. Only my head could tip back, barely enough to see his face. “I know you’re not johnny.”

  Looking down upon me, johnny’s face transformed into the Dark One. “You’ve grown wise to the Tazmark’s way. The truth is, Juan is dead. I have consumed him. Come into me and you can visit him.”

  “I don’t believe you!” I said, pushing against him. “He might be detained by trickery, but he is not dead.”

  “Do not resist me. I am the superior Taz. Why else would Juan not be here now to claim you?”

  A vortex of silky smooth energy spun about him, engulfing me. As a fish drawn in by a net, I was being caught.

  I whimpered to myself, no, no, no.

  “You are a murderer now, Shen. Evil already has you. Resist no more. I offer you eternal comfort away from earth’s suffering.” He forced my cheek against his shoulder.

  “No,” I cried, not as firmly.

  His voice reverberated in my ear, “I can just take you. However, if you come willingly, a brighter experience will ensue. We can love each other for all time.”

  “Hmm mm. No.”

  “Come live in my fortress, my princess, my queen. We can taste each other, pleasure each other, exceeding what you’ve known with Juan. He is weak and not as dazzling as I.”

  I yearned for the Dark One as salt to the sea, and leaves to the tree. But he was making me feel that way—it wasn’t real. It wasn’t! And johnny wasn’t dead. I would know if he was dead, I just would.

  A loud sharp clap sounded behind the Dark One. He released me so he could turn around. johnny, with dragon face was there, hissing white fire that engulfed the Dark One’s head. johnny’s spindly clawed fingers crashed into the silver flames that diminished as he hurled the Dark One away from me to the ground behind him.

  I crouched—twisting my head away, not wanting to see what terrible thing johnny would do next. But I had to know so I turned my head forward and peeked.

  In front of me, johnny stood. Then he knelt, still facing the Dark One. A low moan rose from his throat. His head fell back. His fisted hands rose to square his head. His moan grew louder as if summoning the wrath of hell.

  The earth quaked. His moan now thundered. A sheet of red lightning blinked behind the Dark One, now in dragonman form, coming up fast behind him. johnny rose and backed up. His calf touched my knee. I rose too and steadied myself by embracing his arm as he edged me further backwards. The red light sheet encompassed the Dark One. He convulsed grotesquely. I pitied him, for I knew johnny must have something horrific in mind to end him for good.

  johnny snapped, “Don’t pity him, Jen. It will give him power.” He looked at me from over his shoulder and lowered his eyes. “You must choose. Him—or me.”

  “You, johnny. You.”

  “Then see him dead.”

  My shallow breath cycled twice before I said, “Okay.”

  I pictured the Dark One dead.

  The Dark One began moaning intensely as johnny had done. A crackling rumble sounded behind us. johnny and I looked over our shoulders. A sheet of red came quickly toward us.

  I cried, “What happening!”

  “Shine your light on him, Jen . . . now!”

  johnny stepped far to the side. I looked to the Dark One and summoned my light, willing it to be more lethal than ever before. I closed my eyes with commitment. Yes. I would do this—the thread-like kill. The light gushed up in me like Old Faithful at Yellowstone Park, condensing into a beam so minute, death would be instant.

  I opened my eyes. The point between my eyebrows sizzled with energy, activating launch of the thread-like light beam. Out of nowhere, a human size, full-fledged black dragon swooped toward me, hissing a long stream of white fire that covered my face. I didn’t feel pain at first, but then it came.

  johnny leapt in front of me to throw up a shield, but I couldn’t halt my light, and it shot from my forehead. It had been summoned and I didn’t know how to stop it mid-stream. It pierced johnny’s back and his shield against the dragon never got up. The black dragon’s flames consumed johnny’s front.

  My light beam had shot through johnny and into the black dragon. The black dragon crashed into johnny, and johnny crashed into me. I fell flat on my back. johnny’s body had spun sideways, landing on me diagonally, making us look like the letter X. Though I was crushed beneath him, my body was still heavily doused in Divine Light, and I feared I was hurting him more. At least he’d been knocked below my beam, which hopefully saved his life. That, and the fact that the beam didn’t hit him between the eyes.

  johnny started convulsing violently. The movement allowed me some room
to wiggle out from underneath him.

  Next to johnny, the black dragon looked dead. But that didn’t mean it was. It changed into the human form of the Dark One. Maybe the Dark One was superior. I’d not known johnny to ever turn into a black dragon and fly.

  johnny’s convulsions ceased. He collapsed on his back, motionless, his long hair sprawled on the meadow grass. His human form was returning slowly. It seemed he was fighting that, because for a moment, the dragonman form started to come back. But then it faded. He lay quite still. And though his human form had returned, I didn’t recognize him. His whole face had been burned black, exceeding any burn I’d ever given him.

  I wanted to touch him, but I’d only hurt him more. He was so still. I sobbed, “Don’t be dead, johnny! Don’t be dead!” And if he was, it was so unfair! The enemy regenerates, but johnny goes down for the count. He had been hit from both sides, by Tazmark and Shen, a worse fate than the Goldens had suffered. And this was the second time for him. I was afraid to check for his pulse, afraid I wouldn’t feel it. I couldn’t bare the sorrow.

  The red light sheets had disappeared. The ground had stopped quaking. The battle had stopped. But too late. All too late! My johnny might be dead. If he was, oh if . . . he was, then all God’s were fiction, angels illusion, and hope a ludicrous dream. And I was a fool for believing in any of them. But I wasn’t a fool for believing in johnny. And I wasn’t a fool to bestow him my heart, for in all the dark despair of believing in falsehoods, one certain truth sustained me. Love . . . was . . . real.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Suddenly, my fear of finding johnny dead, changed to a fervor to find him alive. I fell to my knees. “Be alive! Please johnny, be alive!” I bent over him, careful not to touch. With hands above his body, I flooded the blue light of personal love. He was not moving. While flooding the light, I dropped my ear to his mouth to listen for breath.

  Warm breath touched my ear, “Don’t . . . give . . . up.”

  “johnny,” I gasped, “you’re alive!” Tears drowned my eyes. He was alive, but for how long?

  His lips parted and his voice came through in a choked whisper, “You are lit so strongly,” he gasped, “he can’t harm you magically.” He gasped again, “—but physically.” He wheezed for a moment and then said, “Shine . . . on him . . . while he’s down. I’ll send . . . my power . . . through . . . you. Don’t . . . be afraid. Don’t . . . give . . . up.”

  “Don’t die, johnny! Please do not die!” My healing blue heart light saturated his body, in vain it seemed. Maybe he was too far gone. “J . . . o . . . h . . . n . . . n . . . y!”

  Fingers dug into my shoulders. I was propelled off johnny, flying through the air. I crashed on my side. Pain slammed my hip that felt broken. The Dark One tramped over to me, his human face blistered and bulging from johnny’s attack. His skin smoldered gray smoke, emitting a putrid odor. His damning eyes bore into me.

  I rose clumsily, holding my hip. I backed up slowly, almost one legged, summoning lethal light. He matched me step for step. He lunged at me. I jumped back and fell down, but I didn’t lose my concentration.

  ‘Old faithful’ rose in me. I condensed it to the thread-like beam and aimed between the Dark One’s eyes. As his hands came toward my neck, my threaded light beam shot out. He jolted back, rending the air with a roar of pain that broke my heart but not my stamina. He didn’t disappear, or even die, but then, my successes had been on Golden Tazmarks. Perhaps Blacks had higher tolerance.

  I pulled myself up to my feet, overriding the pain in my hip. I stepped backwards, shooting my thread-like light beam between the Dark One’s eyes again.

  He pushed himself toward me despite the light beam. Not only couldn’t I make him disappear or die, but I couldn’t even stop him! I found it hard not to slip into complete hysteria. But johnny’s words rang in my head, Don’t give up. That was a large request. Maybe too large.

  The Dark One came at me faster than I could run. He caught up to me and slammed the back of his hand against my cheek, sending me through the air. I crashed on the hard ground. My body was numb. I couldn’t inhale. I faded into blackness.

  johnny’s words dripped into the blackness, Keep shining, Jen, no matter what he does.

  Okay, johnny, okay.

  Black faded into white. I inhaled deeply. I opened my eyes. The Dark One stood over me. Blood oozed from his face and dribbled on my stomach. I summoned my light to encompass me, hoping I could shield myself with it. A roar of silver flames exploded from his mouth. My light absorbed the fire before it reached me.

  Then I condensed my light into a sharp beam and shot it in between his eyes once more, and I did not let up. He moaned horribly, but then his hands flew around my neck, choking me. I envisioned my light exploding his hands while I pushed against his chest, hoping the combination would make him fall away from me. But it did not. I couldn’t breathe. My eyes bulged when I tried to suck in air.

  My feet began to burn like the devil's inferno. The burning sensation rushed up my body, scorching my insides, flaring scarlet-orange all around me. What? What was this?

  The Dark One lunged backward to his feet, letting loose a torturous roar.

  I panted hard, inhaling gobs of air, forcing myself to stand.

  johnny was helping me! His power had come through me, and around me, mounting still, hot and painful. His red-orange energy flowed over my white light beam, making it look salmon colored. Though the beam was striking the Dark One between his eyes, he seemed to weaken the beam by filtering it outward. Yet, some of it got through because the red-orange of johnny’s energy split from the beam covering the Dark One’s body, darkening it from the outside in, while my white light went into his body and dissolved him from the inside out. Brainwaves would go first, and the skin—last. I don’t know how I knew that. I just did.

  Even so, even with all this, the Dark One pushed himself toward me with vehement endurance. I couldn’t believe it! This might be it then. The Dark One might win. If I was going to die, I wanted to die next to johnny. I moved backward toward him, still shining my light beam mixed with johnny’s energy, straight between the Dark One’s eyes. But then I tripped on a large rock and fell on my side. Still shining light, I scrambled to my feet. I looked to johnny. I had to make it to him.

  My back was thumped hard. I fell forward, face down on burnt grass. The Dark One kicked my ribs over and over, again and again, popping bone like popping corn. A monstrous agony thundered through my body. I wept. The pain. Oh, the pain. But still, I shined. How could he endure? Could I?

  My sobbing screams of, “Angels! Help me!” became the song of the night. My voice rasped hollow horror, loud as ever, while growing deaf to the human ear. Shining . . . shining.

  My body turned. I didn’t turn it. My back touched ground. A fist grew large to my slit eyes and blurred as it came closer. Pain hit my nose, then my cheekbone, and my cheekbone again, and . . . again. My face disappeared in blood. I wished he’d killed me before the beating began. But it was as johnny said of Tazmarks, ‘Prolong death, heighten satisfaction. The greater the challenge, the slower the kill.’

  My mouth stretched wide for blasts of air to exit that should have been screams, but my voice had abandoned me. Even so, I kept shining. What kept me conscious I cannot say—johnny’s fire, perhaps.

  The Dark One snapped my arm. Ungodly pain speared and throbbed. Hot tears flooded my bloodied face. But I kept shining.

  He snapped my other arm with his hands, then my legs. Low guttural voiceless screams exploded from my lungs, laying claim to all of Zeke’s meadow. Such pain had no right to exist.

  But I . . . kept . . . shining.

  He spilled my blood with his violent blows until I was numbed, a watered down spider with shriveled legs, refusing to go down the drain. But he wouldn’t go either.

  Anyhow, I was grateful I couldn’t feel anything any longer.

  johnny’s energy still poured through me, but I began to faint, going down the drain
, after all. An odd delirium set in. Somewhere over the rainbow, wishes come true. The rainbow says, Then die. I could shine no more. Hush-a-bye now, no more.

  The sun began to rise, the beginning of a new day. But not for me. And not for johnny. We were ending. Was the Dark One? I heard his moans. In a glimpse of blur, I saw him standing over me, tears streaming down his bloody black cheeks. He drew back his fist. One final blow to finish me. I fainted before he hit.

  I rose out of my body, high, higher. I looked down. johnny had crawled over me, sheltering my mangled lump of flesh, taking the Dark One’s blow upon his own back. At that moment, and forever more in my heart of hearts, I labeled johnny, My Beloved. Oh, he was no monster to me now. He was my Musketeer.

  The Dark One grunted as he struggled to roll My Beloved off my body. My Beloved fell on his back, leaving him wide open to the Dark One. The Dark One stood over him, huffing and groaning, drunk with pain. It seemed we’d all been zapped of supernatural power. There were no more red sheets of light, flames of fire, or exploding mountains. No more mind games, or magic, or mystery. There was only brute physical force. And that too, seemed nearly gone.

  The Dark One turned away from My Beloved, staggering about until he found a large boulder. He lifted it and stumbled back to My Beloved. He fell to his knees and raised his arms, preparing to smash My Beloved’s face.

  But My Beloved bent his leg and shoved his boot into the Dark One’s stomach, hurling him backwards to the ground. My Beloved inched his way on top of him, gripped his neck, and squeezed.

  I was still going higher and higher. I watched My Beloved choke the Dark One. They appeared smaller and smaller. My body was a bloody heap of crushed bones and broken limbs far below me.

  johnny rose and stood over the stilled Dark One, trying several times to hiss fire, finally starting one, engulfing the Tazmark in white hot flames until he became ash.

  Strange, but from here, the meadow, forest, and hills appeared untouched by fire, explosions, or violence. Had all that destruction been an illusion that could kill? Or had it happened in some other dimension?