by J. A. Pitts
Once the doors closed behind us, we saw immediately a glow coming from down one hall.
Bub pulled away from me, scrambling down the hall. “She is here,” he said, looking back with a grin. “Can you not feel her?”
“Bub, wait,” Skella called, reaching out with one hand.
But it was too late. Shots rang out from one of the side passages. Three bullets smashed into Bub, and he fell back, a bloody ragdoll.
“No!” I shouted, running forward. This could not be happening. Not here. Not the soldiers.
Fifty-nine
Out of two hallways came a scattering of the monster men. On the right a scrum of burly men with the heads of bulls roared forward swinging clubs and axes. On the right, two smaller men with the heads of cats held rifles, while a half a dozen more poured out of the other corridors with swords, axes, and clubs.
Skella ran to Bub and slid to her knees at his side. I turned and rushed the men with rifles, screaming. Jimmy’s own cry reached me as I smashed into them.
One of them got off a shot as I slammed Gram down, severing both arms, and cutting the rifle in half. I staggered as the bullet thumped into my chest, knocking me back a step. I’d feel that later. I assumed the chain stopped it since I didn’t fall over.
The armless guy fell back screaming, the stumps of his arms flailing, spraying me with black blood.
His partner stepped forward and swung his rifle around, catching me in the shoulder, causing me to lurch to the left and nearly go down in the slick blood. I careened against the wall, caught my balance, and juked to the side as he stabbed the bayonet forward, missing me by a hair’s-breadth. The steel rang as it sparked off the cinder block wall and the blade snapped.
I smashed my right hand forward, catching the bastard in the face with the book. He dropped his rifle and brought his hands to his smoking face. I stepped back as his head caved in on one side, melted by a flare of purple light that exploded from the book.
In the flash of light, I saw the Bowler Hat Man back in the deep shadows. These were the shock troops. He’d enter the fray after they’d won or fallen.
I backed out of the hall, glancing around to see how the others were faring. Skella had Bub’s head in her lap and his wounds were a glowing swath of light casting her face in awkward shadows. He was breathing, but she did not look pleased.
Jimmy had taken down three of the other fighters, but was having a hard time keeping the rest from either bringing him down or getting past him to Skella and Bub.
I launched myself into the flank of the oncoming baddies, smashing one with the book, causing another explosion of energy—this one green. The light slashed through several of them like shrapnel causing two to drop and a third to fall back holding his face. I dropped him with a quick thrust of Gram, kicked a second to the side and engaged the final man in that hall.
“About time,” Jimmy grunted as he parried a poorly aimed strike with a short spear and swept the tip of his blade across the monster man’s eyes. The ugly fell back with a cry as two more stepped forward to take his place.
Skella screamed.
“Skella,” I shouted, dancing with my own enemy.
I glanced over, and she was dodging a blow from the Bowler Hat Man. He had come forward too quietly for me to notice, what with all the battle going on. He wielded twin axes, dancing an intricate web of flashing steel and verbal derision.
I made out a few words my mother would blanch at. Skella had no place to go and had just missed getting hit with one of the axes when Bub lurched forward and swiped the inside of the man’s thigh with his claws.
The man roared like a banshee, which thankfully he wasn’t, and I put down my last bad guy. Jimmy was being hard pressed by four of the burly men with clubs. “Hold the fort, Jim,” I called as I swung around toward Skella. The Bowler Hat Man smashed an axe down, catching Bub in the shoulder. He crumpled, lifeless and broken.
“Fuck you,” I cried, leaping over Bub’s body. My vision started to blur as the berserker finally kicked in. Skella fell to the side as she caught a glancing blow from one of the axes, but I dove over her, catching the man in the chest and knocking him back into the hallway he’d come down. We landed hard, my shoulder in his chest, and he grunted, dropping the axes. I scrambled back, looking around. I’d dropped the book, but managed to keep my hands on Gram.
I was on one knee, debating standing or just fighting the guy on the ground, when something very pointy stabbed me in the back. The world sloughed sideways, the walls running like melted cheese. My body seized up, poison flowed into me, pumping from the bulbous poison sacs of a huge millipede that had dropped from the ceiling.
That’s gonna leave a mark, I thought as my vision blurred.
I lurched to the side, trying to bring Gram around to stab the damn thing, but I couldn’t lift my hand. The Bowler Hat Man had his knee on my wrist and was trying to wrench the blade free.
I was rightly fucked. I punched upward, striking the millipede with my right fist, but I was growing too weak to make much of a difference. Then it bent itself back, extracting its stinger and screaming. Skella stood there, blood running down her face, with her torch thrust into the great thrashing creature.
The Bowler Hat Man stumbled back, giving up on getting Gram and picked up one of his fallen axes. I rolled to the side, vomited once, and pushed myself up onto my hands and knees.
Skella pushed the millipede thing away with the torch, and it curled up in a ball, smoking and writhing, the screaming rising in pitch. The sound pierced my head with such pain that I vomited again. I gripped Gram with both hands and forced myself up onto my knees, then let gravity help me smash the sword down on the beast, severing it in two.
The screaming stopped, and I fell back against the wall on my backside, Gram in one hand and my other on Skella’s leg. She stood over me, waving the torch, keeping the Bowler Hat Man from advancing.
“Tut, tut,” he clucked, a grin spreading across his face. “You are already dead, my pretty. I’d prefer to play with you a bit before you fade away, but I think you’ll be entertaining even after you’re dead.”
“Try me now,” I said, almost too weak to talk. “Give me your best shot. See how you like it.”
My vision faded in and out as he laughed at me, standing there, just out of reach with one axe in his hand, and his hair a disheveled mess. Funny, I’d assumed he was bald the way he kept that damn hat on all the time.
I could hear battle coming from the main hall. Jimmy was still fighting. I just wish I could stand up.
Skella waved the torch in front of us, and the man laughed, his voice like a nightmare.
“Don’t you worry, missy. I’ll be having a go with you as well. It’s just this bitch that’s been haunting me. Her I want to hurt. You I’ll take my time with, let you linger a while. I bet you’ll be delicious.”
I looked to one side, then the other, looking for the book.
The man followed my gaze, stepped to my side, and knelt down next to the book. “Is this what you’re looking for?” he asked. “I want to thank you for bringing it to me, after all these years, it’s finally mine once more.”
“Don’t touch it,” I said, half hoping he would. Maybe it would burn him up. But there was something about him, something older and fouler than the other denizens of this fucked up dimension. I had a feeling that if he touched it, he’d turn it, corrupt it.
Wait. Did he say the book was his?
“I saw what you did to some of my boys with that little book,” he said, keeping a fair distance away. “I think I’ll let it sit for now.”
He stood, stepped over the book and walked past us toward the mouth of the hallway.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll see to my great grandson.”
“Warn Jimmy,” I said, but the world slid sideways and I fell over. Grandson? Jimmy?
Screams filled the corridor, and a roar like a grizzly echoed down the hallway. I truly hoped it was on our side.
&nb
sp; Sixty
I woke up with Skella’s face inches from my own.
“Wake up,” she said, smacking me again. She was pouring something over my shoulder out of a small glass phial, but I couldn’t tell what it was. It smelled heavily of urine and roses. Not the most pleasant combination.
“Take the book,” she said, pointing to my left. “I can’t touch it.”
I glanced down at her as my head began to clear. I definitely wasn’t one hundred percent, but I wasn’t going to fall over again. Not yet, anyhow.
She pulled my shoulder and cried out as she did it. I glanced down and saw that her hands were burned badly.
“Book doesn’t like me,” she said, wincing.
“Doesn’t like anyone,” I grunted, forcing myself to my hands and knees, aware of the sound of carnage in the main hall. I had to get up, had to get the book and Gram. I didn’t want to face whatever was making that noise, but I couldn’t leave Bub and Jimmy out there alone.
The second I touched the book, flame rushed over me and through me, entering my mouth, nose, eyes, and every single wound on my body from the slightest scratch to the gaping hole in my back from the millipede.
I lost conscious for a while, not sure how long, but I battered myself pretty good as the power surged through me. I think the only thing that stopped it was Skella slid Gram toward me, shoving her against my outstretched hand.
As soon as the sword made contact with my hand, I grasped it convulsively, and the power overload dialed it back several notches. My hair hurt, the soles of my feet hurt, hell, my fingernails hurt, but I was alive and the power of the book had burned the worst of the poison out of me.
Unfortunately, it also burned off all my body hair. At least what I could feel and smell without disrobing. Things were uncomfortable everywhere. I didn’t want to check anywhere else. But I had a bad feeling.
I sat there smoking, trying to get my mouth to work when a giant of a man came barreling down the hall toward us. Skella screamed and flung herself aside, but the bull-headed man didn’t even try to accost us. One of his huge horns had been ripped off, and there were long gouges down his left side. He whimpered as he passed us, limping into the shadows.
The eaters would finish him. They didn’t take sides, really.
Skella helped me up and I leaned against the wall, getting my sea legs.
“What about you?” I asked. “Any healing potions in that kit for you?”
She shook her head. “No healing potions, period. This isn’t a game.”
“So, what did you do to me, then?”
She looked at me and shrugged. “Think of it as smelling salts for your spirit.”
That wasn’t strange.
Another roar echoed out of the main hall, so I started shuffling my way forward, Gram held tight in my left hand and the book in my right.
“Come on, then,” I said, not looking back. “Don’t dawdle back here without me.”
“You don’t have to tell me twice,” Skella said, edging past me to glance out into the main battle.
She stood mouth agape when I caught up with her.
There in the middle of the courtyard a battle was happening between a dozen or so monster men and a bear the size of a small house. She was wounded with a dozen spears and axe strokes, but the dead around her rose in heaps.
“Where’s Jim?” I asked Skella who pointed to the right hall toward the glowing light we only assumed was Katie. He was down, his sword broken, and his helmet smashed on the ground beside him.
Bub still lay in the middle, at the bear’s feet, unmoving. He wasn’t dead. He’d just reappear again later. He just needed to melt like he always did. I knew he would. I brought my hand to my throat and tried to grab the amulet with the same hand I held Gram in. Did it feel any different? Was it cold? That damned kobold better survive.
“Check on Jimmy,” I said, feeling more of my strength creeping into my veins.
Skella nodded and careened around the right side of the battle, well out of the way of the bear’s brutal attacks.
Okay the bear was on our side. That was good to know.
But she was not going to survive without help. I went to the left, away from the glowing light, toward shadow. I sensed more than saw the shades gathering along the periphery, waiting their opportunity to feed on the fallen.
“Not today,” I said, holding the book up and waving it toward them. The shadows fell back, but they didn’t leave.
The monster men were dwindling, but were in a good defensive position, keeping the bear back with spears. Unfortunately for them, they didn’t realize I was still in the fight.
I rushed forward, swinging the book in one hand, and Gram in the other. Green and purple light arced through the bad guys like chain lightning as Gram cut a swath through them, totally destroying their flank.
The bear took advantage of their sudden confusion and took down the biggest of the bull men, shredding his face and chest with her foot long claws. After that, the remaining enemy turned and fled, dropping their weapons and not looking back.
The bear dropped onto all fours and galumphed after them for a few paces.
“Wait,” I called after her. “Too risky.”
The bear paused, looked back at me and snorted once before turning back and ambling into the room. It walked to Jimmy, sniffed him from head to toe, and dragged its long tongue over his face.
“Eww,” Skella said, sliding back away from the bear. “That’s gross.”
Jimmy spluttered and sat up, holding his head.
“Not dead I see,” he groaned, reaching for his dented helm and placing it back on his head. It mostly fit.
“The bear was unexpected,” I said, kneeling beside him, looking into his face.
The teddy bear that he’d had strapped to his arm was gone. Right, of course. Too obvious.
“Probably kept me from getting my brains totally smashed in,” Jimmy said, struggling to stand up. Skella helped him and he got unsteadily to his feet.
“When the new squad arrived, I knew we were screwed. Just as that big bastard showed up,” he pointed at a huge man, eight feet tall with the head of a rhino, “I went down. The bear was getting big fast, and totally threw me off balance. Kept my brains inside the helmet and my head.”
The bear snuffled Skella then began to walk down the hallway to the glowing white light.
“Where’s the Bowler Hat Man?” I asked.
Skella shrugged and looked after the bear. “If he’s that way, the bear will get him.”
“I’d rather not risk it,” I said, following the bear. “Jimmy, can you bring Bub? I don’t want to leave him here for the feeders.”
I didn’t look back. If Katie was ahead, I needed to find her, needed to know.
The Sideways is a really strange place. There was no way that damn bear could’ve fit inside the school, but when I got to the next classroom she’d pressed herself into the room and curled up next to a glowing white rabbit.
There was no sign of the Bowler Hat Man.
Skella stopped in the doorway, allowing Jim to bring Bub into the room and lay his motionless form beside the bear.
“Close the door,” I said, motioning for Skella to come into the room.
“Is this her,” Jimmy asked, shock and pain painting his features.
“I think so,” I said, pointing to the bear. “She’s pretty bent on protecting that rabbit.” I knelt and reached toward the bunny. The book flared, a green aura spreading from me to the bear, then to Jimmy.
He squawked, desperately pulling his mother’s scarf off his neck and flinging it at me. His hands and neck were burned, but he’d live.
“Yeah, okay.” I knew what to do.
I sheathed Gram, set the book on the ground, reached over, and picked up the bunny.
The bear snorted, swinging her huge damned head toward me and sniffed once, then lay back down, licking the wounds on her paws and arms.
The rabbit slept, nestled in my lap.
“Katie, love,” I said.
The rabbit stirred, but did not react in any other way. It slept on.
“You sure that’s her?” Jimmy asked again, confused.
“Let’s get her out of here,” I said, grabbing the book and shoving it in my saddlebags. Then I picked up the rabbit, cradling it like a baby against my chest. I stood up and paused as the room swam. Maybe I wasn’t doing so well myself.
“Sooner the better,” I muttered. I was flagging. Maybe the poison wasn’t as burned out as I thought.
The bear stood and snorted, so Skella pulled the door open and stepped back.
I don’t know why I didn’t react sooner. Hell, I don’t think I’d ever get the image out of my head.
The Bowler Hat Man stood on the other side of the door, leering, his hat cocked to the side as he swung both axes forward.
“Watch out,” Jimmy said, stepping forward, pushing Skella out of the way.
The two axes flashed. One caught Jimmy in the face, the second in his chest.
It was brutal and sudden, so sudden I reacted on instinct. I shoved the rabbit into Skella’s hands and pulled Gram free. Jimmy fell to his knees first, wrenching one axe from the bastard’s hand, and fell forward with a clatter of armor and axe handle.
“No!” I shouted as I stepped forward, stabbing forward, catching the Bowler Hat Man in the throat. The cartilage in his neck parted like cutting whipped cream, and the grin on his face faded to a look of shock and surprise.
I stepped around Jimmy, drew Gram back and hacked at the man, catching him in the arm as he dropped the axe and brought his hands to his throat. I hit him over and over, smashing his body and carving away great bloody globs of flesh. I was out of my mind, far beyond the berserker. I had no thought, no feelings, just hacked and hacked until my arm grew tired and I could no longer lift Gram.
“He’s gone,” Skella croaked.