Die and Stay Dead

by Nicholas Kaufmann

  Jesus. I tried to swallow, but my throat was too tight.

  Philip charged out of the tent with Francisco’s crossbow, unloading fiery bolts at Behemoth. The demon swatted at them, but the tactic backfired. They exploded on impact, their magical fire spreading over Behemoth’s hands and arms.

  The sight of this titanic demon half on fire was finally enough to get my legs moving. I ran over to Bethany and Gabrielle.

  “Are you all right?” Bethany asked me. The sword blade retracted into her bracelet.

  “I’m fine,” I said. “Behemoth let me go. I don’t know why.”

  I looked back. Behemoth didn’t seem bothered by the fire from the crossbow bolts. He didn’t appear to be in pain, and the flames died out quickly on his hide. Philip loosed more bolts to keep the demon distracted. But damn it, why wasn’t he using Nightclaw? The dagger could end this now.

  “Where’s Isaac?” Gabrielle asked.

  “Right here,” the mage said, limping toward us. Bethany and Gabrielle saw he was missing a hand and ran over to him. “It was the infection,” he told them. “I didn’t have a choice.”

  “But how…?” Gabrielle demanded.

  “There’s no time to explain,” he said. “Listen to me. We can’t let Behemoth off this ship. If he gets out into the city, it’ll be catastrophic.”

  Behemoth let loose a deafening roar then. He pushed out one massive hand, and Philip, dozens of feet away, was repelled backward by a gravity field. He soared through the air, slammed into the side of the island, and then slid down to the flight deck. We ran over and found him slumped against the island wall. He was conscious and wasn’t bleeding. No bones appeared to be broken. If he’d been human, he would have been killed by the impact. Being a vampire, he was just a little banged up. The crossbow wasn’t as fortunate. It lay in a broken heap beside him.

  “Son of a bitch can manipulate gravity,” Philip growled, straightening his mirrored sunglasses.

  “Sorry, I should have warned you,” I said. I reached down to help him up.

  He waved me off and stood on his own. “I’m fine.”

  “Where’s Nightclaw?” Isaac asked. “We have to put Behemoth down before this goes any further.”

  “Damned if I know,” Philip said. “I dropped Nightclaw when Francisco attacked me. I have no idea where it is now.”

  “We have to find it,” Bethany said. “We can’t kill Behemoth without it.”

  Philip glared at her. “Thank you, Captain Obvious.”

  “Can that thing even be killed?” I asked.

  “The Book of Eibon says demons can die, just like everyone else,” Gabrielle said. She glanced at me. “Present company excluded. But yes, we can kill Behemoth with Nightclaw if we can get close enough. I’m sure of it.”

  From vulture’s row atop the island, Arkwright shouted something. It wasn’t English, but whatever language it was, Behemoth understood it. The demon started moving toward the island, his huge centipede legs clanking loudly on the steel deck. We ran away from the island as Behemoth stamped toward us. A red-and-white F-14 Tomcat had come loose and rolled into the center of the flight deck. We ducked behind it and watched Arkwright hold the Codex Goetia before him like a shield. A bright light flickered from it, strobing in Behemoth’s eye. Arkwright began chanting.

  “It’s the binding spell,” Bethany said. “If it works, Behemoth will be under his complete control.”

  “And if he messes it up like last time?” I asked.

  “Then Behemoth will kill us all,” she said. “Six of one, half a dozen of the other.”

  I needed the binding spell to work. Then all I had to do was kill Arkwright and Behemoth would be sent back to his own dimension. Two birds, one stone. Except getting to Arkwright wasn’t going to be easy. In the meantime, we still had to deal with Behemoth.

  We needed Nightclaw. But the dagger was out there on the flight deck somewhere, hidden among the bodies and the various aircraft that had slid out of place. I scanned the deck. Small fires burned everywhere, sending light into the shadows, but I couldn’t see Nightclaw.

  “Isaac or Gabrielle, do either of you have a spell that can, I don’t know, teleport Nightclaw over to us?” I asked.

  Isaac shook his head. “It doesn’t work like that. At the very least, I would need a clear line of sight to do something like that.”

  “I might get a better view from the air,” Gabrielle said.

  “Forget it,” Isaac said. “I don’t want you flying anywhere near Behemoth. You saw what he did to Francisco.”

  Gabrielle rolled her eyes. “How much more do you need to see before you get it, Isaac? I can take care of myself.”

  Philip turned to her. “You’re carrying magic.” It wasn’t a question.

  “Figured that out on your own, did you?” Gabrielle said. “Don’t tell me you’ve got a problem with it, too.”

  “Not yet,” he said.

  “Good enough.” She glared pointedly at Isaac. “I’ve already got one mother who worries about me, I don’t need more.”

  I continued scanning the deck around us. Nothing moved in the flickering light of the fires. Nothing, and no one.

  “Nahash-Dred is here somewhere,” I said. “Arkwright said he was waiting, but I don’t think that’s what he’s doing at all. I think he’s hiding. I don’t think he wants any of this.”

  “You can’t know that for sure,” Bethany said.

  “If he doesn’t want this, why isn’t he doing something to stop it?” Philip demanded. “He’s a greater demon, too, just like his brother. He could probably stop Behemoth in the blink of an eye.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe he knows it’s a trap. Maybe he knows if he does anything, Arkwright will bind him.”

  “Then he’s a coward,” Philip said.

  I couldn’t argue. For all I knew, Nahash-Dred was long gone. And yet, somehow I sensed he wasn’t. He was still here, somewhere. I was certain.

  The sound of helicopter blades chopping the air caught our attention. An NYPD helicopter came flying upriver toward the ship. Its powerful spotlight snapped on and swept the area. It found Behemoth and stayed on him. At the same time, another chopper came from the New Jersey side of the river. This one wasn’t the police. It was a news helicopter with the number 7 and the words EYEWITNESS NEWS painted on the cabin. It switched on its own spotlight and hit Behemoth with it.

  Distracted by the bright lights, Behemoth turned away from Arkwright and the binding spell. He shielded his eyes with one massive arm and roared angrily at the helicopters.

  Shit. The tidal wave that had hit Twelfth Avenue had brought both the police and the media. They had no idea what they were dealing with.

  I jumped up, waving my arms. “Get out of here! Get the hell out of here!” I shouted.

  It was already too late. Behemoth gestured, and the NYPD chopper stopped abruptly in midair, as if it had struck an invisible wall. The rotor blades bent and snapped. Then Behemoth crushed the helicopter just as he’d crushed Francisco. The demon sent it hurtling over the aircraft carrier. I ducked down as it passed overhead. The chopper crashed into the pedestrian bridge that spanned Twelfth Avenue and exploded. Fiery debris rained into the street below. Amid the screams, screeching tires, and crunching metal of panicked collisions, the pedestrian bridge itself began to crumble and fall.

  Behemoth turned his attention to the news chopper next. It was already retreating, but it didn’t get far before Behemoth caught it in a gravity field. He crumpled it, too, and sent it soaring toward the city. It struck the corner of a multilevel storage facility on the other side of Twelfth Avenue, exploding and knocking great chunks of glass and concrete from the building. More screams, more screeching tires. The streets glowed with fire.

  Isaac was wrong. He’d warned us it would be catastrophic if Behemoth got off the ship. But Behemoth didn’t need to get off the ship to show us exactly what being Lord of Ruination meant.

  “We need a plan, and we need it
fast,” Bethany said.

  “Did the binding spell work, or did the helicopters interrupt it?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” Bethany said. “We have to assume it worked.”

  I looked up to the top of the island, where Arkwright stood on vulture’s row. If the binding spell worked, I knew what I had to do.

  Behemoth swept one arm before him. The F-14 Tomcat we were hiding behind was knocked clear off the ship by a gravity field, falling off the port side and crashing onto the cement pier below. It left us out in the open and vulnerable. Hanging back and playing defense was no longer an option. Gabrielle and Philip attacked the demon first. She struck from the air, pounding Behemoth with shock waves. Philip attacked from the ground, using his immense speed to land blow after blow on the demon’s lower, centipedelike segments. Together they tried to drive Behemoth backward, off the ship and into the water.

  Bethany stayed behind to protect Isaac, who was still too weak and too drained to fight. I ran for the stairs on the side of the island. I sprinted up them, the fire sword blazing in one hand. There were probably still fifteen to twenty lesser demons standing between me and Arkwright. They might be frightened of Behemoth, but they still served their master. They would fight to protect him. As if on cue, I heard the clatter of lesser demons’ feet as they raced down the steps toward me. There was no way I would be able to fight my way through all of them, but I didn’t need to. All I needed was for them to capture me and bring me to Arkwright. All I needed was to get close.

  The demons were faster than I was. I’d only climbed as high as the flag bridge on the first level of the island when two of them reached me. I swung the fire sword right for their eyes. The demons parried and fought viciously. With unbelievable speed and strength, they beat me back. These demons were stronger than the ones I’d fought at Bethesda Fountain. I wondered if being this close to the doorway between dimensions was somehow feeding their strength.

  The demons forced me back up against the railing. They both brought their swords down upon me simultaneously. Holding the fire sword horizontally, I managed to block their attack. But they kept pressing forward, their combined strength driving the fire sword closer to my own throat. I strained my arms, trying to push back, but I was outnumbered. In a few seconds, the fire sword would cut into my neck.

  I gave one final shove against their blades and threw myself backward over the railing. Luckily, I hadn’t climbed that high. When I landed on the deck I wasn’t in any danger of smashing my head open. My ankle was another matter. I landed wrong, twisting it. My ankle didn’t break, but it hurt like hell.

  From the landing above, the lesser demons laughed at me. Apparently assholes existed among demonkind, too.

  Behemoth’s angry roar caught my attention. I turned to see Gabrielle pummeling him with shock waves. She managed to knock him back a step, but the demon seemed more annoyed than injured. He extended a hand toward her. She tried to fly away, but it was too late. Behemoth caught her in the same gravity field he’d used to crush the others.

  Forty

  Hanging in midair, Gabrielle struggled against Behemoth’s gravity field, but she couldn’t move. I jumped to my feet—then fell again. Damn. My ankle was weaker than I thought.

  Across the flight deck, Philip sprang into action. He grabbed the wing of a fighter jet near him and pulled, gritting his teeth with the immense effort. A jagged chunk of metal tore off the wing. He hurled it at Behemoth. The colossal demon didn’t see it coming until it struck him in the face. He reeled back with a roar, breaking his concentration and freeing Gabrielle from the gravity field.

  A line of oily red blood appeared on Behemoth’s cheek where the sharp metal had cut him. I was surprised that anything could make him bleed. But it gave me hope that maybe we could stop him after all.

  Gabrielle flew away quickly as Behemoth turned his fury on Philip. He pointed at the vampire, and Philip fell to the flight deck, unable to move. Behemoth lifted one massive centipede leg and slammed it down on Philip’s stomach. Philip cried out in pain, but the appendage didn’t go through him. Apparently Behemoth was more interested in crushing him to death than impaling him.

  I got to my feet again. My twisted ankle screamed at me, but I forced myself to ignore it. I hobble-ran across the deck toward Philip. I didn’t have a plan. All I had was the fire sword, which I was pretty sure would be useless against Behemoth, like trying to stop a rampaging bull with a match. I had no idea what I would do once I got there.

  But Behemoth didn’t let me come any closer. One of his immense centipede legs kicked out, knocking me to the floor. I skidded across the deck portside, stopping between two fighter jets. Wincing in pain, I turned onto my stomach and tried to push myself up. My ankle had other ideas. Unable to get up, I looked back at Philip, hoping he was still alive.

  He was. Philip dug his fingers into the hard cartilage of Behemoth’s centipede leg. He grunted with effort, muscles and veins bulging beneath his skin. Then, with a loud crack, the leg broke, its tip jerking suddenly at an unnatural angle. Behemoth roared in pain, releasing Philip. The vampire ran away in a blur.

  I sank back down to the deck. Something under one of the fighter jets caught my eye. It was a lump of burnt cloth, the charred remains of Philip’s coat. Next to it was Nightclaw. This was where Philip had dropped the dagger. I began pulling myself toward it—

  Something grabbed me from behind and dragged me away from Nightclaw. The next thing I knew, I was rising into the air in a gravity field. Apparently Behemoth was no longer interested in sparing my life. Instead, the demon hurled me through the air toward the side of the island, just as he’d done to Philip. But unlike Philip, I wasn’t a vampire. I wouldn’t survive a high-velocity collision with a solid steel wall. I braced myself for the impact and hoped the others knew enough to stay away from me when I died.

  Gabrielle caught me in midair. My momentum knocked her backward. I held on tight as she regained control and flew me to the opposite end of the ship from Behemoth. The others had already gathered there. She set me down safely.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  Isaac was holding onto Philip for support. He looked worse than before. He’d torn a piece of cloth off his shirt and tied it around the stump of his arm in a makeshift bandage. He was as pale as paper. It wasn’t blood loss. The fire sword had cauterized the wound. But Isaac had been fighting off shock for as long as he could, and now it looked like the shock was gaining ground. A stiff breeze could have knocked him down.

  “We have to … stop Behemoth,” Isaac said.

  “I found Nightclaw,” I said, “but I didn’t get a chance to take it. It’s still there, under those jets.” I pointed.

  “How the hell do we get to it?” Bethany asked.

  “A diversion,” I said. “Gabrielle and Philip can keep Behemoth distracted while you and I—”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Philip interrupted. “I’m staying with Isaac.”

  “No,” Isaac said. “You have to. They—they need…” He started coughing and hung weakly against Philip.

  Philip helped him upright again. “Like I said, I’m not going anywhere. I mean it this time.”

  “Let Philip stay. I can distract Behemoth on my own,” Gabrielle said.

  I nodded. Gabrielle took to the air again. Bethany and I started running for the dagger. We didn’t get far before Behemoth did something that stopped us in our tracks. Something that told me we couldn’t win. That, in fact, we’d already lost.

  The giant demon raised his hands over his head, gripped together in a ball. Then he slowly pulled them apart. Something appeared between them, growing larger as he spread his hands.

  Gabrielle landed next to me, gaping at it. “My God, is that…?”

  I could only nod dumbly. We’d made a terrible mistake. Arkwright told us Behemoth had his own way of tearing the world apart. We should have listened. Behemoth could manipulate gravity. But gravity could do more than crush or repel. It could do more t
han destroy. It could create things, too. One thing in particular. One terrible, unstoppable thing.

  The object growing between Behemoth’s hands was a black hole.

  Light and dust swirled around it, falling toward it, stretching, fading. The air seemed to bend and distort as it was sucked inside, creating a vacuum that sucked us forward. As it picked up speed and power, Bethany, Gabrielle, and I were pulled off our feet and dragged. A piece of metal debris skittered across the deck, jumped into the air, and soared directly into the black hole. We would follow shortly. That was how black holes worked. They ate everything around them, until there was nothing left.

  With one hand, I managed to grab the chain mooring one of the remaining fighter jets in place. With the other I caught Bethany by the wrist. Gabrielle slid past us, but Bethany grabbed her with her free hand. Together, the three of us held on, a human paper chain. But I didn’t know how long I could do this. My shoulders were being pulled in two different directions. Already they felt like they were being yanked out of their sockets.

  At the top of the island, Arkwright held onto the railing around vulture’s row and laughed with sheer, spiteful joy. The lesser demons held on, too, but three of them were pulled off. They flailed through the air toward the black hole, their screams cutting off instantly as they disappeared into it.

  Over the howling wind and clatter of debris I heard the sound of wheels. An immense black shape rolled forward along the flight deck. A huge A-12 Blackbird stealth aircraft had been caught in the black hole’s gravitational pull, dragging its broken mooring chain behind it. The Blackbird tipped up, then tore through the air. As it approached the much smaller black hole, the Blackbird seemed to stretch out, pulled into the center, and then, without a sound, it was gone. Just gone. Swallowed whole.