“Ben, get up! I came back for you,” Allan yelled.
He could see that Benjamin wouldn’t be going anywhere on his own two feet. The blood pooling beneath him made it quite clear to Allan that he returned much too late.
“Ben! Come on!” he begged his companion, though he knew it would do no good.
Byron brought his fingers up to feel fresh blood and the gaping wound left by the jagged stone. He laughed, “A hero made out of a rat. What is this, are you seeking redemption for being so yellow before? Did you forget that God can’t hear you here?”
“Shut your mouth! I’ll kill you!” Allan threatened.
“You don’t know what that means, boy,” Byron said as he rose slowly.
“I swear… I will end you. Stay where you are!” Allan cried.
“You don’t have it in you to look in a man’s eyes and watch him die, and to feel nothin’ while it’s happening,” the old man said. “You have no idea… but I do.”
Allan lifted the stone defensively. “Stay back.”
“It’s gonna take more than that rock to kill a man like me and you know it.” Byron stepped forward sending Allan rushing backwards.
Not even bothering with his gun, he ran on numb legs towards Allan. Both travelers screamed as they clashed together.
Allan swung his weapon, connecting with the side of the old man’s face. It opened a hole in Byron’s cheek but he didn’t relent. He tackled Allan. Landing roughly, they broke through the floorboards of the bloodstained church.
The breath was knocked from Allan’s lungs beneath the weight of the old man. Splintered wood impaled the flesh of his back. His only weapon fell from his hand. Byron forced Allan down further onto the broken boards with one hand while using the other to batter him in the face. Allan felt the shock inflicted by the preacher’s fists. His lip busted, and with the second punch, he felt his front teeth come loose.
Allan moaned as Byron relented, assessing the situation. Seeing that the younger traveler was held in place by the shard of wood piercing his flesh made the old man laugh.
“The little rat finds himself caught in a trap,” Byron said, standing and walking slowly over to the sledgehammer lying beside Ben’s corpse. “If we had a little more time, I would make this so much more memorable, but this will have to do.”
Allan struggled as the old man heaved the metal hammer over his head with a cold grin of victory on his bloodied face.
“Say hello to Benjamin,” he winked then let the heavy hammer fall on Allan’s head.
The vicious blow shattered the top of Allan’s skull. The preacher hadn’t the time to admire Allan’s eyes as they went dim. He strode back out into the bright desert sun, hellbent on dealing with the women who had abandoned him.
He turned back for a moment, knowing the scene inside would bring him nothing but trouble from the wanderers on the other side if they chose to investigate. Besides the wall had been demolished when Benjamin had come plowing into it. Though it pained him, his cunning told him that it was time to find a new sanctuary.
Byron reached into the front seat of his old car and retrieved a half-drunk bottle of booze. Pulling a hanky from his pocket, he shoved it down into the bottle, then lit it with a lighter in his pocket. In his mind, he could hear the screams of those who had built the rickety old building as they were burned alive in the baptismal that had christened the unholy sanctuary.
He tossed the bottle inside and watched as hungry flames began to devour his life’s work.
****
The women snuck back towards the old church, praying that they wouldn’t be spotted in the bright desert sun. The ground was riddled with sharp stones in the hot sand. Their bare feet felt every stray thorn and burr as they slunk low to the ground, but it was far better than braving the night and its hunters.
They were out of breath when they spotted the crooked steeple. A gunshot resounded from inside.
At that very moment, Celia dropped to her knees, the muffled voices of her two companions drowned out by a familiar song coming from a different direction. An engine roared like a hungry beast, but she paid it no attention. The comfort that the tune brought was intoxicating.
She got to her feet and followed it, fear of the preacher ebbing away as she realized that her visions were all becoming reality. Celia ran in the direction of the voice, knowing it would originate from the desolate highway. The other half of her soul was calling her to freedom.
“She’s here. She’s come to get us out!”
Behind her, the exhausted breathing of the other two prisoners became distant. Their footfalls ceased eventually, but Celia kept moving. Her feet carried her madly through the brush. Thorns dug into her skin leaving bleeding claw marks. Low mesquite branches tore at her already abused skin, but she would not relent. She wasn’t even aware of the roaring beast at her back, until it nipped the backs of her legs the, with great speed, sent her flying up and over as the car passed beneath her.
Celia felt the snapping of bones as she was thrown over the hood of the car. The windshield cracked and spider-webbed at the impact of her elbow. It had happened in a few violent seconds.
She opened her eyes to intense pain and the rumble of an engine. Somewhere close, a fire burned and the smoke began to reach her nostrils. A shadow crept across her, blocking the intense rays of the sun. She knew it was him, even before he opened his mouth to speak.
“Where do you think you’re goin’?”
Celia didn’t answer. He knew damn well where she was going.
“I knew I should have killed you already. The last one like you made it out… missin’ an arm, but she still passed through the door. I can’t risk that again.”
Byron bent down and grabbed Celia under the arms. “The Lord giveth. The Lord taketh away,” he said, his sour breath mixing with the scent of the burning church.
“Stop where you are, preacher man!” Eighty-two warned.
He dropped Celia to the ground and turned with a smile on his face. The old woman stood with a rock in her hand, her arm shaking with fear and exhaustion.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
RUIN
“What do you think you’re gonna do? Kill me?” Byron laughed and reached for his pistol, but the waist of his pants were empty and he remembered leaving it in the seat of the car.
“Drop it,” he said.
“NO!” Eighty-two answered and lifted it up, ready to bean him in the head.
“You just assured yourself a long, painful death. I’m gonna skin you alive!”
Byron wasn’t frightened by her threat, just irritated that she wouldn’t just obey him like she always had. He took a step forward as she let the stone fly. It connected with his shoulder and he rushed her. Her frail body fell beneath him as he tackled her to the hot sand. He lifted his fist and let it fly. The sound of it impacting her mouth sickened Celia. She got to her knees, then pushed her battered body up onto her feet. Resounding in her mind, the song strengthened her. She stumbled towards the old man as he was busy pummeling Eighty-two in the face.
****
Casey kept her eyes closed and focused her mind on the vision beyond a wavering barrier. It looked like heat dissipating from the surface of blacktop. Reaching her hands out, she couldn’t penetrate the veil between the worlds. It was now nighttime in her world but stark daylight on the other side with her sister and her prison—the burning church.
She felt trapped, watching her sister beyond the mesquite trees as she was assaulted by a white-haired man who had run her down with his car. He appeared old, yet his strength was that of someone much younger. He turned on a skeletal wraith of a woman who was trying to defend Casey’s twin and began to viciously beat her as well. Casey watched as her twin rose, wobbling as she attempted to rescue the other prisoner of the desert church.
“What can you see?” Javier asked quietly.
“He’s going to kill her,” she answered.
“No. Send her strength. Sing to her if that is y
our bond. It can’t end this way.”
Casey nodded and, with a ragged voice, she sang as tears streamed down her cheeks.
****
Celia fell onto Byron’s back, grabbing a fistful of his hair. He cursed and flung his arm back to knock her away, but she held on. Sinking her teeth into the side of his neck, Celia bit with every last ounce of her strength. He screamed and brought his opposite fist up to punch her in the nose but she still would not relent. Pain meant nothing to her anymore.
He rolled off of Eighty-two, taking Celia with him. Her jaws clenched tighter until blood filled her mouth and a loose chunk of flesh danced over her tongue. Byron’s collar was soaked in blood. His face was red with rage as he brought his fist up, ready to beat Celia into oblivion.
A gunshot nearly deafened her. The old man wheezed, his eyes filling with disbelief. He turned to see Sixty-eight standing with his gun in her hand, her arms trembling so hard that she nearly dropped it in the dirt.
“Look what you left in your car,” she said.
Celia felt relief washing over her as the fragile woman stood her ground. “You thought you’d just burn us all up in that hellhole.”
She pulled the trigger again. A bullet tore through his shoulder, leaving a mist of blood hanging in the arid desert atmosphere. The scent of gunpowder and sweat drifted from the old woman who smiled a toothless grin of satisfaction.
“I got a better plan,” she said, feeling the power of holding his existence in her hands. “We’re gonna burn your ass instead!”
“If I’m going to Hell, you’re all comin’ with me.” he said. “I promise you that.”
****
Casey swayed on her feet. She couldn’t hold the vision much longer. She could feel her strength slipping away when the old man fell over, her sister still latched onto his neck like a wild animal in the throes of death. They scrambled in the dirt, his blood running bright red onto his filthy shirt.
When he got the upper hand, Casey nearly blacked out. Death was coming for a sister that she had never gotten the chance to hold or communicate with, other than their frantic mental exchanges. A part of herself was being murdered right in front of her eyes.
She reached out. The electricity of the barrier ran up her arms and she cried out, losing the words to the song that had kept them bound together since birth.
The sound of a gunshot sent a shock through her chest as she wept. An old woman, so thin and haggard that it was a miracle she had the strength to wield a gun, stood in the dirt, bare-footed and half-clothed. Casey watched as the woman shot the stranger, rocking him back into the dry soil. She stepped forward and pulled the trigger again, this time cutting a hole through his thigh. He screamed and gripped his wounds, his face filled with rabid ferocity as he cursed them and promised them all a place in Hell beside him. The energy coursing through her made her heart stutter. She lowered her hands as the old man was forced into the trunk of his own car.
“Can you still see?” Javier asked.
“It’s leaving me,” Casey said.
She fell to her knees, devastated. “She’s hurt… really bad. I feel terrible. Death is all around us. It lives here!”
“What about him? The man that has been hurting her?” Javier asked.
“They put him in the trunk of the car. I saw a fire in the distance—the church, I think.”
Javier spoke the thought running through her mind, something she hesitated to admit, “I hope they kill that bastard. The evil in him will never cease until he’s dead.”
****
Sixty-eight drove the old black car back to the flaming church. The other two women sat quietly, just praying for it all to be over. Celia held her broken arm against her chest. The agony of breathing told her that her ribs were more than likely shattered as well. Eighty-two laid her head back against the seat, her mouth and nose bled freely and her eyes were swollen nearly shut. As the preacher raged in the trunk, the sounds filled her with anxiety.
He wouldn’t go down easy.
The church crackled with fire as it consumed the dry wooden walls. Sixty-eight brought the car to a stop and looked at her companions.
“We gotta get him in there. He ain’t getting back out,” she said. Her face was grim, her eyes ringed with dark circles.
Celia nodded, “I want to see him die.”
The three women crawled from the car and stood at the trunk as the old man inside went wild again, pounding the trunk lid.
“Just put a bullet in his head,” Eighty-two said, listening to him rage beyond the layer of steel between them.
“No. I want to watch him burn,” Sixty-eight answered, checking the gun.
It only had two shots left. She would have to make them count.
****
Sixty-eight kept the gun aimed at the trunk and nodded. Eighty-two slid the key in the lock and turned it. The lid flew open with a forceful kick from the preacher.
The minutes in the steel box had caused him to sweat from the oppressive desert heat. He was bleeding from his neck and two bullet wounds. Celia knew the gunshots weren’t placed in fatal areas. It made her knees shake. The predator before them hadn’t come so far by being a fool or succumbing to weakness. His eyes were wild as he sat up and came crawling from the trunk in a rage. Her fears were becoming reality as he charged towards Sixty-eight.
She pulled the trigger.
A bullet entered his chest and forced him back against the car. He fell to his knees as he struggled to breathe.
“Get in the church or I’ll put one in your brain,” The old woman threatened.
“Just shoot him,” Celia said.
“No. He’s gonna suffer first,” Sixty-eight said wildly.
“Get on your goddamn feet,” Eighty-two said.
The old man looked Sixty-eight dead in the eyes and sneered, “You can’t kill me.”
“Shut your mouth. You’re not God! You’re a man! And I’m gonna watch you die!” she screamed. Her arm shook as she pointed the gun at his head.
Byron stood, holding the bloody hole in his chest and staggering as she nudged him onward with the barrel of the gun. Eighty-two and Celia watched them as they approached the gaping mouth of fire that was once the church wall. The oldest of the prisoners was finally sending her tormentor to his death, becoming his executioner, a title she had always dreamed of attaining but never thought would become reality.
“Keep on walkin’,” she said.
Byron surprised her by picking up speed. He ran into the flickering flames and disappeared in the inferno before her. The church swayed a bit as the fire fed on its support structure. It had never been strong to begin with, having been built by the hands of living ghosts.
Sixty-eight turned back to her companions, tears running down her cheeks. Celia watched her sway on her feet, relief coming out of her in a flood of weeping. With her back to the burning church, she was couldn’t see the smoldering figure emerged from the inferno swinging a sledge hammer. He flattened the back of the old woman’s head and her life was snuffed out in the blink of an eye.
Celia and Eighty-two ran for the car as the old man came for them, his hand fused to the steel handle of the burning hot sledge hammer. Hurling herself into the driver’s seat, Celia turned the key and the car roared to life. She quickly threw it in gear and stomped on the gas. The doorway was near and she would carry them both through it, even if she had to run the old bastard over on her way out.
“Where did he go?” Eighty-two asked.
Byron was nowhere to be seen. It wasn’t possible for him to simply disappear. Celia brought the car to a stop as they searched the surroundings. Anxiety gnawed at her. She wanted him dead more than anything.
The wall of the church crumpled outward as a flaming car came speeding out in reverse. Benjamin’s car hadn’t been destroyed by the slow burning fire. Byron came for them, demolition derby style, intent on stopping them from making it to the other side.
Celia jammed the pedal to the floor as
the fiery car came slamming into them. They screamed and the old car rocked with the impact. Byron pulled the car forward, positioning it in an attempt to block the doorway but one of its front tires were already flat and the car didn’t move as quickly as the bored-out black beast.
Celia kept the gas held to the floor. The car kicked up rooster tails of dust as it hurtled forward. She felt the doorway ahead, could see a faint outline. Focusing her mind, she felt the fire burning between her eyes. She prayed that Allan was right, that she could open the only exit from Hell in sight. Her head ached, her eyes rolled back into her skull, and she stiffened as they approached the doorway. Eighty-two screamed and threw her hands over her eyes.
The car entered the orb of darkness and came skidding out onto a black highway. Rust behind them came the mangled car of Benjamin, piloted by the preacher. He slammed into the back of his own car.
Clearing the black top, the two vehicles went careening into the desert off the shoulder of the road. The hammer was still melded to one of his hands, the skin of his palm permanently fused to it. Revving the engine, Byron slammed into them once more and drove them into a cactus. He opened the car door and climbed out, swinging his sledge hammer.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
ENDS AND BEGINNINGS
Casey was more exhausted and nauseated than when she had drank the ayahuasca. Her body was threatening to shut down. Javier helped her over to his car and sat her down in the front seat.
She couldn’t speak for crying. Touching the doorway had been too intense for her, and watching her sister fighting for her life without being able to help felt like a punch in the stomach. Javier knelt in the dirt before her. He could feel her mind was nearly at the breaking point.
A roar filled the silent nighttime desert as a car came barreling out of the darkness, lightning crackling across it as it sped out of a hidden gateway. A second car followed close behind. Smoldering and windowless, it slammed into the black car ahead of it.
Those Who Follow Page 12