He wasn't expecting any reply and none came. This was to be his fight; he had sensed that from the outset. But to even the score some, God had lined up some strong and stable people to fight with Sam.
Sam had to smile—what a bunch he had with him. A pretty good cross section of America. Some homemakers, doctors, cops, teachers, businesspeople, a whole gang of kids, some teenagers, a priest and a preacher, one very old lady, and Jobert.
Sam liked the ex-Legionnaire; no back-up in that old boy. None at all.
Sam glanced up at the sky. Couple more hours until dusk. Couple more hours until …
… He wondered how many of those Christians gathered at the mansion and the clinic would live to see the dawn?
Sam wondered if he would live to see the dawn? He quickly put that thought out of his mind.
He once more drove the main street of Becancour looking for? …
… He wasn't sure. Something that might give an indication of what might be coming at them when night wrapped its dark arms around the land, and the forces of evil were unleashed, to come screaming and howling at the small army of Christians.
But the silent streets and empty-appearing businesses and homes gave no ready answer to Sam's questions.
Alone, Sam thought. We are visibly alone in this fight.
But not really alone. God is with us, watching, silently giving us strength. And Michael, the Mercenary, is sitting beside Him, furious that He will not allow the archangel to leave Heaven to join in the fight.
With a sharp cracking sound, Sam was jerked from his musings. The side window of the pickup was spider webbed from a large rock thrown at the truck. Sam braked and pulled over to the curb. He got out, a sawed off shotgun with extended magazine in his hand. He'd borrowed the shotgun from Deputy Lenoir. Sam's .41 mag was in leather, belted around his waist. He looked toward the mouth of an alley. A dozen or so people, ranging in age from late teens upward stood there, grinning and hooting and cursing him.
"Get the bastard!" a man shouted. The crowd of unwashed rushed Sam.
Sam leveled the shotgun and began pulling and pumping. The buckshot knocked the charging mob backward and to the hot street. Blood splattered the storefront and the big windows were shattered from the buckshot that did not enter and tear nonhuman flesh. For that is how Sam viewed anyone who practiced devil worship … Nonhuman.
One screaming, wild-eyed young man almost reached Sam. The man's hands were reaching for him as Sam lifted the muzzle of the 12 gauge and pulled the trigger. The buckshot struck Satan's dupe in the hollow of his throat, almost completely tearing off the head.
A young woman leaped onto Sam's back. Sam fell back on his hard-earned Ranger training and flipped the woman from him, sending her sailing through the air to crash through a store window, the broken glass ripping her unwashed flesh, staining the show area with crimson.
The shotgun empty, Sam tossed it onto the hood of the pickup and jerked his big .41 from leather. He shot a middle-aged man between the eyes, popping his head back as if struck with a hard-thrown brick. The crowd vanished as suddenly as it came. The sidewalk and street were filled only with the dead and dying; the moaning of those badly wounded verbally clawed the hot, still air.
Sam quickly reloaded the shotgun and laid it on the pickup's bench seat. He punched out the empty brass in the cylinder of the .41 mag and reloaded, all the while keeping a watch for any more attackers. None came at him.
He did not concern himself with the dead or wounded. He knew the Beasts and cats were close by, watching.
They would eat them.
THE THIRD NIGHT OF THREE
Sam had inspected the mansion at least a dozen times in a three-hour span. He had corrected a half dozen mistakes before he was satisfied the mansion was as secure as it could possibly be.
It also came as no surprise to him that the phones in Becancour still worked. The Prince of Filth was making sure as much remained normal as was inhumanly possible.
Sam called the clinic and spoke with Nydia.
"We're as ready as can be, Sam," she assured him.
"I know the demon child has not yet made any move." It was not a question; a statement of fact.
"She's making plans. She is not aware I can read her thoughts."
"She's stronger than Little Sam, you know."
"I know. Dog is with him constantly. It will be all right, Sam."
And with that, Sam knew it would be. He felt that Little Sam would not come out of the battle unhurt, either mentally or physically, but then, no one would.
"I love you, Nydia."
"And I love you, Sam."
They both hung up and turned to face the night.
Brother Lester and his hardcore band of Brothers and Sisters, all resplendent in their freshly washed robes, had finished trashing a local store that sold paperbacks. Nothing had been spared. Since many of them had difficulty reading anything, any cover with anything that could be remotely construed as suggestive was either ripped apart or burned. Any cover that dared show the bare curve of a woman's breast or the skin of a thigh was met with whoops of disgust from the Brothers and Sisters; after all, they, and they alone, knew what was best for everyone else.
The Brothers and Sisters moved on, hell-bent on their appointed mission to rid Becancour of anything they considered filthy.
Sister Pauline was a bit tardy in joining the others on their Heaven-sent quest toward Truth, Light, and gross-Intolerance. She was totally absorbed in reading what was left of a paperback in a store they had just trashed.
She did not notice the dozens of cats that had crept into the trashed store, all of them moving silently toward the woman.
Suddenly something furry brushed against her ankles.
"Rat!" she hollered. The book went one way and Sister Pauline went the other.
The book survived; Sister Pauline did not.
The cats swarmed Sister Pauline and brought her belly-down on the trashed floor. The cats howled and hissed and spat and clawed. Her snow-white robe was quickly turned red with her blood. The cats clawed out her eyes. Sister Pauline would never again have to worry about reading another offensive word.
While the cats were busy tearing out hunks of Sister Pauline, they did not notice the huge shapes that cast giant shadows enter the rear of the store. The cats gorged themselves, their fur becoming matted and slick with blood.
A low growl stopped the cats from their feasting.
As one, they spun and spat their anger at the Beasts that were lumbering toward them.
Cats met Beasts in the center of the trashed store. But it was no real contest.
The cats could not claw through the thick skin of the Beasts; at best they were able only to inflict very minor wounds on the huge creatures of Hell. The cats were ripped apart and slung about the littered store. Then they were eaten. Only a few escaped the raging jealousy of the Beasts.
The Beasts lumbered toward the torn body of Sister Pauline.
They feasted well that early evening of the last night.
Janet's demon child, Bess, did not wait until the full dead of night to launch her attack on the Blessed child, Sam. While the adults were setting up guards around the clinic, Bess slipped away from the crowded room she occupied with half a dozen other kids and made her way to where she knew Little Sam was waiting, with that strange dog. She also knew that the turncoat witch, Nydia, had left her son alone, with that dog, and had done so deliberately.
Bess, with her young and evil mind, matured by a hundred thousand years of depravity, did not understand that move. But that didn't matter; she knew the task before her, and meant to see it through.
She felt that Guy's changing into his real self had been a mistake. Bess planned to stay a little girl, since her mother had told her that little boys were taught from an early age not to hit little girls. Only at the last moment, when she struck the fatal blow, would she change. And by then, she would be too powerful for any of the others to stop—including Nydia.
Bess didn't know Little Sam as well as she thought she did.
Like his father, but learning it at a much earlier age, Little Sam had been born to combat Evil. Little boys or little girls … it made no difference to Little Sam.
Little Sam looked up at the open doorway when Bess stepped into his room. Dog never took his eyes off the girl.
"My fight," Little Sam said.
Dog shook his great head as if to say, "I hear the words, but that's about it, little buddy."
The smile that formed on the lips of Bess was Evil at its darkest. Sam slipped off the couch and faced the girl.
"Why don't you yell for your mother to come help you?" Bess asked.
"I don't need her help." The boy returned the whisper.
"You're a foolish little boy," Bess taunted him. She hissed at him like a cat, the expulsion of air fouling the windowless room. Her breath was that of a hundred thousand years of evil, straight from the burning pits of Hell.
Little Sam leaped at the girl and kicked her, knocking her sprawling on the tile. Before she could recover from her shock of having a little boy attack her, Little Sam kicked her again, this time in the stomach.
Bess squalled in rage, her face changing, her anger betraying her plans to contain her inner self. She leaped to her tennis-shoe-clad feet, her face a mask of evil, her eyes burning with hate. She spat at him, the spittle a yellowish stinking glob that clung to the wall like a leech.
Little Sam infuriated the girl when he laughed at her.
She sprang at him. Little Sam sidestepped and Bess crashed into the wall, stunning herself with the impact.
When she picked herself up, Little Sam knew that playtime was all over.
The little girl was no more. In her place stood a haglike creature that only vaguely resembled something human. The cackling laughter that sprang from the mottled mouth was followed by puffs of breath that smelled fresh from a stinking grave. The creature spoke to Little Sam, but the boy could not understand the words. They were from a time and place that had long since died and vanished from history.
Dog ran out of the room and clamped his powerful jaws around one ankle of the creature and twisted and jerked, spilling the Godless creation to the floor. The hag attempted to break free from Dog's powerful jaws. But Dog held fast. The sounds of ancient bones splintering and shattering filled the corridor. The hag shrieked her pain. Dog jerked once more and ankle separated from leg. A thick yellowish fluid leaked onto the floor from the severed ankle. Dog slid backward, his paws trying to gain some hold on the slick tile. He spat out the stinking foot and charged.
More than a hundred pounds of Cod-sent dog hit the creature as she was attempting to get to her one remaining foot. The force of Dog's charge knocked the creature across the corridor. Little Sam lashed out with one shoe and caught the thing on a kneecap. The kneecap shattered. Little Sam reached down and grabbed a wrist and twisted. The wrist broke free.
Little Sam dropped the wrist to the floor as the creature went scurrying down the hall, trying to reach the exit door.
His nails clicking on the tile, Dog reached the creature before she reached the door. The animal grabbed onto a foot and pulled the hag back. Twisting his head, he broke off the one remaining foot. Frances Lenoir picked that time to step into the hall. The hag sank her yellow teeth into the woman's ankle, biting deeply. Frances screamed in pain as the yellow teeth began working higher and higher up her leg, over the calf, and digging and biting into the softness of inner thigh.
Some adults left their posts until Nydia ordered them back. Only Don Lenoir failed to obey Nydia's orders. The deputy stood in horrified shock and watched as his wife, within seconds, was consumed and transformed and altered and finally absorbed by the now bloody creature.
They became as one.
"Frances!" Don screamed in rage. He pulled out his .357 and emptied it into the creature.
The heavy hollow-nosed slugs knocked the hag back to the floor, momentarily stunning her.
Little Sam was the first to react. The little boy ran down the hall to the lobby. He jerked a sharpened stake out of a large potted plant and raced back up the hall. He jumped at the creature just as she was sitting up, laughing and howling and spraying the walls with a stinking yellow fluid. The stench was awful.
The point of the stake hit the hag in the center of her chest and drove deep. She howled and hissed and clutched at the stake with her gnarled hands. Little Sam worked the stake in deeper, sweating from his exertions.
That which had once held the human form of Bess rained Hell's curses down on the little boy's head.
Little Sam spat in the creature's face.
Where the spittle struck, pockets of steam rose from the hag's skin.
The hag's hands left the stake and tried to reach Little Sam. Dog leaped and ripped one arm to the bone, tearing great hunks of flesh from the arm. Dog jumped over the vibrating stake and tore at the other arm, shredding it, rendering both arms useless.
Little Sam worked the stake in deeper, finally piercing the evil demon heart.
The shrieking abruptly ceased; the hag began changing. The creature spun back in time, almost too fast for human eyes to follow, until all that was left was the human form of Frances …
… with a stake sticking out of her bloody chest.
Don fell to the floor beside his wife and began weeping.
Little Sam walked up the hall, Dog by his side. Little Sam's part was over. He had passed the test. God's little warrior and his animal friend could now rest.
22
"Oh, my God!" Jobert screamed. " 'At's Charles and Maurice Ballatin out dere!"
Sam ran to the second-story window and looked out. Jobert was trembling beside him. "Who?"
"Cousins of Ben Ballatin. Them people drowned years ago, with them Yankees come down here to fish."
"Padre!" Sam yelled. "The Undead are walking."
"I see them," the priest said, no fear in his voice.
The second-floor porch decking prevented Sam from seeing what the priest was doing.
Father Javotte stepped out onto the main porch, a large cross in one hand, Holy Water in the other. Javotte lifted the cross.
"Back," he spoke. "Go back to your graves and rest. There is time for you yet. God forgives what you are not responsible for. Go back into the waters."
All the outside lights were on, flooding the ground with harsh light. The naked, wrinkled, fish-white walking dead were strangely frozen in the light.
Ben Ballatin stepped into the light, bloody and torn and ripped … and dead.
The kids appeared, naked and chalk white and wrinkled.
"All of you," Javotte said, his words gentle but yet firm, "return to your final resting places. Go, while there is still time."
The woman appeared in the light. She walked to her children and stood between them.
"Take your children and go with God. Your sins are forgiven. For you are blameless. Go, go."
The woman took the hand of the girl, then the hand of the boy. They walked out of the harsh light and into the darkness.
Sam and Jobert had joined Father Javotte on the porch. Sam held stakes; Jobert had fixed a bayonet onto his rifle, the long needle pointed FFL bayonet of years past.
The walking dead screamed, the foulness of the bayou bottom momentarily engulfing those on the porch.
Naked and screaming, the men charged the porch.
Father Javotte tossed Holy Water on one man. The man was suddenly pockmarked and smoking where the water touched his fishy skin. The undead exploded on the front yard, rotting organs and ropy intestines flung about.
Jobert impaled Ben Ballatin on his bayonet, the needle point sinking deep, piercing the heart. With Ben's hands gripping the rifle barrel, Jobert drove the bayonet in to the hilt. Ben died on his naked feet.
Sam plunged the stake into the chest of the third man. The point hit a bone and was deflected off, the point exiting out the man's upper back. The Undead jerked
free and ran howling off into the night.
"Two outta t'ree ain't bad," Jobert said.
Brother Malcolm stepped out of the line of singing and prancing and dancing so-called social reformers. He walked into an alley to relieve himself.
Brother Malcolm almost fainted when a great black panther appeared a few feet from him. The panther snarled, exposing long fangs that glistened in the darkness of the alley. And if that wasn't enough, a stark naked, ghostly white woman appeared beside the panther. She crooked a finger at Brother Malcolm.
"Come," she said, her voice low and seductive.
"Not on your life, lady!" Brother Malcolm said, then split as fast as lightning into the mouth of the alley.
Brother Malcolm had been quicker even than the panther, getting the jump on the big cat as he hauled his tail out of there. With his robes held high, his red, skinny knees flashing in the streetlights' glow, Brother Malcolm passed the entire line of white-clad Brothers and Sisters. He raced past Brother Lester.
"Come back here!" Lester shouted. Lester knew nothing about the naked woman and the great black cat.
"Screw you!" Brother Malcolm yelled, fleeing for his life.
"Heathen!" Lester shouted. "Backslider! Coward!"
But Brother Malcolm was gone into the night, heading for the clinic. Brother Malcolm had had quite enough of Brother Lester and his nutty ideas. He had taken no part in the burning of those men; indeed, had known nothing of it until it was all over. It had been Brother Malcolm who had vocally questioned Lester's so-called conversation with an angel.
Hell with the whole bunch of them.
Brother Thad turned around to see what in the world might have caused Brother Malcolm to behave so strangely.
It was to be Brother Thad's last look at anything.
Snarling, the panther leaped at Thad. One clawed paw ripped Thad's face, shredding the flesh and tearing out one eye. Thad did not have the time to even scream his pain and terror before the panther tore out his throat and lapped at the sudden gush of hot blood.
Bonnie grabbed Sister Ilene and flung her to the hot concrete of the street. Falling on top of the woman, Bonnie's teeth flashed in the night and sank into the woman's throat. Bonnie sucked greedily as the woman's legs kicked and jerked and trembled.
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