by Jayde Brooks
For all of her so-called fascination with the humans, for all of her efforts in trying to dress and talk like the cool kids, Khale was more out of touch than ever.
“Kifo brought him back,” she said, abruptly changing the subject. “I should’ve destroyed that weasel long ago.”
She was right. She should’ve. But in her grief, Khale had let him live. After The Fall of their world, the Ancients were scattered, afraid, and the differences that had divided them seemed petty in light of losing their entire world. Kifo had done what they all had done. He’d stumbled along, looking for his place in this world, coming to terms with losing everything he’d known, and building a life for himself here.
“Have you seen Sakarabru?” he asked.
The last time he’d laid eyes on Sakarabru, Mkombozi had sent his ashes flying across space.
She shook her head. “But I can feel him. His power—everything that’s happening now to these people—is so familiar.” She frowned. “Only it’s worse for them for some reason. Kifo had built Sakarabru’s army on Theia from the bodies of fallen Ancients. The transition for them wasn’t as devastating as it has been for humans.”
She was right. Humans transitioning from human to Brood had left behind rabid and vicious beasts instead of disciplined warriors. Humans had turned on other humans and fed off them, like wild animals. It was a side effect that no one could’ve seen coming.
“There isn’t much time left, Guardian,” Khale said, looking at him. “I know that Eden isn’t ready for this. Believe me, I know more than you realize how frightened and unprepared she is, but we’re out of time. As Sakarabru grows stronger, this world will grow weaker. Soon he’ll be ready to call his army to him, and he will turn Eden’s world upside down even more than it already is. You know this as much as I do.”
Humans all over the world were affected, and those that weren’t, were fodder.
“I may be able to slow him down,” she said, concerned. “But our forces aren’t as strong as they once were.”
“Our forces aren’t anything, Khale,” he corrected her.
It pissed him off that the Ancients had grown so indifferent, so weak, even knowing that the day would come when the Demon would return. They’d grown comfortable in their suburban homes and designer clothes, fancy jobs and cars. The Ancients talked a good talk about the return of the Demon but had done nothing to prepare for him.
“She’s the only hope we have, Tukufu,” she said sincerely. “I hate that the salvation of her world has to fall on her shoulders, but you and I both know that the Redeemer has to bond with the Omens, and that when she does, she can defeat Sakarabru. She has no choice.”
“I do have a choice, Khale.”
Neither of them had noticed Eden standing in the living room, barefoot and wearing one of Prophet’s shirts. Her dark locks cascaded down her shoulders, and soft, dark, vulnerable eyes darted back and forth between Prophet and Khale.
“You’ve tried to take it from me my whole life, but I won’t let you. I can’t.”
Khale turned to her. “Then your world as you know it will die, Eden. If you choose to do nothing, that’s what will happen.”
Khale looked at Prophet. It really was up to her. Khale might not have wanted to admit it before, but now she had no choice. And whatever choice Eden made, he would stand by her and suffer the consequences alongside her.
“It’s up to you, Eden,” he finally said.
She looked back at Khale. “Where’s MyRose?” Her voice cracked. “I need to talk to her.”
“Rose is dead,” Khale said bluntly.
Eden shook her head. “No,” she murmured.
“She died several days ago, Eden.”
Rose was an Ancient, a constant who had never failed Eden no matter how many times Eden had disappointed her. She stared at Khale, standing there looking like some geeky gamer chick, waiting for her to say something heartless, like that she was just kidding and Rose was standing outside. Khale didn’t even blink.
“She left me?” Eden asked, gradually coming to terms with the fact that this was not a joke.
“No,” Khale said, coolly. “You left her.”
“Khale!” Prophet snapped at the Shifter.
Eden’s whole body shook. He believed that she was going to crumble and break apart into a million pieces, but Eden’s expression changed; she walked over to Khale, opened her mouth, and screamed, drew back her arm and swung it at Khale, landing a powerful backhand to the Shifter’s face.
The force coming from Eden was so crippling that it lifted Khale off her feet and sent her flying over the railing and out to the sky, sailing over trees that stood at least three hundred feet tall. Khale shifted into an eagle, flew away, and disappeared from sight.
Eden fell to her knees, sobbing. Prophet went to her, picked her up, and carried her up the stairs and back to bed.
“MyRose is gone,” Eden murmured pitifully, not willing to let him go. “I should’ve stayed.”
“It might not have made a difference, Eden.”
“She was always there for me, Prophet,” she sniffed. “I should’ve been there for her.”
She pulled away from him, dried her eyes, and lay back on the bed.
“She was my mother,” she said thoughtfully.
“You loved her.”
She nodded. “With all my heart.”
Eden was starting to cry again, but she forced herself to stop. She’d done too much of that already.
“This is really happening, isn’t it?”
He nodded. “Yes.”
“I hate Khale,” she finally admitted.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “Join the club.”
PAUL CHAPMAN
“In the past I was guilty of underestimating my enemy, Kifo.”
Sakarabru was growing stronger with each passing day. He had transitioned from his phantom form and had become blood and tissue again, muscle and bone. He had not yet reached the fullness of his former self, but he knew now that that day would come, and it would come soon.
He slowly circled the creature Kifo had brought to stand before him, examining it and assuring himself that this one had no weaknesses.
“He looks stronger than the others,” he said, introspectively.
Naturally this man was not as tall in stature as the Demon, but he was large compared to the others Kifo had brought before Sakarabru.
“He was a fighter in his previous life,” Kifo explained.
Sakarabru looked surprised. “A warrior?”
Kifo chuckled. “As much of one as this world has to offer. He’s trained in several fighting forms, martial arts, boxing, wrestling.”
“And those are the traits of a good warrior in this place?”
Kifo nodded. “Yes, Lord Sakarabru. He has fought and won many battles against his opponents.”
Sakarabru bent slightly at the waist to examine the markings on the creature’s face—scars, wounds.
“What is your weapon of choice, Brood?” he asked this thing that Kifo called Paul Chapman.
The apprehension of Paul’s circumstances filled his eyes. He did not know how he’d changed. He simply understood that he was different and that Sakarabru was his god.
He raised his hands, palms facing up, to Sakarabru.
“M-my hands, Lord Sakarabru,” he said, almost as if he were responding against his will. He was a slave to Sakarabru’s will now, so his own thoughts were of little consequence.
Sakarabru closely examined his large rough and calloused hands and nodded approvingly. “Are you obedient, Paul Chapman?” he asked, staring the creature in his eyes.
Paul Chapman nodded. His eyes glazed over with tears. “Yes, Lord Sakarabru,” he said passionately. “Oh yes. I am the most obedient.”
Sakarabru was pleased. He had taken the tale of the Redeemer too lightly. Sakarabru had thought of her as nothing more than a character fit for a child’s bedtime story, and because of that, she had defeated him and nearly destroyed him
.
“Khale has a great deal of faith in her reborn,” he said introspectively.
Paul Chapman stood head and shoulders taller than Kifo. Muscles bulged from every part of him. Kifo had forged him personally and made him the most fearsome creature the human race had to offer. It would be a formidable foe against Khale’s new Redeemer.
“She is only human, Sakarabru,” Kifo offered. “And without the bond with the Omens, that’s all she’ll ever be.”
“You will find her, Paul Chapman,” he said, admiring this new kind of warrior. “You will find her for me and you will kill her before she bonds with the Omens. Do you understand?”
“I understand,” he said convincingly. “On my life, I will find her for you and I will kill her.”
* * *
Paul had memories. He had had another life once, and he’d been someone else. Paul’s memories of the man he’d once been were mostly vague, like dreams he’d had and forgotten as soon as he’d opened his eyes and woken up. But there was one he couldn’t forget, one he couldn’t shake no matter how much he wished he could. It replayed itself over and over in his head, beginning with the man he’d been and ending with the man he’d become.
“Uuuugh!”
Paul Chapman dropped to his hands and knees on the floor of his bathroom in agony and grunted—short, shallow breaths—praying that the searing pain in his gut would mercifully subside. It stabbed him again and then wrapped around him, raking down his spine like the prongs of a pitchfork. He shuddered. Sweat beaded on his face and dropped in pools on the floor. Paul couldn’t help himself, and he vomited, then stared miserably and helplessly at the bloody mess he’d spit up.
Angry hot tears filled his eyes. Fuck! He’d always been such a mean motherfucker, tough as nails and fuckin’ fearless! And now look at him. Arms the size of pythons had shrunk down to toothpicks, and he could barely keep himself from dropping face-first into the crap he’d just barfed up. The National Mixed Martial Arts Heavyweight Champion of the World was a goddamned pathetic lump of flesh, too weak to stand up and walk a few feet across the room, a shadow of his former mountainous-sized self.
Paul “Stone Mountain” Chapman, he’d dubbed himself. Paul nearly laughed at that tag now, but his body was too tortured to work up the strength to laugh. Paul was dying. It didn’t take a genius to figure that out. He was dropping dead right here and right now in his goddamned bathroom, and there was nothing he could do about it.
Paul lay across the floor, wheezing, his head pounding like someone was stomping on it.
He’d painfully managed to pull himself up using the vanity for leverage. Paul shakily balanced himself and stared at his horrific reflection in the mirror. Once upon a time, he’d been a good-looking guy. Half Italian, the other half German, he was swooned over by women when he walked into a room, and when they did, he’d half smile, run his fingers through his dark wavy hair, dart a green-eyed, hypnotic glance in their direction, and leave them panting after him like the thirsty animals that they were. Every now and then, he’d grab one of them by the hand and welcome her into the fold, at least for the night.
He stared, looking disappointed at himself, or at the remnants of what was left of him. He used to stand six feet four and weighed a solid and muscular 270 pounds. He could bench-press more than 600 pounds. And in the last two years leading up to this moment, Stone Mountain Chapman had been one of the most feared fuckers on the planet.
An invisible vise suddenly gripped his chest and squeezed. Paul’s eyes bulged until they were almost ready to pop out of his head. His lips turned a violent shade of purple, and in that moment, he knew it was over.
It was dark all around him, and the darkness pressed down heavily on top of him. Paul struggled to open his eyes but couldn’t. He struggled to catch his breath but couldn’t do that either. He was trapped, unable to move or to do anything except suffocate. Panic struck like lightning, and he forced his mind to will some part of him to move, to get up, to … scream.
A low hummmmmm … a whisper … a song … chanting. In the darkness, he saw something darker … hovering over him … floating … humming. He was terrified, and Paul opened his mouth to scream, but there was no air and he had no voice. He raised his arm on the air and swiped at it—the ghost—with his hand. What nightmare is this? He kept thinking. Wake up! Wake up, goddamnit! It chanted some kind of prayer or song over him. It waved its hands above him, and it was suffocating like … the stench … something rotting, molding.
The whole thing seemed to have lasted an eternity, until the words converged on each other and became one long continuous sound except for one word: “Sak … Sakarabru.” The more he heard that word, the more it eased his pain and his fear. It soothed him like a cool wind rushing past him on a hot day. It quenched his thirst and washed over him like cleansing rain. “Sakarabru” was a word that filled him with hope and purpose, and he began to miss it when he didn’t hear it. He looked helplessly at the dark figure, chanting, begging him with his eyes to just say the word he most needed to hear: “Sakarabru.”
“You will heed Sakarabru,” this being said, his voice haunting and deep, echoing through the chambers of Paul’s mind. “You will need only him, your master, your savior, your teacher. He will remove your pain, Paul Chapman. He will be your healer.”
Paul didn’t resist, he couldn’t, because what the ghost said had been everything Paul had wanted to hear. And as he accepted it, he felt relief set in and erase all of his doubts, his pain. His lungs seemed to fill with air, cool and fresh air that couldn’t exist in that place. Yes! He wanted to say. Sakarabru! It was all he needed.
He sat up with a jolt, gasping for breath. Paul clutched at the stained material of his shirt and coughed uncontrollably, gulping in buckets of precious oxygen until he finally realized that he was on his bathroom floor. What the hell happened? he wondered, sliding on his backside across the floor to the wall. He sat there for several minutes and realized that the pain was gone. At least he hoped it was gone, but Paul wasn’t convinced, and so he waited for that shit to grab hold of him again.
He took his time getting up, ready to give in to the fact that maybe his ass was actually dead and that his bathroom was his version of heaven, or hell, depending. He looked down at the dark and crusted stain on the floor that looked like it had been there for weeks. Paul stood there, feeling pretty good, actually, like he’d really managed to kick this thing, and was even feeling better than he had before he’d gotten sick. His reflection looked like him but it didn’t. Shit. He looked even bigger than he’d been before he’d gotten sick; taller, thicker. Paul’s shirt felt two sizes too small and the waist of his pants dug into his skin. And then it hit him. He was fuckin’ famished. When was the last time he’d had a meal?
Paul rummaged through the refrigerator, grabbed a handful of sliced turkey from the package, stuffed it between two moldy pieces of bread with some mustard, and bit into it heartily. He gagged and spit the food in his mouth into the sink. That shit tasted like dirt. He tried the leftover baked chicken, cheese, even an apple damn near rotted to the core, and it all tasted like crap. He couldn’t even bring himself to swallow any of that shit.
The burn in his stomach and the need to eat made him crazy. He’d never felt like this before, but Paul couldn’t remember the last time he’d been able to keep anything down, either. Of course he was hungry. The shit in the fridge was spoiled, he concluded. Paul grabbed his keys and decided to go out to get something. He swung open his front door and stared into the frantic face of his manager, Ed Taylor.
“Where’ve you been, man?” Ed said irritably, pushing past him. “I’ve been blowing up your damn phone for weeks and banging on your fuckin’ door until my knuckles bled! You missed the fuckin’ title match! How’d you miss the goddamned title match, Paul?”
Paul stared at him like he had no idea what the man was talking about.
“I’m not speaking Japanese, man.” Ed was pissed. “You just blew the title. D
o you get that? You forfeited the damn title, and now some knucklehead kid from Nebraska is walking around somewhere in the world with your shit around his waist.”
Paul inhaled deeply and smelled the savory scent of Ed’s perspiration, and his mouth watered. His stomach growled again. Crazy thoughts, crazy images flooded his mind. In them, he felt satisfied, relieved.
“You can stop looking at me like I’ve lost it and start talking anytime now, Paul. What the hell happened? Or should I say Who? You look like shit, by the way. You smell like shit. When was the last time you took a bath?”
Paul was mesmerized by him, and by the rich, purple-black color surging just beneath the skin in the vein on the side of his neck. “This world’s gone to fuckin’ hell in a fuckin’ handbasket,” Ed paced back and forth. “People are dropping like flies and coming back.” He raked his hand across his head. “I know. Right? Who gives a damn about a prize fight? Who the hell cares?” Paul’s heart raced, and he found himself stepping closer to him, as if being pulled by an invisible cord drawing the two of them together.
“Fuck!” Ed yelled. “What the fuck’s your problem? Is it drugs? Are you on something, man?”
The hole of Paul’s belly burned, his bones and muscles tensed, and adrenaline surged through his body, filling it with anticipation and an anxious excitement that made him want to jump or run or fly. Drool began pooling in the corners of his mouth.
Ed Taylor fought for his life, but he lost and he never screamed. Paul expected him to, but the look on the man’s face, the terror in his eyes, the realization that Paul had sliced him down the middle with a kitchen knife and then torn open his torso with his bare hands was too overwhelming an experience to warrant a scream.
Paul saw what he was doing from some distant place in his mind that made sense of it. Paul relished the savory flavors of the other man’s blood and skin, and something deep inside of him that he never even knew existed could not understand or accept how wrong it was for him to do what he’d just done.