Death March: Black Magic Outlaw

by Domino Finn

  The driver's window shattered as Manifesto slammed sideways out of view. I rushed forward amid honking horns and the sounds of panic. I was almost at the car when he sat upright in the seat, head fixed on me with those preternatural eyes.

  Rifle fire pelted the rear of the vehicle. The DROP team had made it back to the street and was flanking him. Manifesto gassed the stolen car and peeled out. I lunged and grabbed the window frame as it jerked into motion. The officers ceased their fire.

  And then we were racing down a street in the afternoon with me gripping broken glass. My jeans scraped asphalt. I tried to kick my boots up and over the rear end, desperate for a steadier perch. One hand slipped and caught the metal handle. My other hand reached through the broken window and clawed at Manifesto's face.

  His pistol peeked over the door and barked. I jerked my head out of the way and grabbed his wrist. He struggled momentarily, but I banged the gun into the door frame until it plummeted to the street. We were still locked together when the car swerved into the oncoming lane.

  Looking ahead, I saw the Metrobus he was maneuvering to sideswipe. It came at us too fast, and I had very few options. I released my grip and fell to the street, immediately sinking into the shadow beneath the car. As soon as it passed over, the sun flooded me and I came tumbling out onto the street. Horns blared as the bus narrowly avoided my flailing, rolling body.

  I scraped to a stop and hurried to the curb on hands and knees, wincing at the road rash I'd just incurred. I could do nothing but watch as Manifesto once again eluded capture.

  Chapter 34

  I passed an officer examining the fallen motorcycle. "You okay, bro?" he asked in awe.

  I shrugged. "Nothing a hot tub won't cure."

  He watched silently as I trudged toward the apartment building.

  It must've been wild for non-practitioners to see stuff like this, but Evan's DROP team had already been introduced to the fire. They didn't have special training against spellcraft or any targeted education regarding the preternatural, but they knew it existed. That was usually enough to stand a fighting chance.

  I passed more officers in the breezeway. Some nodded my way, others were establishing a perimeter. A fire extinguisher cabinet on the wall was empty. I walked through the open door into the foggy apartment, equal parts bomb dust and fire smoke and propellant agent from the extinguisher. Evan was on the phone while Darcy chilled on the couch.

  I collapsed beside her. "You holding up?"

  "Yeah. I just... There was so much kinetic force in there. Kinda left me in a daze."

  My eyebrows climbed my forehead. "I've never seen anything like that before. I'm impressed."

  "And I need to thank you again," said Evan, slipping his phone in his pocket and approaching. "That was a small improvised device, but you very likely saved lives." Evan eyed my shredded clothing and smiled. "You look like you've been through a cheese grater."

  "I got spare clothes in the car."

  "You have spare skin in there too?"

  I checked wherever I hurt. I was scraped up pretty bad, but I didn't see any blood.

  "Officers pegged the car he jacked. We put a BOLO out."

  "He's not stupid enough to keep it for long."

  Evan nodded in agreement. "Either we catch him in the next few minutes or he's in the wind."

  I pulled the pistol and slapped it on a side table. "I recovered this from the street if it helps."

  "It might. Might be registered to an accomplice or linked to another crime. We'll check it out."

  I really didn't want to get up, but I was determined to make something out of this mess. I strained to my feet. Just as I made it, a tall black woman with big hair stomped into the apartment. "What happened here?" She paused when she saw us. I collapsed back on the couch.

  Evan winced and spoke under his breath. "I advised the feds right before we stormed in. I had no choice."

  The look on Special Agent Bell's face was priceless. "What is he doing here, Lieutenant Cross?"

  "Material witness."

  I'd already worked on covering my ass and picked up the slack. "I caught someone following me on the road yesterday. The same guy ambushed me in the street earlier today. It was the Manifesto Killer." I kept mention of the dry cleaner out of it.

  Rita's eyes went wide.

  "I'm fine," I said, "but I realized it was the same guy and I had his plate number on video. I reported it to the police and..." I shrugged to the interior of the apartment. I was pretty proud of the story. It simultaneously explained why I looked beat up while also keeping me out of the police raid.

  The FBI agent frowned. "And who's she?"

  "No one. I'm babysitting."

  Darcy slapped my chest. "No way. I'm"—she turned to Agent Bell with a straight face—"his girlfriend."

  I jumped up so fast pain shot through my back. "No," I said firmly. "No, you're not. It's not smart to lie to FBI agents."

  Darcy smoldered, but she curled her lips and spoke in a throaty voice. "That's not what you said last night, sweety." She smacked my ass and I jumped again.

  Jeez, maybe she was eighteen and all, but she was kind of a kid to me. Watching her pouty lips was more than enough to arouse a guy, but I didn't think of Darcy that way.

  Rita Bell clicked her tongue. "Whatever, lovebirds. I don't care about Cisco's choice in women. What happened here?"

  Evan gladly took the ball. "Everything he said is true. We identified Nathan Bartlett Jones, found the address, and notified you."

  Darcy was still making kissy-faces. At first she was fighting to be a respected adult, but now she was definitely screwing with me.

  "You didn't wait for me to enter," noted Agent Bell.

  "We felt, with Manifesto's increased activity and erratic behavior, that the circumstances were exigent. We breached the door, contained an improvised explosive, and exchanged gunfire through a locked bedroom door before Jones escaped."

  She brushed past him and into the bedroom. Shreds of wood and drywall salted the floor. She stopped at the window. "You didn't have officers outside the rear exit?"

  The lieutenant's face flushed. "We had no way of knowing where the apartment was located in relation to the street before we found the door. At that moment I made a judgment—"

  "You could've had the building surrounded."

  He ground his teeth. "I didn't have enough men."

  "That's why you should have waited." A few suits entered the apartment. "We'll take over from here, Lieutenant Cross."

  "We have a right to share this crime scene," he pressed. "You're not kicking us out that easily."

  I saw the writing on the wall and pushed past her into the bedroom. A discarded fire extinguisher lay on the floor beside the blackened walk-in closet. Everything inside was toast. From the metal trays and the chemical smell, I figured it was where Manifesto manually developed his photographs the old-fashioned way. I could only wonder how much evidence was destroyed.

  "What do you think you're doing, Cisco?" asked Agent Bell with a self-indulgent smirk.

  I turned to leave the otherwise nondescript bedroom when a string of pictures along the entry wall caught my attention. Color prints of people taken from a distance. Some I didn't recognize. Others I—holy crap.

  "You know them?" asked Rita.

  I stifled a cough and tore my eyes from the pictures. These could expose everything the Society was trying to cover up.

  "Good God!" cried one of the older feds. We peeked out. The older man was covering his nose with the fridge open. "We have multiple mason jars with human remains in here. Eyeballs. Hands. What are those... Lips? Jesus Christ."

  While everyone huddled around with morbid curiosity, I melted back into the bedroom and returned to the photographs. I studied the shot of Shen outside Marie Devereaux's house.

  I grimaced as I stringed the narrative together. The first two performers were murdered. Random targets, probably. Marie Devereaux was assigned to investigate. Manifesto f
ollowed her and took her out. Then it was Shen's turn to take the case, and Manifesto was on to him too. The killer had been scoping out his own crime scenes. He'd killed animists and waited to see who'd take notice. That was how he knew to target Shen. That was why he was following me.

  The two photos of Quentin Capshaw confirmed this was a list of potential victims. The hypnotist had also been watched from a distance.

  I checked the door again. Evan was arguing with Rita over jurisdiction. He was buying me time. I continued piecing together the photos. Shen outside Marie's house, but no proof of Simon or myself there. That was lucky. Evidence of me at that location would prompt a lot of questions from the feds. It must have been after we'd left, when Shen was cleaning down the house.

  Manifesto followed Shen home. Diana was there. He tailed them the next day. I stopped cold at the picture of the dry cleaner, right in plain sight. A picture of me standing beside the Firebird. Fucking hell. The next few shots transferred Manifesto's focus to me. Once again I was lucky. No proof of me interacting with Shen, who'd been pictured at Marie's house. Diana was the only link. Not much of a loose end because she was dead, and we could always propose that Manifesto followed her and randomly targeted me for getting a shirt pressed. After all, it's not like the feds knew about animists in any real sense.

  Running out of time, I hurried to the end of the string. Manifesto had followed me that day, I knew. I'd all but caught him in traffic before scaring him off.

  Only I wasn't so lucky that time.

  Manifesto had snapped a photo of me leaving Capshaw's hotel. I didn't know how he'd done it. Maybe after losing us he decided to surveil Capshaw again and caught a lucky break. He'd found me again. Alone again. But not for long.

  The next photo was me waiting in my car outside Fran's park.

  My heart stopped. The last photograph in the sequence was a group shot. Me, Emily, Evan, and Fran outside the police station after the vampire confrontation. Manifesto had tailed me through it all. Depending how much he saw and who he followed next, he may have even guessed Emily and Fran were animists. I yanked the photo off the string and crumpled it in my fist.

  "See anything interesting?" inquired Agent Bell as she returned to the room.

  I held the crumpled picture tightly in my fist. "He has pictures of me," I said, motioning to the wall. "This is proof that what I said is true. Proof that I'm not the Manifesto Killer."

  Her attention immediately turned to the display, eyes lighting up at the influx of information. I backed away and twisted my arm around my back.

  "Did you know you were being photographed?"

  She turned to me and I froze. I shook my head. Agent Bell curled her lips. Her eyes shot to my hands, behind my back.

  "What do you have there?"

  I backed up, my entire body tensing as I weakly shook my head again.

  Darcy strolled into the bedroom. "What's going on?"

  Rita turned for the briefest of seconds. I tossed the balled-up photo out the window. I hooked my thumbs in my back pockets and spun around casually, showing my hands without being obvious about it. Rita narrowed her eyes.

  "Hey," exclaimed Darcy, "I know that guy." She drew the FBI agent's attention by rapping her finger on a photo. "That's Quentin Capshaw, the famous hypnotist. He has a show in town this weekend."

  "Another target," Rita surmised. She pulled out her phone and made a call. When her back was turned, I gave Darcy a thumbs up. She came back with kissy lips again. My thumb went down and my middle finger cranked up in its place.

  Relieved, we retreated to the main room and dragged Evan to the breezeway. "He had a picture of us together," I said under my breath. "You, me, Emily, Fran."

  His eyes went hard.

  "Don't go too far, boys," called Rita from inside, still on the phone but apparently on hold. "I'm gonna need your statements." Darcy followed further down the hall.

  "You need to go get them," I told Evan. "Right now."

  "Why would—"

  "Don't ask questions, Evan. Just trust me. You have a spare key. Get your family and take them to my place. The wards will let you in and keep you safe."

  We all stomped down the stairs in unison.

  "I'm coming with," said Darcy.

  "You sure are. Everybody." I put my hand to my head, trying to cover loose ends. Milena was safe. She wasn't an animist and Manifesto hadn't been on to me that night. The next day it was Shen, Quentin, and...

  I dug out my phone and dialed Kasper. He didn't pick up. I called again. "Come on, buddy. Come on." No luck. "This isn't good," I muttered as we went outside. "Manifesto could've seen us question Kasper about the cipher. That old man's covered in runes. Anyone in the know could practically see the magic dripping off him."

  "You think he's a target."

  "I didn't see any pictures, but a bunch of them were burned. It's possible. You get your family. I'll pick him up and meet you at the condo."

  He nodded and we split up.

  I passed through the back alley and recovered the crumpled photograph, which I hoped was the only evidence of my kid's attachment to any of this.

  Chapter 35

  The evening was in full force. I weaved between the lit towers that form the Miami skyline. My experience at the dry cleaner had turned my worry-dial to eleven, but I could only go so fast on the spare tire. The little donut was partially flat itself and made a disheartening whump whump that echoed off nearby buildings and cars. I took comfort in the fact that Darcy's follow motorcycle drowned out the embarrassing noise.

  As if we didn't have enough to deal with, a windowless black minivan pulled behind. I scowled. My first thought was to take them on right then and there, but I didn't think Manifesto would wait on my vampire crusade. If we continued right into Brickell maybe they'd call off the tail entirely. I decided to drive by the tattoo parlor without stopping, just to get eyeballs on the situation. The old man would kill me if I led the Obsidian March to his doorstep.

  I traversed the construction-filled neighborhood, in transition but tightly clutching to its previous industrial identity. Rough and dirty—that was how Kasper liked it. As the Firebird rumbled by the small tattoo parlor that would soon be out of place in the area, my grip squeezed the steering wheel.

  Another black minivan was parked out front. The vampires were already here.

  And why not? Manifesto hadn't been the only one following me yesterday. I'd chased the black van away after visiting Kasper's shop. I'd already put him in danger.

  I waited at the stop sign an extended beat, playing through possible scenarios. I drew my shotgun and loaded fire rounds into the breech and the two-shot sidesaddle. Darcy revved the bike impatiently before pulling to my left and stopping by the window.

  "What gives?"

  "Vampires. Tailing us and in Kasper's shop."

  Her eyes discreetly scanned the area.

  "We're gonna go get him," I said.

  I peeled the car around and swerved to a stop in front of his parlor. I leapt from the car and aimed at the parked van's windshield. No one was inside.

  The tail van realized the jig was up. They accelerated directly at us. Darcy jumped off her bike and brandished the Hecate statue.

  While she could make the van swerve if she wanted to, the effort would knock her out of commission. I couldn't babysit and save Kasper at the same time, so I charged between her and the van and fired. A cone of fire smashed into the hood and windshield. The van veered to the side and hit a telephone pole. I pulled Darcy into the shop.

  Kasper often kept the lights off so it was dark. The red-and-gold flashes going off like strobe lights weren't normal. A vampire sailed past us and crashed into the wall. Kasper's fist glowed with residual energy. "Good timing, broham."

  Another upir leapt on his back. The runes flared and fended off vicious teeth. Several more surrounded him. I knew from personal experience what a handful that could be, and with everybody moving so fast it would be impossible to stun them all
.

  I phased through the darkness, appeared next to a surprised black carapace, and shoved the sawed-off into his chest. The resulting boom sprayed the wall with blood and fire. Darcy swung her fetish and a vamp went flying. The grotesque creature's neck snapped on impact and he fell in a heap. Only a second later he regained his feet and snapped his head back into place.

  Kasper reached for the wall and tore down a double-sided ax on display. He swung and swiped, putting real power behind his blows, failing to do lethal damage against the quick vamps but forcing them back.

  Which was all a way to say that we were doing all right until the second van of vampires flooded around us and opened fire.

  At least five pistols barked. A cacophony of lead rained over us. I dissolved into shadow as nearby cabinets shredded apart. Kasper buried his face in his arm and huddled over. Blue runes sparked across his body. Darcy just stood there holding her statue out like the chosen one. Wood witch-god eyes stared deaden at the barrage of bullets suspended in the air. There is no spoon.

  The firearms were spent fast. Vampires hissed and licked their lips. To their utter disbelief, the three of us squared off without so much as a scratch.

  "This is gonna hurt," said Darcy.

  She flicked her statue sideways. The bullets hovering before her rocketed into the vamps like a frag grenade. They flinched and jerked and rolled away in agony, empty black holes popping their skin or bouncing off completely. Those upir carapaces weren't just for snazzy looks.

  I dropped my shotgun into the shadow and spawned my darksword. "They're not invincible," I assured my friends. I lunged and sliced a recovering vampire from the shoulder to the chest. The wound was dry and black until I struck the pumping organ that sourced his unholy power. Blood rushed like a geyser. The vampire exploded and turned to ash. "If you hit them in the heart, they're big softies."

  Kasper grinned. "So that's what I was doing wrong." He charged two vampires with reckless abandon.

  Darcy arched an eyebrow, considered the various medieval implements adorning the walls, and said, "This is gonna be fun."