“But what is it for?” Khalid asked.
“I asked that, too,” Michael replied. “They wouldn’t tell me. I found out later it’s for killing demons.”
“How’d you figure that one out?” Abigail questioned him further.
“I killed a demon with it.”
Khalid burst out in laughter. Abigail blinked at him. Sam and George stared at him wide-eyed, like they had just found a new hero.
“And I looked it up later on the Internet. It –”
The crash of glass and the shrieks of his classmates interrupted him. Bits of broken window flew around him. He covered his face to protect his eyes. When he looked up, O’Bryan crouched on the table above them. His friend’s face wrestled between a snarl and a smirk, pallid and pale, his lips smeared with blood.
“Heya, Mikey!” His nose glowed yellow as he growled, “can I come in and play?”
Chapter Twelve
Michael reacted on autopilot. He’d already finished the double-tap to O’Bryan’s chest before he even realized he’d drawn his forty-five. His combat pistol instructor had kept the compliments scarce, but he would have beamed at Michael’s marksmanship.
O’Bryan just laughed.
You idiot, Michael told himself, his conscious mind finally overriding his training. The phurba still sat on the table, just behind O’Bryan’s right knee. He retrained on the yellow nose, hoping that shots to the face would at least slow the thing down, and squeezed off a few more rounds. Then he threw his chair at the revenant.
“Everybody out!” he shouted.
The chair proved worthless as O’Bryan batted it away with one hand. His fleeing classmates, on the other hand, provided a better distraction. The creature swiveled and jumped to intercept them. It snatched up Sam by the throat, lifting him off the ground with his right arm. The young man’s feet dangled beneath him as he struggled. Shouts of panic turned into howls of pain as Michael’s dead comrade casually used his left arm to rip the young student’s arm off.
Michael fired as he moved, hoping to keep O’Bryan distracted. Weakened by the impacts, the yellow-nosed creature dropped the boy and turned toward Michael. Khalid stepped out of nowhere, cracking a heavy reference book over the back of the beast’s head. O’Bryan rewarded him with a backhand to the face, slamming him into the wall. The rich boy collapsed into a heap.
His effort bought Michael a few precious seconds. He dove across the table, reaching for the phurba. His left hand closed around the cold hilt as he slid off the far end. Dropping into a crouch, he used the table for concealment as he moved toward his target. He snapped around the corner and bolted upright, weapon ready for the attack.
The O’Bryan Michael knew had never moved so fast. No human could. The blow to his arm knocked the phurba across the room. Michael lost sight of it when O’Bryan’s other hand struck his head, knocking him backward. His head spun as he rolled out of the fall, finding his feet as Sensei Rogers had taught him, pistol at the ready, and fired off his last two rounds. He pressed the release to drop his magazine and slammed another home.
A quick glance around the room confirmed what he’d feared. O’Bryan had cut off the route to the door, and with it, escape. He needed to get his friends out of here and find his phurba. Useless as his pistol had proven, he had nothing else.
He advanced as he fired, firing without count. One or two of the hollow point rounds would have easily dropped a normal man. Whatever O’Bryan had become, a full seven round magazine merely drove him back a couple of feet. But it cleared the pathway to the door, and the students took it, George and Denzel carrying their one-armed friend clear.
The 1911’s slide locked back, magazine empty again. He let it drop to the floor, replacing it with his third and final magazine, when he heard the shriek. He turned to identify the source. A small, blonde mound huddled in the corner.
Abigail, he realized. O’Bryan stood between her and the door, his stumpy legs still missing their feet. How is he walking? Michael wondered.
He pushed the thought aside and unloaded his last magazine into O’Bryan’s face. What remained of it smirked back at him. At least, he thought it was a smirk. He couldn’t be certain through the bloody mess. He easily recognized O’Bryan’s cackling laughter, though. As the living man reached down to his ankle for his backup gun, the undead creature grabbed at the girl.
Michael raised the little snub nosed revolver nervously. Five rounds of thirty-eight wasn’t likely to do much – not to a creature who’d just taken three magazines of forty-five. But it was all he had left. He took care with his last few rounds, aiming for the spinal column, trying to sever something vital. If he couldn’t kill O’Bryan, maybe he could at least shut him down and end the threat. It seemed to help – the beast slowed down and moved with a new sluggishness, but it still reached for Abby.
He braced himself for the last chance he saw. He threw the pistol right at the stumpy thing that had been the beast’s nose. Grabbing Abby by the arm, he threw her toward the door.
O’Bryan cut off her escape route. Once again, Michael noted his undead friend’s raw speed. Worse, the motion had forced Michael to turn his back on his assailant. O’Bryan took advantage of it, reaching his arm around to put the former soldier in a one-arm headlock. Michael’s jujitsu training kicked in again. The last time he’d fought one of these beasts he’d nearly died. He wasn’t about to play nice this time. He twisted his shoulders hard toward the creature and slammed the palm of his hand into its groin. Grabbing hard, he twisted and pulled. He felt something rip followed by the warm, sticky dampness of blood.
O’Bryan howled as Michael twisted the rest of the way out of the hold, moving behind his assailant. He tried to hold on to the withered arm. O’Bryan proved too strong, ripping away from his grip. The yellow-nosed man followed it with a mule kick, catching Michael hard in the gut and launching him backward. Michael hit the conference table hard, but held onto his breath.
The beast growled as it dove at him. Prepared this time, Michael hit him with a hard side kick to the chest that propelled the beast upward and off of him. It didn’t buy him much time, though. He desperately searched the room for the phurba as he rolled to his right to avoid a rain of claws. He felt something hard beneath him and rolled again, snatching the weapon up in his hand.
He pushed himself off the floor, raising the weapon high as his fallen comrade closed in on him. But O’Bryan blocked his arm as he struck. Wrapping his hand around Michael’s wrist, the creature slammed it into the table over and over again. Michael held tight through four blows, but the fifth proved too much and he dropped the phurba again. O’Bryan laughed and tossed him across the room.
Abby screamed as the creature moved toward her and tried throwing books at it. The creature didn’t even flinch. Michael rose slowly, fighting off the haze in his head. He had to end this. Desperate, he fished through his pockets, feeling for anything he might use as a weapon. He dug the rosary out of his pocket and stared at it. Then he looked up to see O’Bryan silhouetted against the floor to ceiling window he’d smashed through earlier.
It was a bad idea and he knew it. He didn’t have any others. He said a mental Hail Mary and kissed the rosary wrapped around his right hand. Then he charged straight at the creature, fists extended. Bodies slammed together.
The burning hiss, the smell of acidic smoke, and O’Bryan’s blood curdling scream caught Michael completely off guard. But the thing turned to focus on him. It slammed a palm into Michael’s chest with a savage roar, staggering him backward several feet and knocking the wind out of him.
Desperate, Michael charged the beast once more. Arms extended again, he slammed into it with his fists, following with his shoulders. With his last strength, he continued his push. The hiss and scream came again, but Michael ignored them. His weight carried both himself and the beast out the second story window. He screamed as he fell, pounding on O’Bryan as the ground rushed up at them.
Chapter Thirteen
&nb
sp; The pain hit first. Then he realized that pain meant he’d survived the fall. Then he noticed the blackness. He felt the tension in his face and realized he clenched his eyes closed. He opened them to the sight of O’Bryan lying beneath him, screaming. He said a silent prayer of thanks. The fall from the second story conference room would probably have crippled him if he hadn’t landed on the creature.
O’Bryan interrupted his contemplation, shoving him up and out of the way. The creature struggled to rise. His left leg appeared severely misshapen. The former soldier’s elation at finally hurting the beast was short lived, however, as it didn’t seem to be hindering the beast at all. Neither did the stumpy legs the crash had left O’Bryan. It stalked toward Michael with a hungry smile, empty shoes flopping along the ground.
Michael skittered back toward the library wall. The motion came out more like a slow crawl, but his body managed it. He found the rosary still clutched tightly in his right hand and held it up, the crucifix on the end dangling before him. To his surprise, O’Bryan slowed, and the smile faltered, but he didn’t stop.
Michael thrust his arm forward, cramming the crucifix in the creature’s face. The hiss of the burn and a plume of rising smoke came once more, assuring him that he’d hit home. He pushed, hard, and the creature staggered backward. The undead man clasped his hands to his eyes and let out an inhuman scream.
Then, to Michael’s surprise, he ran.
Groaning, he pushed himself to his feet and took stock before giving chase. He hurt, everywhere. Miraculously, nothing felt broken. He probably had a concussion, though.
He took off after O’Bryan at a dead run. At least, that’s what he tried to do. His body had different ideas. His gait looked like a drugged sprinter and his pace resembled an octogenarian amputee. His foot hit the ground, and he stumbled. But he stayed upright, and somehow managed to get out the next step and the next and then a third.
With each stride his body seemed slightly more functional. His speed increased. His head cleared a bit. He took his bearings as his crawl turned into a light jog. The library loomed to his left. He recognized the marketing building on his right. A few yards ahead, the cement sidewalk transitioned into the fancy brick in front of Park Hall.
South, he thought to himself. Shit. At this time of night the student center would be one of the most crowded areas on campus. He wasn’t sure what the body count had reached – he still prayed that there wasn’t one – but he knew that if O’Bryan let loose in that crowd it would only rise.
He pushed himself harder. The light jog became a heavy jog, then a light run, and then, finally, he was moving at full speed. He took the steps down to Baldwin street three at a time. He didn’t even look as he crossed the street. Tonight he would be one of those same pedestrians that he’d sworn at back in August. Somebody honked, and he heard brakes squeal. He ignored it as he ran.
His head pounded. His knee and his hip throbbed. He pushed the pain out of his mind and ran even faster.
Students mingled in the fields to his right, but not many. He scanned the groups for O’Bryan but saw no sign of the beast. He pushed onward, coming up around the back of the campus bookstore. He took another flight of stairs, three at a time. Then he saw what he’d dreaded.
The campus bookstore marked one edge of the courtyard. A bus pulled away from the stop that marked the other. A large covered patio connected the bookstore to the food court that occupied the near corner of the student center. Dining students packed the outdoor tables and benches. More students mingled and wandered about, both inside and out.
He saw the yellow nose first, its faint glow standing out in the night. Right in the middle of the thronging masses stood O’Bryan, waiting and watching. His face no longer smoked, but it bore a black scar in the shape of a cross where the crucifix had burned it. Students began to notice his glowing nose. Most gave him a cautious look and then returned to their own interests. They saw weird things on campus all the time. A few of the more curious approached him, apparently to ask about it.
O’Bryan caught Michael’s eye and flashed him a vicious grin. He reached out an arm blindly, clutching young, dark haired girl by the neck. His random target screamed. Her friend screamed. More students screamed. O’Bryan laughed.
As the creature pulled the girl in front of him as a shield, Michael poured on the speed. His vision narrowed. He saw his opening. Everything slowed around him as he sped across the pavement. Five yards. Four. Three.
At two yards, he raised his right hand to head level. It formed a solid, vertical fist. His left arm came across to support it. He kept a solid bend in his arm, elbow braced against his body, and tensed everything. His eyes locked on O’Bryan’s as the undead face cackled above the young girl.
Michael gave a flick of his thumb. The crucifix that had rested on top of his fist rolled over. Caught by the rosary beads tangled in his fingers, it came to rest along his forward knuckles. O’Bryan’s laughter turned to terror.
He caught the creature square on the right eye and ran straight through him. O’Bryan screamed. The girl spun out of his arms, collapsing to the ground in terror.
A few paces away Michael managed to slow himself and turn. All around him, students turned to watch the commotion. A few even started chanting. “Fight! Fight! Fight!” It didn’t catch on.
O’Bryan faced him, composure regained. Michael lifted the rosary. At the sound of his adversary’s laughter, he looked down at his fist. The crucifix had broken off. He let the beads slide out of his hands as he brought his fists up to his face and positioned himself in a strong fighting stance.
“You never did know when to quit, did you Michael?” O’Bryan snarled at him and charged.
Michael braced himself, but the assault never came. Instead he watched as a thin stream of water sprayed O’Bryan right in his yellow nose. For a moment, O’Bryan simply stopped. He blinked a few times at his unusual assailant. Michael’s gaze followed the stream of water back to the source and wondered just how hard he’d hit his head.
But the old man really had just shot O’Bryan with a water gun. He even recognized the shooter. The dark, expensive suit, flag pin, and unkempt mop of gray hair belonged to the strange man who’d given him his now broken rosary.
The old man tossed aside the empty water pistol. He withdrew an elaborate crucifix from inside his suit. Nearly a foot tall, exquisitely crafted, and inlaid with gold, it shone brilliantly even in the dim light. The old man stepped closer to O’Bryan and called out a prayer in a loud, clear Texas drawl.
“St Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle. Protect us against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God restrain him, we humbly pray. And do thou, O Prince of the heavenly host, by the power of God, thrust, down to hell, Satan, and with him the other evil spirits who prowl through the world seeking the ruin of souls.”
The crucifix glowed, brighter than the nearby streetlights.
O’Bryan ran.
The old man took off after him at a brisk jog. Michael followed, quickly catching the old Texan.
“A water pistol? Really?” he asked as they ran.
He received a shrug in reply.
“Holy water. But apparently he’s not a vampire.”
Michael hesitated to label the old man crazy. In terms of weird things he’d seen and heard that evening, it didn’t even rate.
“Apparently,” he responded.
O’Bryan came to a halt in front of the stadium and turned to face Michael, laughing. Michael slowed to a walk about ten feet away and lifted his hands again. O’Bryan grinned at him.
“You can’t take me, Michael.”
“That won’t stop me from trying.”
The glow of the old man’s crucifix cut off O’Bryan’s grin.
Sirens wailed in the distance. O’Bryan stood trapped against the concrete barrier that lined the sidewalk. Beyond it lay a twenty foot drop to the pavement below. Flashing red and blue light joined the glow of the Texan’s crucifix.
&nbs
p; O’Bryan resurrected his grin.
“Keep an eye on those pretty girls, Michael. It would be a shame to have anything untoward happen to them.” He barked out that monstrous laugh again and leapt over the barrier. Michael barely registered the squeal of tires behind him. Instead, he noted the direction that O’Bryan ran. He spun on his heels, ready to find the stairs and give chase. Four police officers cut him off, weapons drawn.
“Down on your knees and hands in the air!” they shouted.
“The cavalry has arrived,” the old Texan noted dryly as he complied.
A clanking noise caught their attention. Half the police that surrounded them turned, training their firearms on the source of the sudden noise. Then more clanking. Then the music started.
Jeremiah Ezekiel Elijah Jones stood on one of the police SUVs, legs astride the flashing lights. He appeared to be break dancing to Michael Jackson’s Thriller. For a moment, they all just stared at him, dumbfounded. He carried some kind of staff in his right arm and a flask in his left. As he danced and chanted, he sprinkled the liquid over the police cars, and a generous portion on the roadway.
One of the officers holstered his weapon and moved to collect the hobo.
“Come on, Jeremiah. Let’s get you a room at the station tonight.”
“Beware the coming of the un-undead armies!” Jeremiah shouted as they pushed him into a car. “I have blessed this ground that they shall not pass! But not all are safe! Beware!”
Chapter Fourteen
Michael mulled over his situation inside the jail cell. They didn’t have a lot on him. They probably had a good case for carrying firearms on campus. Even with his concealed carry permit, that would be a misdemeanor. They’d revoke his permit and fine him. They’d also probably confiscate his guns, but he’d avoid jail time.
He took in his cellmate. Somehow the man had kept his suit immaculate, even through the altercation. They’d taken the man’s crucifix, belt, snakeskin boots, wallet, and watch when he was booked. But his ten-gallon hat still sat neatly on his head.
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