Never Just One Apocalypse

by Karen L Mead

  Before Sam could answer, Dmitri spoke.

  “Listen, when he awakes, he will not be the boy you know. Perhaps he will be, eventually, but at first, it is very difficult.”

  “He’ll be like a rabid animal,” said Sam. “And there’s no guarantee he’ll ever progress beyond that. Some vampires never do.”

  “No,” Dmitri admitted.

  “How did he end up like this?” Khalil asked again, turning from Mike to Sam.

  “How?”

  Sam wouldn’t meet Khalil’s eyes.

  “It’s all my fault.”

  Khalil walked up to the table and slammed his hands down on it, making the surface vibrate; Sam winced but didn’t look up.

  “I know it’s all your fault. Who else’s fault would it be? I’m asking, what happened?”

  “Not now. Don’t you two do this now,” said Dwight. The manager had been so quiet, Khalil had almost forgotten he was there.

  “Then you tell me!” Khalil said, spinning around to face Dwight. “You were in on whatever was going on here, right? That’s you, the loyal lieutenant. Nothing goes on here that you don’t know about.”

  Dwight sighed and stood up, leaning against the employee lockers.

  “It was a deal for information, with the Liddell clan—that group of vampires that the teacher used to work for. Mike was supposed to donate a small amount of blood as a gift to them. It was a routine thing, I think. No one thought something like this would happen.”

  “A deal,” Khalil repeated, looking from Sam to Dwight with a look of utter disgust.

  “Do you hear yourselves? We’re no better than the rest of them now. We’re scum too.”

  “We?” Dwight repeated. “You weren’t part of this.”

  “Well, obviously I’m one of us, aren’t I? And I can’t ever leave, because who knows what’ll happen if I go? Who will you sell into slavery next? Jay Peglioni?”

  “He talked me into it!” Sam said through gritted teeth, finally looking up. “I didn’t want to do it, but we needed the information, and Mike wanted a chance to hack their computers. I must have said no twenty times, but he wore me down.”

  “Right, so you’re just the victim here? Interesting how that works out.”

  “If you think you can make me feel any worse about this than I already do, you’re wasting your time,” Sam said, leaning back in his chair and rubbing his temples. “The only reason I haven’t reversed all of this is because I can’t right now; the taint is too strong.”

  “What the hell does that mean, ‘the taint is too strong’? How come you’re supposed to have this balls-out amazing magic, only it’s completely useless whenever it might actually help someone? Have you noticed that?”

  To Khalil’s surprise, Helena spoke up from the floor.

  “Please, don’t yell at each other. It was I who did this, I who broke the contract and shamed myself and my clan.”

  Sam looked over at Helena like he’d only just remembered that she existed.

  “Why are you still here?”

  “I am responsible.”

  Sam looked puzzled for a moment, then stood up.

  “I see. You’re Liddell’s apology; for being careless and mistreating his ‘gift,’ he’s making me a gift of the vampire responsible.”

  For the first time, Helena looked up. There was a look of sad resignation on her tear-stained face that evoked Khalil’s sympathy, as much as he wanted to hate her.

  “Do whatever you want with me, I deserve it all and more. To desecrate a gift? To harm a child?”

  Fresh tears ran down her face, and she shook her head.

  “I won’t ask you to give me the final death, because that would be too kind. I don’t deserve that kind of peace.”

  Sam and Khalil exchanged glances. Despite their arguing, they still had a kind of mutual understanding that hadn’t dissipated. Both of them could tell that Helena was not the kind of vampire who was likely to lose control of herself and kill a person.

  “What happened?” Sam asked, sounding calmer and more rational now that his curiosity was piqued. “You’re not the type of vampire who endangers the people she feeds on. I can tell you’re not.”

  She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, trying to collect herself.

  “I don’t know if you can understand. But when I was first turned, in a small village in Poland many years ago, the people around me tasted the way that boy tastes. Something I hadn’t tasted in decades. I thought that kind of blood had disappeared from the world. When I drank from him, it was like…going back to that time…I was so young….”

  She shook her head hard, like she had to rouse herself from the memory.

  “By the time I came back to myself, it was already too late.”

  Standing guard over Mike, Dmitri looked at Sam and nodded. Clearly, he thought her explanation was believable, and he was in a position to know.

  Looking at Helena’s dejected form, Khalil found that he couldn’t feel any hatred for her at all. He wanted to hate her, wanted to have somewhere to direct all his anger, but he knew better.

  “There’s no point in taking it out on her. It was an accident.”

  “I know. She never should have been put in that position,” said Sam. He took a deep breath and then exhaled.

  “Helena Liddell. Return to your master. Tell him that I don’t hold him responsible for this, so no apology is necessary.”

  Helena winced.

  “I’m no longer welcome there.”

  Before Sam could respond, they were interrupted by a loud banging on the front door of the café. After a few moments of no response, whoever it was banged on the door again.

  Khalil turned to Dwight.

  “I thought you put the ‘Closed’ sign up.”

  “I did. Guess someone really, really wants their iced Americano with caramel.”

  The banging continued, even louder. Dwight got up to take care of it, but Khalil stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

  “Don’t, I’ll go.”

  Khalil knew it irritated Dwight to deal with demanding, abusive customers, because he was too professional to treat them in the manner they deserved. Khalil had no such limitations.

  When Khalil left the break room and entered the shop proper, he was surprised to see who was standing outside the big glass door. He had been expecting one of their regulars, but instead the person banging on the door was a slim youth he didn’t recognize. The boy, probably about Mike’s age, was wearing a fashionable blue suit, though it looked somewhat tattered.

  He looks a little young to be addicted to espresso. Who knows, though, at the rate we’re going they’re going to be giving the stuff to kindergartners soon.

  “We’re closed, kid,” Khalil said, projecting his voice loud enough to be heard through the door. “Come back tomorrow.”

  The kid, painfully thin with a shock of bushy brown hair, reddened considerably.

  “I’m not here for a bloody cup of coffee! I have an important delivery for the Son of Sam—”

  Khalil opened the door and pulled the kid inside as quickly as possible.

  “Hey, watch it! First rule of Demon Club, don’t talk about Demon Club!”

  “Don’t you think I know that? But I need to get this to him, as soon as possible!”

  The boy opened the jacket of his suit, where an aged wooden rod was partially sewn into the lining. Khalil looked at the object and frowned.

  “You need to give Sam a stick of rotten wood?”

  The boy’s face went from red to white. He had a lot of teenaged acne, so his overall impression was more of pimply petulance than rage, but it was clear he was pissed.

  “It’s the bloody Rod of Moses, you wanker! You think I spent a week covered in fish guts to deliver you a stick of rubbish?”

  Chapter 39

  Trying to turn around to see your own back is a uniquely frustrating experience.

  “I don’t get it! You say they’re really big, but all I can s
ee is a little shimmer out of the corner of my eye.”

  “That’s because they’re folded up behind your back. Can you spread your wings?”

  “If I could move them, do you think I’d be this confused?” Cassie sputtered.

  Apparently, sometime between the beginning of Dinosaur Killer 3D and being thrown in the dungeon, she had grown a pair of wings. Translucent wings, but Cordley said he had noticed them right away as soon as she’d been tossed into the room.

  “I would offer to gently pull one of them out to the side so you could see it, but to be honest, I’m not sure it’s safe to touch them.”

  “Me neither.”

  Cassie sighed and sat back. Then, getting an idea, she crabwalked backwards until her back was nearly up against the pile of rocks at the back of the cell. When her wings made contact with the rocks, it was an odd sensation; it was like she could feel the hard texture, but if she concentrated hard, it wasn’t the skin of her back that was feeling it. She was aware of things that touched her wings, but seemed to lack a general awareness of them, somehow. Right now, they were like a limb she couldn’t move.

  “Do you feel that?” Cordley asked, curious.

  “Kind-of-sort-of. It’s hard to explain.”

  She picked up one of the rocks between her fingers, then brought it up to her face. In the dim light, it was impossible to tell for sure what it was.

  “Is this a diamond?”

  “Possibly. I think they’re all gemstones,” Cordley said, eyeing the giant pile of stones. “They have no value here.”

  Cassie picked up some more gems and let them fall through her fingers like sand.

  “What’s the point of having them in here?”

  Cordley shrugged.

  “Maybe it’s a cruel joke? If a prisoner could somehow escape with them back to the Upper World, they’d be millionaires. But once you’re here….”

  “…either a demon owns your soul, or you’re already dead,” Cassie finished for him. “Yeah, that sounds like something Sammael would do just to be obnoxious.”

  As Cassie finished speaking, the ground started vibrating; gently at first, but soon the tremors were strong enough that Cassie nearly fell over.

  “What’s happening?” Cordley shouted, looking around frantically. Clearly he had no idea what was going on either.

  Cassie was about to ask if there were earthquakes in Hell, but closed her mouth and listened instead. It was hard to hear anything over the racket of everything shaking, but if she concentrated, she thought she could hear something; something high-pitched and strangely vulnerable.

  “Someone’s screaming,” Cassie said, bracing herself with her hands.

  Cordley screwed up his face in concentration.

  “I can’t hear it. I can’t hear anything.”

  To Cassie’s surprise, Sammael appeared at the door. Enough time had passed that he was back to his normal appearance, although under the current conditions, he looked rather blurry.

  “Come,” he said simply.

  Cassie struggled to get to her feet and nearly fell over, but before she could fall, Sammael caught her at the waist.

  “I didn’t do whatever this is!” Cassie shouted over the cacophony.

  “We’ll see about that,” said Sammael.

  Then before Cassie knew what had happened, they were out of the dungeon; Sammael had picked her up in his arms and was running, already leaving the house far behind. They were in what looked like a corn field, if stalks of corn were blurry and blackish-purple.

  “Don’t just leave Dr. Cordley alone down there!”

  “He’ll be fine. Worry about your own skin for a change.”

  Cassie tried to get a better look at her surroundings, but they were moving too fast, and everything was a blur of brilliant colors. As they moved, the screaming got louder. Somehow, it was like a young child’s scream, yet irritating like the sound of fingernails on a chalkboard at the same time. It had a strange resonance, like nothing she had ever heard before. Her ears hurt, and she wondered if maybe the bones in them were shaking in a way they weren’t supposed to.

  “What is that?”

  “Someone wants to see you and they aren’t taking no for an answer.”

  Oh no….

  Suddenly Sammael stopped. If this had been in the real world, the whiplash likely would have snapped Cassie’s neck, but fortunately, physics were malleable here. Perhaps even more than usual, in this place.

  They were standing in front of a cave. The inside of the cave was dark, like it wasn’t illuminated by any of the light outside at all, and all that was visible to Cassie was a single point of red light, far in the distance. The screaming quieted, then stopped.

  “Thought he’d never shut up,” Sammael muttered, shaking dust off of his lapels. “Come on. If we don’t get there fast enough, he’ll start that infernal shrieking again.”

  He took Cassie’s hand and began guiding her through the cave. Because she could barely see anything, she followed him as closely as she could and tried not to think about what the darkness might be hiding.

  “Why does Satan want to see me?” Cassie asked finally, her voice low. In the cave, even her breathy whisper echoed off the walls.

  Sammael’s grip tightened on her hand for a moment, painfully, but then he relaxed.

  “I’m just about out of patience with you. Stop playing dumb.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Fine, stop being dumb.”

  He held Cassie firmly so she couldn’t move for a moment, then picked her up again and jumped. Cassie thought they must be crossing some kind of crevasse, although it was too dark for her to tell. Her stomach did flip flops as they traveled through the air.

  They landed, and Sammael let her down. She realized that since Sammael had picked her up again, there had been a dull hissing sound, like the sound of frying sausages in a pan in a kitchen down the hall.

  “What’s that sound?”

  “It’s your wings, burning me.”

  Cassie tried to move away from the demon, but he grabbed her arm.

  “You can’t move on your own here, you’ll fall. You have to stay close.”

  Cassie bit her lip, not sure how to feel. Considering the fact that he’d just thrown her in a dungeon, Cassie wasn’t Sammael’s biggest fan right now, but nevertheless, she didn’t want to hurt him. Plus, the very idea that this odd new part of her was responsible for anything was weird.

  “Have you ever seen this before? Someone, um, growing these, like I just did?”

  He didn’t answer. Cassie decided to shut up for the remainder of their trip through the cave.

  As they descended, the air grew much hotter. Little motes of flame, looking much like fireflies, began to pop up out of nowhere. The air seemed painfully dry and thin, and it hurt Cassie’s throat.

  “Don’t worry; I’m putting a sphere of fresh air around you,” Sammael said, and Cassie breathed in the artificially cool air, relieved.

  As the little motes of fire became more common, Cassie was finally able to see. They were in a huge underground cavern, larger than a football field. Everywhere was consumed with flame, flame that oscillated between blue, yellow and orange. The only spot free of fire was a small circle in the center, occupied by a slender youth wearing dark, nondescript clothes.

  With her in hand, Sammael plunged into the flames, only for the fire to withdraw to either side of him, making a walkway. After walking for a few moments, he stopped short.

  “Pull those things in,” he grunted.

  “Huh?”

  “Your blasted wings. They’re affecting the fire.”

  Cassie turned and looked behind her and saw that he was right; where she had walked, the flames hadn’t respawned. Instead, there was a hiss of steam, and a sheen of moisture in the air.

  There was a deep laugh, and Cassie nearly jumped out of her skin. Devon screamed like a child, but his voice was distinctly that of an adult male.

  “Oh come on, Gran
dpa, you know Mother can’t help it. We water elementals don’t like the heat much.”

  Sammael continued drawing her forward, until they were about ten feet away from Devon. The whole time, the demon of all demons seemed to drink in the sight of her with his eyes, like she was food for a starving man. She looked at the ground, her cheeks burning redder than the flames.

  When they were as close as Sammael was willing to take her, he let go of her hand and grabbed her upper arm.

  “There, I’ve brought her to you. Whatever you want to say, make it quick.”

  Devon just continued looking at her, smiling. Annoyance warring with fear, Cassie broke the silence.

  “Help me out here: I knew my son was going to grow up to become the Devil, so I named you Devon? That’s so lame. I can’t believe future me would do something that pathetic.”

  He chuckled, showing a hint of his teeth. His incisors looked larger and sharper than that of any vampire she had ever seen.

  “Dear Mother, you’ve got it backwards. You named me Devon, and the whole ‘Devil’ idea only came later, as a result. Someone spelled my name wrong at some point, and it must have stuck.”

  “Yeah but…that doesn’t make sense. Because that means when I named you, I didn’t know that the Devil was a thing, otherwise I never would have named you that. But I’m supposed to have you in the future, and how could I not know….”

  Devon threw up his hands nonchalantly. “There was a time before the Devil existed where you named me that, but the timeline changed, and enough iterations later, here we are. You can name me Keith this time around, if you think it’ll make any difference.”

  “Hurry it up, Keith,” Sammael said. “You were granted permission for this audience on the understanding that it would be quick.”

  Cassie looked from the Devil to Sammael and back, curious. Here was the Devil, calling her “Mother,” and Sammael wasn’t reacting with any surprise. Surely he must have seen the nature of her relationship with Devon in her mind, but if he already knew, his behavior until now seemed strange.

  He learned I was the Devil’s mother, and his response was…to take me to kill dinosaurs?

  Devon relaxed his shoulders and sighed, an odd sound.