Cult .45

He phased into hell. He noted that this was the first time that he hadn’t had the opportunity to stop and smell the roses, so to speak. He had no time to register the smells that this world might provide, and he was happy for that. He scanned his environment and the only thing he could see was blood and body parts. The urban landscape was like a scene from Dante’s Inferno if Dante had mixed Crack, Meth, and Krokodil together after downing a jug of pure corn whiskey. Declan had seen some things in his life, but nothing had prepared him for this. He could already feel mother rummaging through his head, applying psychiatric techniques built for trauma victims, and adjusting his body’s response by flooding his head with endorphins. She was, in the immortal words of NYC sewage workers, keeping his shit together.

The sounds of screaming echoed through his ears, and fires were burning everywhere he looked. It was hard to tell what made him gag, the smoke, the blood, or the stench of decaying bodies. Ah, he thought, there is the smell I was so desperately missing! He was in sensory overload, dizzy from just being dropped into what felt like a torture chamber run by H.H. Holmes and the Marquis De Sade under the guidance of the CIA. Bile rose in his throat and he choked back a full-on vomit that was forming in his stomach. He caught some in his mouth, but swallowed it quickly; swaying, he grabbed a street pole to steady himself and looked around.

“Kristine, what the hell is happening here?”

The car bopped beside him, “War? Riots? Hard to say.”

Declan examined the area around him, and he immediately ruled out war. He saw no signs of shelling, and the fires looked to have been started by accidents or by spreading from one place to another. The damage and devastation could have been caused by riots, but if that were the case then they were the bloodiest riots he’d ever seen. Riots didn’t generally leave limbs hanging from lamp posts about or heads laying in gutters. This was just bad timing on his part. He’d tried to get here as soon as he could and clearly was in the middle of whatever it was that the Invigilator wanted to be stopped. He understood that now. There was something seriously wrong with each world that he’d visited, or so he believed. He may not have seen it on Rah’s world or that of the centaur known as Sarah, but he was certain those were worlds that were like rotten apples; lovely on the outside and a horror show under the skin.

Declan was about to pull up a mental map of the area when he realized that he was standing under a street sign and he looked up to read the names of Wabash and Lake. He was right where he was supposed to be. The man in the blue suit closed his eyes and silently thanked God that he was at least close to where he was supposed to be. He turned and saw the sign for Bloody Starr’s Coffee and More. It wasn’t lit up but he could see people inside. Declan made a beeline for the door and found it locked. He knocked, but no one answered. Again, he knocked harder and this time was answered with a scream from inside.

It was a voice that he knew all too well. Sarah was screaming like she was being murdered. He didn’t hesitate. Before he realized what he was doing he was already in motion. His foot flew up and kicked just below the door handle. Unfortunately, Declan had never been trained to use his foot to kick down a door, so when he lashed his leg out he struck with a solid thunk and pushed off the door so hard that he ended up landing on his ass hard. He looked up at Kristine hovering there and shouted, “Kristine, break the glass of the door and help Sarah. I’ll be right behind you!”

The miniature 57 Chevy imitation took off like a bullet and shattered the glass of the door, shards sprayed inward in her wake, and Declan heard her strike at least one body as she vanished into the darkness. He picked himself up and pulled his gun from his back. His knee was stiff and was not happy being asked to move so soon after his failed attempt to SWAT the door. It protested loudly with each step he took. His rear end didn’t feel any better, but he supposed it was better than having one’s limb’s ripped off. He saw a struggling body laid out on the counter. She, he was certain it was a she, was fighting and kicking as three other individuals who were wearing black robes held her down. A fourth individual was laid out on the floor and Declan could see that the unconscious form prone on the floor was also wearing black robes and holding what appeared to be a Kris in their hands.

The first of what he assumed to be cultists looked up at him as he entered. Declan could not see his face, but he could hear him clearly, “Greetings, brother! Have you heard of your Overlord and destroyer, Shoggluthoid?” The third acolyte cut him off, “We are supposed to be chanting, Jerome! Chanting! How can we sacrifice this maiden if we aren’t chanting? Let’s really call to the master!” The second figure turned his cowl to face the man wanting to chant, “Are we doing the Om mani padme hum chant?”

The third figure almost threw up his hands but realized just in time that he was holding his victim down, “No, you idiot. Buddhists chant that, not members of the Cult of the Endless Eldritch Entities!”

Cultist number two pointed a finger at himself, forgetting completely about the girl he was trying to kill, “I am a Buddhist, and a cultist; the two things are not mutually exclusive. Everyone seems to think that Buddhism is a religion, it’s not. It is more of a philosophy or way of life. Anyone can be a Buddhist, even the Pope!”

Jerome cut in, “You don’t find being a Buddhist interferes with your murderous and bloody philosophy of appeasing the old ones?”

The second thug shook his hood, “Not at all, I believe that they are mutually exclusive endeavors. Buddhism allows me to try to be a better self as I struggle to summon the dark gods whose names must not be spoken.”

The third assailant started screaming, “Eeeeaaaay, eeeeeeeAh, Shuggim, Shugger, Shuggthem, Riley, F’taghn!” The others just stared at him from their dark hoods. “I think you mispronounced R'lyeh,” Jerome stated flatly, “Unless one of the dark lords is named Riley.” The third cultist growled and began chanting again, but he stopped when no one joined him. “We can’t stop chanting just because the Unholy Friar has been knocked unconscious!” The second hooded figure turned to look at the first, Jerome, and let out a soft, “Eeay?”

Jerome the cultist chastised them, “Look, I like chanting as much as the next guy when we are doing a sacrifice, but we also have to think of recruitment. Someone will have to replace those that we lose during the culling. This guy,” he pointed at Declan, “Looks like a decent candidate. Why not ask him to join us? I have a spare robe in my car. We can just sacrifice her, and then I’ll go get it.”

“Uhhh, eeay,” said the second noncommittally.

Declan drew up his gun and didn’t even give a warning. He fired three times, one cartridge pierced the chest of the furthest robe wearer, one round went into the arm of a second, and his third shot pierced the skull of the nearest acolyte from hell, the one who liked chanting. He had to admit, it sure looked like they were trying to sacrifice her, so he figured he’d let them join a real death cult. One in which the first requirement for membership was death.

He reached out a hand and helped to pull the hapless victim up into a sitting position and Sarah’s face appeared before him. She was paler than he was used to seeing her, and was wearing a gossamer black dress that did little to hide her, um wow, bigger than average assets. She clearly had no bra on, and he was not about to look south unless she said that her feet were on fire. She stared into his eyes and he saw no hint of recognition. This iteration of his love clearly did not know him.

“My name is Declan,” he said in as calm a voice as he could manage. The car motored over and came to a rest near his shoulder, he nodded towards her and said, “This is my friend, Kristine.” The stunned barista looked the two of them over, “Thanks, I’m Sarah. I work here.”

Declan couldn’t wait, “What is going on around here? It looks like the whole world has gone mad.”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. All I can tell you is that everything was normal three hours ago, and then everything started going crazy. Some people started changing into these crazy things. The ones who didn’t were torn apart. Other people, like these bastards in the robes, came in and started chanting, and before you knew it they were grabbing customers and making sacrifices. I was the last one left and they weren’t wasting time doing their thing. If your little car thingamajig hadn’t come in when it did that wench on the floor would have already cut my heart out.” She kicked the prone form at her feet, and Declan accidentally looked south. He blushed and turned away only to see the cloaked figure he had shot in the arm standing back up.

“Eeeeaaaaaay,” the man roared as he pulled what looked to be a short paring knife from his sleeve and waved it over his head. Declan took careful aim with his handgun and fired another round directly into his cowled head. That did the trick, as he dropped like a sack of rotten tomatoes. “IiiiiOoooUuuuu,” Declan said as the monastic menace dropped, “You should have brought more vowels if you wanted to do a chant off. I didn’t even have to say, “And sometimes Y, punk.”

The gun was suddenly heavy in his hand, and a wave of exhaustion swept over him. He had never felt so tired in his life. It was finally getting to him, all the nonstop fighting and running. It bothered him that he had taken to killing so quickly and easily. The man was drained and all he wanted to do was go to sleep. His arm with the gun dropped to his side like the weapon weighed a hundred pounds.

Sarah had shrieked at the sound of the gun going off, but Declan waved her down, showing her that he had just finished off the one acolyte that he had hit in the shoulder. Kristine lifted the kris from the floor magnetically and scanned it carefully. “Declan, look at this.” The wavy knife floated over before him and he could see intricate designs etched into the metal of the blade. “Any idea of what they mean,” he asked the car. Her laser light ran over the symbols on the blade, “They are . . . ,” she began, but stopped. The knife flipped over and over, rotating as she scanned it once more. “Declan, this is worrisome.”

“What do you mean?”

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She scanned the knife again. “It’s odd,” she said ominously, “I know that I have scanned this weapon several times. I am further aware that I had downloaded all the information on it into my database, but all of that information is gone.” Kristine paused and levitated the kris in front of her headlights so that she could have a better look. “I know that I have repeatedly recorded the symbols, but I have no records of what those symbols were. It is as if they were erased from my database. Let me try to compare them to my store of known languages.” She became absolutely motionless. Normally she would drift a little to one side or bob up and down ever so slightly. Declan realized that he had never seen her completely still until now. It was unnerving.

Her headlights came on and she swung her tail end around. “This is most curious. I cannot retain the images of those symbols within my database for longer than twelves seconds. They are purged in some manner that I cannot counter. This should not be possible.”

Sarah brushed herself off and straightened her dress, “Look, I appreciate the help and all, but the door is broken and there are weird things roaming the streets. Cultists are going around killing people, and I am several blocks from home. I appreciate all the Sherlocking the two of you are doing, but it isn’t safe here.” She emphasized her observation by pointing at the piles of bodies in the café. “I would be happy if you came with me and helped me get home, but if you are more interested in some creepy knife then I’m going on my own. You want to join me? Great! If so, let’s go, but I’m not staying here much longer.” Sarah put her hands on her hips and licked her lips most suggestively. “Whatta ya say, tough guy? You coming or staying?”

Declan had never seen Sarah so, erhm, aggressive before. He had thought the centaur version was bold. This Sarah was really coming on strong, and it bothered him. “Look, Sarah, I can get us all out of here safely. No worries about those things outside, I’ve dealt with them before. Give me a minute, and we’ll be on our way.” He looked back at Kristine, “How much time is left on the counter?”

“You have fifty-six minutes remaining.”

He pinched his nose, ‘Great, we are going to be really cutting this close. Mother open a portal for Sarah and Kristine.” He looked over to the car, “Make sure that you take that knife back with you. I want mother to study it.”

“You got it Deck!” She motored over to the girl, “We have a safe place that we’d like you to join us in. In a moment a doorway of sorts will open. Once we go through we will be safe. Will you come with me?”

Sarah smiled a toothy grin. “I don’t have much of a choice,” she said as she looked outside. “Will the hero be coming, too, or is he planning to stay here and fight off the ravening hordes?”

The car listed to the right, “Declan will be joining us immediately afterward. He just has to take some precautions so that nothing follows us. He’ll be fine.”

The girl, as frazzled as she was, gave him a hungry look, “Good,” she whispered to the car, “He smells absolutely delicious.” Kristine not only caught the predatory glint in the girl’s crimson eyes but also saw what she thought were fangs extending from behind her upper lip.

Declan was oblivious to the conversation his car and the new Sarah was having. He had picked up an order pad and a pen and was frantically writing down numbers. “Eight minutes twenty seconds before we see it, then another half hour, give or take a minute or two, before the shockwave hits. That gives me thirty-eight minutes. We can do this.”

This time he did not wait. He pulled up his HUD and scrolled over to his apocalypse screen. He typed: Eight minutes ago the sun gained extra mass from a passing main sequence star. This caused the sun to go Super Nova and explode. A shock wave has since been traveling at one quarter the speed of light and will strike the earth on its day side instantly vaporizing everything on its surface. The night side temperatures will exceed the average temperature of the sun’s surface by 15 times and incinerating/disintegrating everything on the night side moments later. Then the planet will fragment and explode and become little more than space debris.

He hit enter and closed his HUD. It was time to go. He appreciated the way he could make things happen retroactively, which helped him shave off an extra eight minutes from his deadline. He wanted to make sure that he was able to leave before he set everything up for the apocalypse.

Needless to say, he was surprised to see both Kristine and Sarah still there. “What are you still doing here?”

“Mother hasn’t opened the gateway, she says she can’t.”

“Can’t?”

“As before, on Crowe’s world, something that she will not permit through is too near the gateway position.” Declan was looking out the window as the car spoke. He saw the night sky flare brightly for a minute before it settled back down into its normal luminescence.

“Dammit,” he spat. “Can you go take a look outside and see if there is anything nearby? If there is we might be able to get out of its range this time around.” Once more his focus was such that he hadn’t even noticed that Mother had not spoken to him since the time he’d arrived on this world. They needed to get a set protocol together, something that was better coordinated and not so reliant on taking care of things “In the moment.”

The car didn’t even acknowledge him; it just zipped out the broken door and flew down the street. Sarah looked over to him, “That makes it just you and me. All alone.” She stepped over and slid behind the counter. “I’m starving, you want some coffee?”

He nodded, “I could use a cup. Just surprise me. I really don’t care what you give me so long as it has caffeine.” She gave him a thumbs up, and two minutes later came back with two steaming cups of coffee, she handed him one as she sipped hers. “Mmmhhmm. I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to get it hot enough, but this is perfect.” Declan blew on the cup and inhaled a strong scent of pumpkin spice, he was already thrilled to get coffee, but pumpkin flavor was the best.

Normally, he enjoyed drinking his coffee in much smaller sips, but the cup in his hand seemed lukewarm and so he took a long draught, and almost spit it onto the floor. It tasted of iron and pumpkin. At first, he tried to figure out what was in his mouth, but then he remembered the name of the store. Bloody Starr . . . surely that wasn’t really blood in his cup, was it? He forced himself to swallow it. Sarah saw his face and asked, “What’s the matter? Is it too hot? I thought I had it at exactly 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit.”

He forced himself not to gag, “Is there blood in that coffee?

She looked puzzled, “Of course, but I gave you O-. I thought everyone liked O-. Are you more of an AB+ guy? I can get you some of that if you like.”

Declan looked at her, really looked at her, and realized that she had fangs. Her canines were elongated, not enough to protrude from her mouth, but enough to be noticeable if you paid attention. Dear God, he was so stupid, didn’t his mission statement say something about hemovores? Her people drank blood to survive. She was a living vampire; flesh and blood, but a vampire nonetheless. “No,” he sputtered, “I’m fine. I’m going to check on Kristine. Give me a minute, OK?” She nodded and he initiated his Headnet.

Kristine, are you all right? Do you see anything?

Declan, the streets are clear. I can’t find anything around or above the area I have designated as minimum distance for being able to interfere with our extraction. I’m coming back, I’m afraid that my presence will only draw attention if I remain mobile. I saw that flash of light, was that your doing?

Yes, I set off a supernova, we don’t have much time left. Get back here and we’ll try again.

I am returning now.

“Kristine says we are all clear, so whatever it is has to be nearby. Mother wouldn’t leave us here to die unless she had no choice.” He looked the café over, even going into the back, but he found nothing. He went back to Sarah and sat beside her. She was still cradling her coffee in her hands and taking short sips. He was about to ask her about being a living vampire, as opposed to the undead variety when he noticed movement on the floor.

The stabby cultist, the one the other robed madmen had called the Unholy Friar was moving his leg, and the exposed flesh was a light green. Declan stood up and pulled his handgun from his back. He placed the barrel right behind the hood of the killer and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened; he was out of cartridges. He began thinking, did I fire five shots or did I fire six? He’d lost count in all the commotion, so he wasn’t sure. For all he knew the weapon hadn’t been fully loaded when he took it from Crowe. She might have fired it before she found him, or she may have just left a chamber empty so she didn’t shoot her foot off. Either way, it didn’t matter now. The cultist was getting up.

He figured if he couldn’t shoot the bastard then he’d use the gun to club him to death. He began battering the cowled head over and over. His blows, numerous though they were; seemed to do nothing to the hooded cultist. The friar stood up slowly and drew back his hood.

Declan saw that he had made two miscalculations. First, the friar wasn’t a man at all, she was a woman. At least, she used to be a woman. A presumably pretty one at that, but now long strands of black hair were falling out in globs as she transformed. Her eyes were already those jelly-like fish orbs and her mouth had become lamprey-like, circular with numerous rows of teeth spiraling around in an endless circle. He could see buds that would be quickly growing into tentacles forming above her upper lip. Her skin was swiftly becoming more gelatinous, and her fingers were rapidly extending into talons. He was boned. He knew it, Sarah knew it, and the friar knew it. He and Sarah were going to die in moments unless he could think of something quickly.

Before he could move a stool slammed into the monster’s head. The seat flew off to the right, and the four legs splintered on the impact. Sarah had clocked it from behind! The assault had no effect on the beast, though. It didn’t even turn around to see what had just hit it. Its eyes were focused on him. Oh, joy, he thought, she likes me. He drew his hands up into fists and prepared to jab her in the eye. He took a step forward when he heard Kristine’s voice.

“Get down, Declan!”

He didn’t hesitate. He dropped to the ground face first. He heard a loud Ka-Chunk! And Kristine screaming, “I’ll run your green ass over, bitch. I’m a frikkin’ steamroller.” She had connected to the cult monster at the base of its skull, the creature’s head rocked forward, and it stumbled, but it quickly righted itself. Declan rolled out of the way, and grabbed a stool. As he stood he used it to play lion tamer and kept her at bay. The woman was getting bigger, and less woman-like by the second.

He looked around for anything he might employ to hurt the creature. He doubted there was anything that he could use; she had just taken a full shot to her skull with Kristine going at mach speed and she didn’t even blink. The fact that she no longer had eyelids might have contributed to that factor, but she wasn’t slowed in the slightest. He could hear Sarah yelling and frantically patting him on the shoulder. He spared her a glance and saw she was offering him the strange dagger that they had gotten from the friar pre-transformation. He reached out his left hand and took it from her. He sent a signal via Hnet to Kristine telling her to distract it for a moment.

The little car did not disappoint. She began circling the monster’s head so fast that she was little more than a blur. Declan took advantage and lunged forward with the knife. He drove it deep into the beast’s belly and dragged it upwards until he struck the breastbone. Then he shoved the blade in as deep as he could, going so far as to drive the blade in so far that he was in its chest cavity as far as his wrist before he could stop. The creature shuddered and fell backward. His hand came free with a disgusting Sssshhhhlucking sound and he flapped it in the air in a vain attempt to get the green goo off of him. Between the goo and the blood, he had just imbibed he really wanted to retch. There was a tingle in the back of his head and without thinking about it Declan dropped the knife. It fell from his hands and plopped into a green puddle of sludgey blood that was threatening to stain his shoes if he didn’t move soon.

He heard the portal open and saw the blue glow that it emitted. He grabbed Sarah and said, “Let’s go!” Kristine zipped ahead of him and entered the portal just before him and Sarah the Vampire.