Chapter 31

Crashing headlong into this strange new world of undead sorcerers and terrifying spells, I resorted to my baser instincts and opted for a favorite and time-honored approach when a man feels threatened or out of depth: good old blunt force trauma.

The parking meter was a blur that exploded against the green energy shield, making it flare brightly in protest. I could feel the rain-pitted surface of the metal bar in my hands bending as though it were clay under the unyielding steel of the corded muscles in my arms. Coins shot across the room in a glittering spray of silver as the parking meter’s glass display shattered.

Fortunately for me, the necromancer’s magic shield didn’t fare much better. A blinding surge of light flashed across its surface from the point of impact, followed by a cracking sound as fissures spread all over the shield’s surface. With only a few dying flickers of protest, the entire sphere of neon green energy pulsed convulsively one last time, then finally popped like a soap bubble and dissipated into the air, leaving only a flummoxed necromancer staring blankly at the mangled parking meter howling on its descent toward his head.

“I-Impossible..!” Marduk blurted out while hurriedly flinging his arms up.

Here’s where my inexperience with this new breed of enemies came to the ugly light. I thought the panicked sorcerer was simply trying to shield his head. I was dripping with confidence in my newfound strength. A magician without his magic shield should be squashed flat like a roach in no time, right?

Only when I saw the green glow coating his arms did I recall him flinging some nasty green stuff that left black scorch marks and puddles of smoking goo anywhere it landed.

“Shit!” was all I could snarl in my head as I watched a substantial glob of green acid unerringly flying toward my chest at point-blank range. I jerked my swing back and used my makeshift club to bat it away. Surprisingly, my timing was spot on and the green ball struck my trusty parking meter head-on with an angry hiss. The ball of acid burst apart and I swept past it while ignoring the scalding pain that flared across my skin.

Committed as I was, my momentum finally brought me face-to-face against the necromancer. His face was one of absolute shock while mine was a leering snarl of unabated fury.

The mage jerked back as his hands became blurs of motion in the air. He was likely casting another spell but I knew he was mine now and swung the parking meter at his head. Only instead of the gratifying crunch and corresponding splash of blood I’d been expecting, my blow sailed right past him and I was sent reeling with the force of the missed swing, confusion plastered all over my face.

“How the hell did I miss?”

That’s when the burning smell hit my nostrils and I looked down to see green sludge eating away at the stump of metal in my hands. The meter head had already been melted clean off and it was descending toward my hand next. I looked back up only to see Marduk lifting his hand in my direction.

“Crap!” I growled to myself. Glowing green crap, as a matter of fact. Probably radioactive, to boot.

I desperately threw the melting stub of metal in my hand but Marduk didn’t even flinch as he swayed to one side, his gaze not leaving mine as though he’d already won. Maybe he had. Only a scant 6 feet separated us, but by now Dash had worn off and Marduk’s movements were not those of a simple human. I knew he couldn’t miss a human-sized target rushing at him point-blank.

“Hey, asshole!”

Both Marduk and I turned our heads at the same instant. That’s why I missed the glorious spray of blood as a full burst of 9mm hollow-point bullets shredded Marduk’s skull and sprayed bits of his brain all over the walls. A shotgun blast promptly followed, blasting what little remained of his head and leaving only the tattered remnants of the necromancer’s jaw flapping against the side of his neck.

Vicky narrowed her eyes and there was a wildness captured in their gleam that matched the rapid rising and falling of her chest as she met my gaze over the smoking barrel of her MP5 machine gun.

Damn, but she was beautiful, even with all the dirt smudging her face and a halo of smoke curling up around her figure from where the necromancer’s spell must have side-swiped her.

I quickly shook my head to clear errant thoughts, studying the corpse of the necromancer that lay at my feet. Behind my back, I heard footsteps as Vicky and Dex walked up and stood gazing down at a mangled corpse that had abruptly deflated of all its suffocating aura of death and evil, like a balloon that had been popped with only empty air inside.

“Is.. Is he dead?” I couldn’t help but ask, still wrestling with my close brush with death and how quickly and terminally the threat had been ended.

The shotgun blast that followed my question and left a shrill ringing in my ears sprayed even more blood across the weathered moss-green floor.

“He sure as hell better be,” Dex squeezed out between rapid breaths, though I noticed he immediately pumped his shotgun and kept it trained on the corpse, almost as though expecting it to rise back to its feet at any time.

“Was that really necessary?” Victoria asked flatly.

“Only way to be sure, according to The Rising Dead season 2 episode 10, ‘The Culling of the Zombie Nation.’ It’s the one where-“

“Spare me the details. Kai?”

I felt hands inspecting me, searching for wounds and burns.

“Fine, I’m fine,” I waved her off absent-mindedly.

I couldn’t quite pull my eyes away from the still-twitching corpse at our feet. A being of tremendous evil and seemingly matching power, one who had claimed to have surpassed the limits imposed upon mortal kind, he’d been..

“Shot down like a rabid dog in the streets,” Dex supplied next to me, almost as though he’d been reading my thoughts. “Megalomania at its finest.”

I tilted my head toward the corpse before us. “You don’t sound surprised.”

Dex simply shrugged. “I told you before, this whole thing with magic and orb keepers is creepy and scary and exciting as hell-“

“Exciting?” I stared as though the man had gone insane, but he just kept going on.

“-but people, no matter how souped-up they are on this whole metaphysical power cocktail, are still just people in the end. That means they can bleed, and what can bleed, we can kill.”

“You almost sound as though you blow people’s skulls off on a daily basis,” I pointed out. “What happened to that whole ‘we’re just normal nerds that like to play children’s card games’ and all that shpiel?”

That finally earned me a dark glower from Dex. “Magic the Gathering is NOT a children’s game.”

When I just shrugged in response, Dex scrunched up his face and seemed about to launch into another of his diatribes. Luckily, Victoria grabbed me by the collar and spun me around to face her angry, accusatory eyes.

“What the hell was that, Kai?”

“Wha-?”

“You just pulled another of your reckless suicidal rushes and nearly got killed again.”

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I wanted to point out that technically, I might be dead already. Instead, I frowned as I jerked my head in the corpse’s direction.

“Which was the only reason we popped that fancy barrier of his and killed the bastard,” I pointed out.

“You can’t rely on luck or me to bail your ass out of the fire every time,” she replied, her voice dangerously monotone but her eyes burning holes through my head.

“It got the job done, didn’t it?” I said, shrugging.

Her hands tightened their grip on my lapels as her scowling face drew dangerously close to mine.

“I promised I’d help you find your girlfriend and I stand by my words,” Victoria said, and though she didn’t exactly accuse me of the opposite, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel the burn from that. But what was the use of another apology? They felt hollow even before they made it to my lips. So I didn’t even try. “You rushing off to die at every corner is not part of the bargain.”

“I’m not-” I began instead, but her next words stopped me cold.

“Do it for her,” Victoria said, her face suddenly an expressionless mask. “You must stay alive for her sake, if nothing else.”

I held back what I’d been about to say and closed my mouth. After a moment of silence, I nodded begrudgingly. It was only now that I began to realize how little I seemed to care about my own survival. Was it because I’d already died once and felt as though I were living on borrowed time? Or maybe it was simply a part of the package. After all, what was the point of an undead minion that was too concerned about its own survival to do its master’s bidding?

“Yes, you’re right,” I said, taking a deep breath. “I’m no good to anybody dead.”

Victoria suddenly let go and turned away without another word.

I lifted my hand in her direction, but slowly let it drop without saying anything. What was there to say, really? You could fill oceans with the words that would be needed to bridge the abyss separating us, here and now. I just couldn’t afford to. Right now, I needed to find Allie and that was that.

Everything else - Me, the world, even Victoria - was just collateral damage.

“Uh, touching as this little reunion has been, we should really get going before that mob of zombies decides to turn around and join this jolly party of ours,” Dexter cut in from the side.

Brushing aside the uncomfortable pressure in my chest as I gazed at Victoria’s solitary figure and the barely perceptible sagging of her shoulders, I turned around to study the corpse at my feet.

The cowl had been torn apart, along with the majority of the man’s skull. Thankfully, his body was still intact from the neck down. As I approached the corpse, several bright lights suddenly flared into life above the necromancer’s corpse and I jumped back with a startled cry.

“Shit!” Dexter gasped next to me, pumping another shotgun blast at the corpse for good measure. It rocked for a moment in response, then lay still.

“What’s the matter with you two?” Victoria asked, her tone cold.

“What the hell, Kaizer? You just scared the shit out of me!” Dexter protested.

It was only after I nearly crapped my pants that I realized it was the familiar sight of mana orbs, which silently streamed into my wrist. I shrugged sheepishly in Dexter’s direction, to which the man just rolled his eyes, pumping another shell for his shotgun.

“You’re looking a little jumpy there, Mr. They’re-just-another-human, sir.”

“Ha fucking ha. Very funny,” Dexter said dryly. “I’ll just let the next evil necromancer melt your balls into a pile of goo, THEN blow its head off.”

I didn’t reply and instead followed the familiar tugging that had brought us all the way here. It was a resonance that unerringly led me to dig out a golden amulet from the figure’s robes, right at his chest.

Intricate patterns carved upon its surface glowed with a flickering green light that sent chills through my skin. It was shaped like a round disk with a red gem nearly the size of a quail egg encrusted in the center. The crystal had a deep red hue and seemed to absorb the light around it but reflected none of it back. It reminded me of the color of blood, only not fresh and bright but instead like a pool of it that had been left to dry for a few days. I could almost feel the sickening stench of it, to the point that I had to suppress the sudden itch in my nose.

The amulet was a disgusting cocktail of death, corruption, and decay to my senses, and underneath it all, there was Allie. Her scent and her presence called to me as clearly as though I were holding a part of her in my hands. Only then did I realize that maybe I was.

“Blood?” I murmured, studying the scarlet gem in the amulet with disbelieving eyes. “It’s her blood..”

“Her blood? What are you talking about?” Dexter parroted next to me.

“Allie’s blood. I can feel a connection to this amulet. Rather, to this gem. It’s almost like it’s calling to me somehow,” I said, shaking my head at my inability to articulate the feeling in my head. “I don’t understand it either.”

“Maybe you’re right. Maybe it’s her blood. The sorcerer mentioned something about a seeking spell revealing the truth,” Victoria said, moving up beside me to study the amulet in my hands. Suddenly, she turned her head toward Dexter. “In works of fiction, don’t such spells require a trace of genetic material to work properly?”

Dexter’s grin was one of self-assured gloating, as though he’d been waiting for this moment his entire life.

“I’d say in this case, it’s more appropriate to call it lore rather than fiction,” he began confidently, but began to falter as his expression quickly wilted under Victoria’s deprecating gaze. “But yes, you’re right. Seeking spells ought to necessitate a medium to attach a magical conduit to the ritual’s target.”

“You mean to say that this entire bloody ritual,” Victoria said, winter in her voice as her gaze roved about the scene of carnage all around us. She gestured toward the pile of headless corpses, including latest victim’s head which was still dripping with blood. “This whole ordeal was meant to power a simple seeking spell?”

“I wouldn’t qualify anything in the realm of sorcery as simple, but yes,” Dexter nodded in response, but then his brow crumpled up in puzzlement. “You remember that weird flaming skull? Maybe that was meant to be the beacon that would lead to the target. Though I don’t understand why it misfired.”

“Wait, let’s look at the facts before we draw conclusions. The necromancer was obviously ecstatic about whatever results the spell wrought,” Victoria pointed out. “That wasn’t the gaze of someone who’s sacrificed god knows how much for a misfired spell.”

“But the only visible result of the spell was that flaming skull,” Dexter said wonderingly. “And it flew straight towards..”

Suddenly, both Dexter and Victoria’s eyes turned to stare at me, the former with vague hints of suspicion while the latter was filled with concern and even a hint of fear.

“In fact,” Dexter continued, and suddenly his eyes didn’t seem as friendly anymore. “The necromancer specifically stated that they’d been scouring the farthest corners of the world for you.”

“Stop,” Victoria said, holding up her hand, but for once Dexter ignored her and kept going.

“He was looking straight at you,” he said to me, his eyes narrowing into slits. “Not Alexia Fox, the Angel of Death, but you, Kaizer Lee. And there was no mistaking the satisfaction in his voice as he said that you’d delivered yourself to his feet. Now, what is this truth, this secret that would shake the foundations of the world?”

“Knock it off,” Victoria said, stepping in front of me and glaring at Dexter. “You’re jumping to conclusions.”

“Then what about you?” Dexter said slowly, carefully enunciating each word. “Victoria, I never thought I’d say this to you, but you’re clearly letting your feelings cloud your judgment. There’s clearly more to him than what he’s told us. Step away from the suspect.”

“Enough,” Victoria said, her tone final. “You don’t want to push me on this, Kelly.”

The two stood there facing each other in silence, the tension so thick in the air, you could have cut it with a knife.

I wanted to step in, I really did. However, Dexter’s accusations brought into sudden and painful relief all the questions that had been bombarding my own head this entire time. Just what was I? Did I truly become a mindless killing machine at Allie’s side? Then where did she go? What terrible battles did she wage, how many unspeakable horrors did she commit, and just how much did she sacrifice, all in order to bring me back? And in the end, did she succeed? Was I really myself? What am I? Craving flesh and blood, ripping parking meters from the asphalt with my bare hands, feeling hollow except for an unquenchable need to find Allie - did I even qualify as a person anymore?

“Victoria, you don’t even know if that’s the Kaizer Lee you remember,” Dexter said. “You don’t even know if he’s human, for crying out loud.”

“You’re right,” Victoria admitted calmly. There was a firmness to her next words that brooked no contention, however. “But no matter what, some things never change.”

Dexter held Victoria’s gaze for a long time before he finally dropped his gaze, his shoulders slumping in defeat as his entire figure deflated.

“I suppose so. I suppose some things can never change.” There was a bitterness to his voice as his words trailed off, as though he’d been expecting differently, and still was. “Hell, of all people, I should know.”

Victoria didn’t say anything else. She seemed to acknowledge his words with that silent pause. Then she finally turned around to face me.

“Are we done here?”

I’d expected an entirely different sort of question. Hell, I deserved a goddamn inquisition. But Victoria just looked at me with eyes that shone with such clarity that it was impossible to find even the shadow of doubt within their pristine depths.

This kind of open-handed acceptance flying contrary to the demands of logic and even sanity, it was a gift that I didn’t deserve. It punched another hole straight into my heart, right next to the silent tally I’d borne for all these years.

I now knew this was a tab that I would never be able to repay.

So instead, I hugged all the hurt into my chest and steeled myself, nodding curtly.

“Yes, we are.”

Just three words, cold and emotionless. I couldn’t offer anything else.

“Then let’s get moving.”

She didn’t ask.