Shadow of a Doubt Read online

  Locke didn’t say anything else as he gently set the armful of artifacts on the edge of the bar, as if he were handling priceless china.

  “How’s the Swede?” Locke asked, breaking the tension and changing the subject. He nodded to the now unconscious paladin that had begun breathing in a deep, slow pattern. There was a pile of dull iron rods that were coated in blood and even some flesh. It made me shudder to imagine Oberon slowly sliding dull rods into Ludvig’s flesh to get answers. I admired the Hunter as I admitted to myself that I wouldn’t have made it to half the stack had our situations been reversed. I would have been singing like Whitney Houston.

  “Asleep. He’s going to make it,” Val said as he turned to face where Ludvig rested. A single tear had run down his cheek, and he wiped it away quickly. “All the rods have been removed, so now all we need to do is give him a blood transfusion and let him heal.”

  “I know just the place!” I said excitedly. I looked to Depweg, who caught my meaning, and we began to move.

  Depweg grabbed the huge, unconscious Ludvig under his knees and just below his neck as everyone made their way outside. I turned to regard Valenta, who watched me with crossed arms and a look of sorrow across his face. I went to open my mouth, thought better of it, and turned to join the others.

  As I pushed open the doors, Val called from behind, “John.”

  I turned while keeping a hand on the door.

  “Yeah?”

  “Do ’em proud. Ya hear?” he said, his Southern drawl returning.

  I tried to smile while nodding, but could tell it was only a mere stretching of my lips. My eyes remained unaffected, heavy with the burden Val had just laid at my feet.

  Once in the parking lot, everyone removed their rifles, shottys, and all other long-barreled weapons and placed them in the back near the turret. It would have been uncomfortable to have them strapped on while seated. We loaded the unconscious giant of a man into the passenger seat of Depweg’s Hummer and piled in. Once again, I sat at the turret while Depweg drove. Magni sat behind Depweg so he could keep watch over his master. Locke sat just behind the Swede.

  “Joey coming?” I asked.

  “Better to give him some time,” Depweg said as he pushed the button, bringing the Hummer to life.

  “I don’t think he should be alone,” I responded.

  “I don’t either,” Depweg confided. Something about Joey whispered in my mind, something I was supposed to remember, but Depweg broke my train of thought as he said, “I also know he shouldn’t be in a vehicle with the person he deems responsible for his brother’s death.”

  A dark feeling crept over me that made me momentarily dizzy. “You mean…me?” I asked, terrified of the response.

  Depweg thumbed toward the unconscious Lude, whose bandages were starting to soak through. I could smell them from the back of the Hummer. At the realization of who Depweg had meant, relief washed over me, and I let out a breath I had been holding. In my reprieve, I let my thoughts wander the wastelands of my mind to find what I needed to remember about Joey.

  “John,” Depweg started somberly as he looked into the rearview mirror. “I can’t say whether or not Joey blames you, too.”

  A dagger pierced my heart at the thought I was to blame for the incalculable anguish Joey was experiencing at this very moment. I knew his pain all too well, and to be responsible for someone else to feel that was nearly more than I could bear right now.

  As Depweg pulled the beast of a ride onto the road, I looked at the back of Magni’s head, feeling the weight of Joey’s pain stack on top of what I had done to this kid in front of me. My chest felt dark and cold where my heart was, and I promised myself I would make things right with both of them.

  “John,” Locke said, turning in his seat to better face me. “It’s not your fault what happened to him. Don’t blame yourself.”

  “What makes you think I blame myself?” I asked, faking normality. My voice betrayed me as it cracked a little.

  “Your silence,” Locke responded, staring right into my eyes. I felt as if he were reading my soul. “It wasn’t your fault. Joey will be fine, with time. All you can do is be there for him and endure his anger.”

  The dagger that had been in my heart retracted slightly as Locke spoke.

  “He’s right, John,” Depweg added as he turned onto the highway, glancing into the rearview mirror periodically as he spoke. “I only told you the truth that, in his pain, Joey might blame more than just Ludvig for what happened. It’s normal.”

  “What if he’s right?” I asked, defeat in my voice.

  “Cut that shit out, right now,” Depweg said, stern eyes piercing my soul from the rearview mirror. “Get your head on straight. We have an entire fucking world to save.”

  I let his words seep into my brain and marinate.

  “You’re right,” I said, wiping snot from my nose from the tears that I had refused to let out of my eyes. Instead, they had opted for the back exit to the outside world.

  “And don’t pull that kind of shit again, like with the pebble portal,” he added.

  “Didn’t have much of a choice,” I said.

  “Explain what happened, then,” Depweg demanded through building agitation.

  I recounted the events after I had thrown the pebble, starting with Lolth turning into the giant lizard thing and then the wave of self-sacrificing Shadow Fae that had been determined to tear us apart. They had almost won until…

  “So, ah, thanks for throwing the portal at us,” Locke said, breaking my pitfall of a thought. Depweg didn’t say anything, and I knew he knew I had done the right thing.

  I continued, leading up to destroying the throne that had powered the black hole. Then being tossed into the abyss.

  “So the black hole can’t grow stronger,” Depweg said to himself. “That’s a positive, at least.”

  “Except for the fact that we have no way of shutting it down now that it is self-sustained,” Locke added in annoyance. Glass half full, meet glass half empty.

  “We will figure something out,” I threw out, completely at a loss of what we could do to stop a fucking black hole from swallowing all the light from the sun that was destined for Earth.

  “I’m all ears,” Locke said facetiously.

  “You’re about to be missing those ears if you keep talking back, young man,” I said while lightly flicking the back of one ear.

  He smacked my finger away as I did and turned to glare at me. His adult head on a ten-year-old body was morbidly funny to me. It was like a really good CGI effect from a movie.

  We rode in silence as we drove closer to Doc Hunt’s clinic. I could hear the gears in our collective brains straining to figure out a solution to the impossible problem.

  Depweg slammed on the brakes in a squeal of rubber on asphalt. The Hummer pulled to one side as it lurched to a stop. Luckily, everyone was wearing their seat belts—Oh, right. There wasn’t a seat belt in the turret, and my face raced to kiss the back of the minigun. My angelic helmet sprang into existence, stopping most of the force against my skull. I was both impressed and confused at how something that was so tightly fitted to my head could mitigate the impact. It wasn’t like it was full of padding like a motorcycle helmet.

  “What in Lilith’s name was that?” I called out, gripping both sides of my head.

  “We have company,” Depweg fretted quietly.

  I squinted to see past the turret and out the windshield. What I saw would have made a lesser man pee his pants.

  As the warmth spread down my leg, I popped the hatch, and the turret platform sprang through the top of the Hummer. The roof that had separated cleanly at the middle acted as a bullet-resistant armor on either side of the turret.

  Purple eyes shifted to crimson as my fangs grew. The scene around me lightened with the change, as if illuminated by daylight, and I could see everything clearly.

  I turned the minigun to face the wall of Shadow faeries in front of us. Mixed with them were
the drow—dark-skinned elves that were very much corporeal compared to their Shadow buddies. And oh, goodie! Behind the army of Fae were monstrous demons ranging in size from very small houses to very large houses.

  The rest of my angelic armor shimmered into life as I sighted a swirling mass of shadow on the ground at the front of the line. Lolth dramatically climbed from the abyss—bulky arms shooting up before slamming onto the ground—to stand at the head of her army. I rolled my eyes at her showmanship.

  “Come on, then. Ol’ Painless is ready,” I whispered as I released the safety on the minigun. The electric barrel started spinning with a high-pitched whine, ready to send silver-tipped freedom seeds to the enemy. God bless America.

  Lolth smiled her Cheshire grin—stunning me in her confidence—as waves of darkness on either side of the road rushed to the center and toward the Hummer. They were as long as the eye could see and closing in. Streetlights exploded from behind where the wave demolished the poles like an out of control train derailing at Mach speeds . Bursts of black mist wafted into the air where the wave—made of countless shadow bodies—was bathed in the streetlights before their brothers and sisters took out the poles. Just like in the Faerie prison, the Shadow zealots didn’t seem phased by sacrificing their own existence for their mission.

  Without further invitation, Depweg threw the Hummer into reverse and began speeding backward. The electric engine provided immediate torque that got us up to an impressive speed quickly.

  Smoothly pivoting the turret to face the road behind us, I let loose a volley of 7.62mm gunfire at over five-thousand rounds a minute. Every fourth round was a tracer so that I could see where I was shooting, the ammo creating a streak of orange into the darkness that looked like a sci-fi movie laser blast. My hands began to tingle from the vibration of the weapon as I bared teeth and fangs in concentration. The distinct smell of the rounds’ propellant quickly permeated the air around me, morphing my clenching jaw into a delirious smile. I had always enjoyed the smell of gunpowder and cleaning oils; I assumed it was like how women at the mall must feel at one of those candle stores.

  As I focused on the crashing shadow wave directly behind us, I let loose a maniacal laughter that could only come from behind a military-grade death machine. I cleared out huge chunks that went straight through before pivoting the Gatling-style turret to another portion of the oncoming wave. Lucky for me, one round could pierce through the wave from head to tail, as the Shadow Fae had incorporeal bodies that didn’t slow the projectiles. So, effectively, one bullet could take out hundreds of enemies standing in a line, and I had thousands to spare. Tee-fucking-hee.

  The shadow wave approaching from behind realized this and spread out to join the waves on either side of the road. I had effectively cleared a path for us.

  I followed one of the flanking waves and kept firing until I was perpendicular to the Hummer. I could almost hear the shrieks over the constant brrp of the minigun; it made me smile.

  From the corner of my eye, I saw the drow, who had been standing in several rows, begin rushing forward at supernatural speeds that caught me completely off guard. I pivoted the turret with a curse as my smile melted and sighted the chain gun on their rushing position. I pressed the firing buttons with my thumbs, and the weapon burped out enough rounds to cut down a small forest. But the drow continued to bear down on us, gaining ground. Not a one of them fell or exploded into mist.

  “The fuck…” I said as I glanced down at my weapon and back to the approaching drow. At this point, Depweg saw we were losing the race and swung the Hummer around like he was the star of Speedy and Superfluous—or whatever that movie series was called starring that Riddick guy. Cars were never really my thing.

  As he swung us around in a full one-eighty, I was impressed to see the turret kept me pointed toward where I had positioned it.

  We lost some speed in our turn, allowing the drow to get uncomfortably closer, but once again, electric Hummer with megatorque. Depweg slammed on the gas and we rocketed forward. I sighted the gun again and began sending test bursts down the lane. A tracer passed right through one of the sprinting drow, who responded by manifesting a bow and launching an arrow straight at me. It struck my armor center mass and I inhaled sharply in surprise at the force of the impact. I knew what the darkness could do if it got under my skin.

  I was relieved to see my angelic armor had destroyed the arrow on contact.

  “Thank you, Da,” I whispered before focusing my attention on the same drow again. He was notching another arrow as I fired. This time, I held the thumb triggers and kept the gun trained on him and only him.

  We passed where I assumed the wave had first formed, and a bright LED streetlight passed overhead before washing over the drow. At that moment, the silver rounds did their job and shredded the bow fucker into pieces of flesh that flew everywhere like a firecracker inside a meat patty.

  “Light!” I called down into the Hummer. “I can’t attack the dark elves without light!”

  “Got it!” Locke cried out as he climbed over the back seat and into the turret. It was a tight fit, but his tiny body could squeeze into compact spaces.

  He stood in front of me between my chest and the gun, and took out a flashlight from the tactical vest he was still wearing. An almost comically bright beam of light bathed everything in front of the minigun in the blueish tint of the LED flashlight. Without hesitation, I pressed on the thumb triggers and began ripping the drow to itty-bitty dark elf pieces.

  As soon as they realized what was happening, the drow fell back without a word between them. Even their dark faces seemed steady and emotionless. It unnerved me.

  We rode in silence before Depweg slammed on his brakes again. I gripped the minigun to steady myself as Locke flew into me, the flashlight tumbling to the ground below.

  “Son of a…” I said as it rolled into the concrete barrier along the side of the highway, the light flickering before blinking out forever as it shattered into little black plastic pieces.

  I pivoted the turret and saw what had caused the emergency stop. We must have been in an episode of The Twilight Zone because an army of Shadow Fae, drow, and demons was smack dab in front of us, identical to the first.

  I didn’t wait for them to rush. Pressing the trigger, I sent hundreds of rounds in an arc, aiming for the knees of the formidable demons this time. My strategy worked as the heads of Shadow Fae evaporated in a puff and the house-sized demons began bellowing in pain before falling to the ground, clutching at their knees. Another pass, and the rounds tore through their flesh, ending their visit to Earth in the largest pools of melting ectoplasm I had ever seen.

  Drow rushed forward and Depweg turned on the Hummer’s high beams. I mowed down the dark elves who were in front of the vehicle with extreme prejudice. Horror struck as the remaining drow shifted directions and quickly began making their way to the edge of the Hummer’s headlights and then forward, trying to flank us. A small group that had already been near the front of the line made it to the Hummer and began tearing chunks of metal off the vehicle like it was made of popsicle sticks.

  “Locke, take over!” I shouted at him as I leaped from the turret and to the nearest drow. I manifested my flaming gladius and tore through him as if he were made of paper before multiple hands latched onto both of my arms. I struggled and was horrified to see how strong these emotionless dark elves were. Shadows grew from under the Hummer, and featureless monsters grabbed my legs.

  “Fuck!” I cried out as my sanity began to give way to panic. “Someone help!” Even as I said it, I knew no one in that vehicle could do anything to stop what was happening.

  Drow and Shadow Fae alike tried to stab me—with a plethora of different style blades—only to find that my angelic armor was impregnable. It wasn’t going to be long before one tried my exposed mouth or found a space between the plates.

  One of the shadow monsters at my feet morphed into three basketball-sized spiders that scurried up and around my
torso. I cried out in wide-eyed horror as clicking mandibles searched for weaknesses between the armor. I did my best to keep my body rigid to prevent them from sinking their dripping fangs into my flesh.

  “Why is it always spiders!” I cried out.

  I became aware that the chain gun was not spitting silver-tipped rounds downrange and anger started to replace my panic. Then I heard Locke chanting over the chattering of spider fangs and drow blades against armor.

  A ball of light the size of a baseball appeared over the Hummer and began levitating into the air, growing in size as it did. The bigger the sphere became, the more light was spilled over the landscape. The spiders hissed and retreated into the shadow under the Hummer, as did the Fae at my feet. The drow, on the other hand, kept up their goal of piercing my flesh with their hungry blades.

  With my legs freed, I did a wide backflip, yanking the drow attached to my arms with me. As I landed, I tossed them back and brought my blade up to the remaining elves. It sliced through their flesh with ease as I danced in an offensive attack meant for multiple attackers. Heads rolled, limbs fell to the ground, and insides became outsides as my sword struck with unparalleled expertise.

  As the shadows and drow began to move away from the light of Locke’s growing death star, the remaining demons charged forward. Some wielded obsidian weapons while others had claws made out of the Hell stone. I would have to be careful because I knew those would effectively counter my angelic blade. Oh shit, could they pierce my armor? I was determined not to find out as I rushed forward. As I did, a muscle-laden werewolf, eight foot long and weighing over five-hundred pounds, ran alongside me. The demons who had been left standing from my initial volley of rounds charged and tried to encircle us.