Insurmountable
said, “but let’s get the hell out of here first.”
Edward slapped a hand on Boston’s back. “Good to see you, my friend. Glad you all made it.” Edward jumped into the driver’s seat, Boston in the passenger side, and everyone else jumped in back.
As Edward started the van and Boston was about to explain what happened, a boy, maybe twelve years old, barefoot with tattered jeans and a dark-stained white T-shirt, stepped in front of their vehicle, five feet away, gaping at Boston.
“Back up,” Boston said. “Get us out of here.” Boston had a revolver out, but he didn’t think it would matter.
Edward reached for the gear shift, and the boy’s attention fell on him. “Hello, you puppet cunt,” the boy said.
“It’s Zeisule,” Boston said. “GO!” Without taking his eyes from it, Boston reached back and slid a small panel open to the backside. “Hold on, everyone, we’re in trouble.”
Edward shifted to reverse and punched it. The back wheels spun, squealing on the asphalt. The van remained in place as if the wheels were not on the ground, but he could hear they were. The reflection in the side mirror revealed a cloud of smoke wafting from the tires.
“What’s happening?” Amber asked.
The boy continued to stare, smirking.
And then like they had been hit by a car, the whole van rattled and shook.
Edward took his foot off the gas, braked, shifted into drive, and hammered the gas pedal. They roared forward. Edward cranked the wheel left, into traffic.
Zeisule tracked a finger across his throat in a death gesture, pure malice in its eyes as it locked onto Boston.
The van pitched to the right.
“We’re going over,” Boston said. “Hold on to something.” He gripped onto the handle above the door, eyes wide.
Edward gripped the wheel.
The van slammed down on the passenger side, Boston cranking his head away from the potential for glass shattering in his face. He gritted down on his teeth as the van slammed onto the road. Sparks flew and the grinding sound of metal against pavement rattled his teeth. Thankfully, the slide lasted only a couple seconds, the friction stopping them quickly.
Both Edward and Boston had been belted in, but everyone in the back was left to their own devices. Edward and Boston shared a glance, and then peered through the sliding panel opening. Before Boston could assess if everyone was okay, or even ask, both back doors ripped outward, off their hinges, and smashed into a car stopped behind them. One of the doors lodged into the windshield. Nothing stood there, and that sank Boston’s heart and quickened his breath. There were more of Eziel’s kin. There would be no fighting them, nothing they could do to an invisible being that exerted so much strength.
“Is anyone hurt?” Edward asked.
From the back, came Amber’s voice: “We’re all okay, I think. Bruised, that’s for sure, but nothing serious.”
There was no hiding. They had to get out and face whatever awaited them.
The engine continued to run, even though the van had fallen on its side. Edward turned it off and prepared to crawl up through the driver’s side window.
Small holes punctured through the windshield, as the barefoot boy squatted down to make eye contact with Boston. Again, it smiled, like it had heard the best joke of its life. The windshield tore out and skidded across the asphalt.
Vehicles had stopped all around them, and the drivers and passengers jogged toward them, no doubt coming to see if they were okay.
“Everybody out,” Zeisule said, “before you’re dragged out by your face.”
Boston and Edward scrambled out through the opening where the windshield had been. The others came around to join them, everyone no worse for wear.
“Are you all—?” a man approaching asked, cut off before he could finish, his final words bubbling through a slit throat; his head fell back. It had been cut more than halfway through, almost decapitated. His body thudded to the ground.
Screams rose up from those approaching. They backed off but didn’t leave.
“Anyone speaks, other than Boston and I, and you fucking die,” Zeisule yelled. “And any of you try and leave, and I mean anyone, you will die.”
“Who the fuck are you—?” a giant of a man said, disdain in his face at the puny body touting such threats. The man’s head ripped from his body, and then flew into the side of a nearby car door as the dead man’s body fell.
The big man’s body lifted off the ground with the neck stump facing downward, and, like a human highlighter, the invisible Ezielite holding that body drew a massive circle of blood around the crowd that had gathered. Everyone gaped at the bloody trail that encircled them, up over cars, onto the sidewalks on both sides, and back to the starting point near Boston.
“Why are you doing this?” Boston asked Zeisule.
“You know why. We’ll get to you soon enough.” Zeisule walked, facing the wide-eyed audience. “Any one of you steps out of that circle, you die. I shit you not. There’s no sympathy here. Just stay the fuck where you are, shut the fuck up, and you’ll survive… for now.” Zeisule smiled from ear to ear.
Boston glanced at Ash throughout, waiting for him to say something. Ash’s skin had to be crawling at the display before them, his instincts wanting to help, to console, to protect. Boston closed his eyes and let out a slow, controlled breath. His team, and that included Ash now for sure, kept their cool. And so did the crowd, though some of them were likely in shock at what they had witnessed. Of the thirty or so bystanders, half of them seemed frozen in place, unable to move.
Sirens rose in the air, getting closer.
All eyes were on him and the child that contained Zeisule. It approached Boston, getting within inches, and glared up at him.
“Where are they?” Zeisule asked.
“Who?” Boston asked.
Zeisule snapped its fingers and a young woman, maybe eighteen, shrieked a moment later. Her long dark hair was yanked up, her body following. Her feet dangled, legs kicked, and toes grazed the grass.
“Let’s break it down, Codan.” Zeisule snapped its fingers again, and the woman dropped. She moved away from the scene of the assault and sat on the ground, near a blood circle edge, hugging her knees. “Eziel and Sartuish were in that building.” Zeisule pointed to the Nexus tower. “And now they’re not. But there be a bunch of dead Codans, Bos-ton, and not the ones we killed. Dumb twats was helpin’ us, and we wouldn’t have ended them just yet. And”—Zeisule glared at Lorcthe—“here be the cunt traitor herself. We all know you, Lorcthe, and what you did. So, I ask, again, where are they?”
Boston wondered how it could possibly know that, how so much ground could be covered so quickly. They had just left. Had Zeisule, or any other of its kind, seen them, they would have been stopped in their tracks. It’s like they just missed each other, and then, what, Zeisule swept through in seconds?
Boston turned to Lorcthe and shrugged, and she tossed the silver pyramid to Zeisule. Boston’s body tensed when she did. Their lives might soon be over. What would keep such an easily triggered creature from slaughtering every single one of them? They had captured its leader, master, whatever the hell Eziel was to them. It had killed for much less.
“And the other part of the device?” Zeisule asked.
All Boston got from Lorcthe was a shrug.
“Give it to me,” Zeisule said. “Spare me any bullshit you don’t have it, since you just used it. The only reason you’re alive is because of Eziel. We swore none would touch any of you, otherwise there wouldn’t be a single breathing Codan gaping at me right now.”
And there it was, but why? Why did Eziel continue to string their lives along for the horrible ride? Possibly for its entertainment. Eziel was sadistic, after all. Boston reached into a pocket and pulled out the tiny rectangular housing for the pyramid and held it in the palm of his hand, forcing Zeisule to come to him. When it did, Boston didn’t see the innocent eyes of a child, but the dark eyes of malice. It sneered.
“Oh, puppet, I see how much you would love to kill me. Go ahead, kill this boy I inhabit. I would love it, Codan, love the disgust, the judgment that would ensue. It would be glorious.” It tilted its head. “No? I leave it to you. I need this body not much longer. Though, I suspect someone else might want it very soon.” It grinned, remaining in place, forcing Boston to step back as he couldn’t trust himself being so close to it. Eyeballs were on them, and sirens were very close.
As multiple police cars, ambulances, and firetrucks raced in from all directions, screeching to a halt, lights flashing, police yelling, Boston tuned most of it out when Zeisule placed the pyramid in the housing and spun it counterclockwise. Seconds later, a blast of light that reminded him of the Shepherd’s Watch forced him to turn his head and close his eyes from the brilliance.
When the glow subsided, the boy’s body lay on the ground, and Boston knew what was coming. With neither dead body reappearing from the pyramid, that Eziel and Sartuish had inhabited, Boston could only assume the thing ripped spirit or soul from the physical.
As the police moved in, hands brushing the butts of their guns, a whoosh of air whisked by him, and a whisper followed: “You did this.” Even though Boston couldn’t see what said it, there was no question who spoke it.
Every cop grasped at their throats, blood gushing, lost words gurgling, and dropped to the ground twitching and shaking.
Screams, a cacophony, echoed through the street.
“STOP!” Ash yelled. “STOP THIS!”
When Boston’s attention came back to the boy, now standing, a toothy grin met him, and there was no question: Eziel. “Nice try, Codan. You done fucked up.” Eziel’s attention turned to Ash. “And I will not stop, not ever, not until we rule this world. Your lives mean nothing to me or my kin, and I will leave no safe harbor for a Quisling. None of you deserve the life you were given, and I’ll happily take it away.”
“Keep them back,” Ash said. He was on his phone. “Keep them back, I’ll explain later. Do not send anyone else in.”
“Good advice,” Eziel said. “If they do, we will dispatch them sans mercy next time.” Eziel turned to the crowd, a boy in appearance, but he somehow changed his voice to something made of nightmares, a distinct voice that if Boston heard it in a movie he would immediately associate it with the demonic. “Nobody breaks that circle. You do, you die. You speak, you die. You annoy me, or my kin, in any way, you die. Do not let this facade of a boy fool you, nor what you can’t see. I see what you don’t, Codans. I see everything, and there is nothing you can do about it.”
Eziel nodded at something beside Lorcthe. A moment later she struggled as if something held her on both sides.
“Lorcthe,” Boston said, approaching her.
“Oh,” Eziel said, “she’s fine, just holding her in that body.” Eziel had the pyramid device in hand and spun it up.
Whump, whump, whump.
Lorcthe, her eyes tearing up, said, directly to Boston, “Wil-kin-son.”
A golden beam of light shot at her from the pyramid with a sparkling sizzle, and in seconds her body disseminated and floated up the beam. And then the beam ceased. Instead of spinning it up again, Eziel plucked the pyramid out, and tossed both it and the housing in the air. “Poof,” Eziel said, as it raised its hands in the air. Both objects vanished. It had to be one of Eziel’s kin, snapping it out of the air. “I’ll have to settle for eternal imprisonment,” Eziel said. “But you lot? No, I need you to see.”
It approached Boston, eyes black, wagging a finger. “Couldn’t leave well enough alone. Had to come looking, ya dumb twat.”
“Yeah,” Boston said, “I’m such a fool, leaving you to destroy humanity.”
Eziel cackled. “Humanity destroyed itself long before I got here.”
“Spare me a lecture.”
“Oh, I’ll spare you, Codan, but one of yours must die or all die. Pick one.”
“What?”
“PICK ONE!”
“No.”
“Sartuish, kill the firemen.”
Boston held a hand up. “Wait. I…” Boston pulled a revolver, cocked it, and held it under his chin.
“No, no, no fucking way. You don’t get off that easy.”
“You’ll be rid of me. Leave them alone, and I’ll do it.”
“No. You kill yourself, and not only will I torture and kill your friends, I’ll torture and kill every single person in this bloody circle. I will torch them, slice and dice, whatever the fuck tickles my fancy. They will scream and beg for mercy, but there will be none. Pick one and the rest live. My word, Codan, and you best fucking believe I’ll keep it. I always do.”
Boston’s insides roiled, guts clenched. Everything he’d done to protect them had been for nothing. It couldn’t be beat, especially not with its kin there to help it. He glanced up at the night sky, eyes watering, and through the blurriness the quarter moon vanished in a cloudless sky. He wiped a sleeve over his eyes and looked again. The moon was gone, as if something blocked it out. He didn’t dwell, thoughts going to his friends, his only family. His lips quivered.
“Cry, Codan, but it’ll change nothing. Make a decision, right now, or I’ll make you watch what I do.”
Amber shook her head, tears pouring down her face. Ralph hung his head. Jayson glared at Eziel. Krull stared off in the sky, maybe seeing the oddity that Boston witnessed. Ash’s eyes roamed the massacre before them, tears in his eyes. And Edward, stoic as ever, lips pursed, nodded at Boston.
Edward stepped to Boston. “Let it be me, my friend.”
“No,” Boston said, “I-I can’t let that happen.”
Edward put a hand on Boston’s shoulder. “You have to. You know it. Let me go see my wife.”
Boston turned his head away, tears trickling down his face. “Please,” he said to Eziel. “Don’t kill him.”
“Me?” Eziel said. “You have this all wrong. You, and only you, Boston, will end one of yours. You have ten seconds, or things get bloody.”
“It’s okay, good sir,” Edward said. “I’m ready. No regrets. Do not blame yourself, or I’ll come back and haunt you.” Edward smiled.
Boston couldn’t return the gesture. Instead, he gripped the man with both arms that had helped them without a thought of repercussion and held him tight. A gentleman, a beautiful soul, a friend in a world of hate. “I love you, my good friend.”
Edward broke, his chest heaving. “Love you back and always will. This changes nothing. Know we’ll see each other again.” They stepped back and looked at one another. “Know it.”
Boston nodded. “Okay.”
“Enough of this shit,” Eziel said. “Do it!”
“Your time is a-comin’,” Edward said to Eziel. “And it’ll be a doozy of a daisy when it does.”
“DO IT!”
Boston’s body shook. “I-I c-can’t.”
Edward whooshed out a breath. “I’m ready, Boston. Don’t delay. And don’t dwell on me for one moment. Don’t you dare. Get ’em all. Stop this. Promise me.” Edward popped his pipe in his mouth and smiled.
Boston shook his head. “No! Fuck you, Eziel! I fucking hate you! Evil. Vile. Abomination.”
“The feeling is mutual, Codan. Need I remind the consequence of inaction?”
Boston glanced once more at the night sky and then brought out a revolver and cocked it. He looked at Edward. “I promise. I promise I’ll end Eziel and anything or anyone that bows to it.”
“Yes, sure, Codan, good luck. Your promise is meaningless. Your time is well up. DO. IT. NOOOOW!”
As Boston brought up his weapon, Edward closed his tear-filled eyes. “I’ll see you all again, my friends,” Edward said. “No goodbyes.”
Boston’s arm shook. He stepped within inches of Edward, the barrel shaking. The muzzle was so close to Edward’s forehead that it would be almost impossible to miss. If he didn’t kill him on the first shot, and Edward suffered even for a moment, it would crush his soul. He squeezed the trigger through blurred vision, and then fell to the ground with his friend, knees thumping into asphalt, but he didn’t feel it. Boston dropped his revolver, placed his head against the asphalt, palms pressed down, and screamed.