Chapter 35: Into the Hive

The Hydra squads were attacking the target dead zone from the south, coming up Franklin Ave in an arrow formation, with the Golem triad following right behind. The avenue was a one-way street with traffic heading south, cars parked bumper to bumper along each shoulder, trees growing out of dirt plots in both sidewalks, the buildings three stories tall, ground floors boasting salons and liquor stores, restaurants and fenced off stoops leading up to old brownstone entrances.

It was 12:52 PM, and the demon symbol burned four blocks up ahead, revolving as ever in its wreath of purple flame, malefic and dire.

One more block to go.

James lifted his radio. “Hydra is in position, one block south of target, over.”

“I read you, Hydra,” said Richard from the command center in the Marriott. “Hold your position till I give you the green light, over.”

James rolled his shoulders. The fire-axe felt light in his hands, and he wished he had a spear, the rebar, even, but there hadn’t been time to scrounge up something fitting. Crimson Hydra came to a stop just behind him, with Ebon on the left side of the street, Ivory on the right. He heard the Crimson Golem team leader radio in.

Almost time.

It was clear the Nemesis 2’s had been busy. Only a block away James could see them moving along the southern facades of the three-story buildings, working on a pink wall that partially extended across the street, some tenuous strands already connecting, other segments nearly completed. The wall gleamed, but in the manner of porcelain, not slick meat; whatever the Nemeses did to human flesh, the result was hardened and stiff.

“I can see about a dozen of them,” said Serenity, her new IWI Tavor X95 bullpup rifle raised so that she could sight down the length of its Smite-burning stubby barrel. “They’ve either not noticed us or simply don’t care we’re here.”

“Their mistake,” said Becca Locklear, the private security guard with the Bushmaster rifle. Her tone was proud, callous, cold.

Bjørn the CFO guy was standing just behind their front rank. “What are they doing? Building a wall? Forming a castle of sorts?”

“Impossible to say.” James took a deep breath. “And it doesn’t matter. Whatever they’re doing, we’re going to tear it apart.”

“All triads prepare to move in on my mark,” came Richard’s voice over the radio. “Three. Two. One. Advance.”

“Bless Green,” said James. Another of Richard’s innovations. Green meant the Blessers should hit everyone with a generalized +2. Bless Red meant they should each target their +5 Bless to one of the Smiters, with the pairings designated ahead of time. Bless James, or any other single member name meant all three should concentrate their +5 Bless on that member alone, giving the target a stunning +15 across the board.

Bjørn, Jason, and Yadriel hit the team with Bless Green. The wash of power was intoxicating as every aspect of his being was enhanced, his reserves doubling, his strength and explosive power deepening, his body growing light and almost febrile with nervous energy. James flicked up his stats for a quick review:

Strength: 11 (Bless+6: 17)

Stamina: 5 (Bless+6: 11)

Speed: 6 (Bless+6: 12)

Agility: 5 (Bless+6: 11)

Power: 10 (Bless+6: 16)

“Oh, that’s good,” breathed Serenity, and visibly shivered. “Agility 27.”

Now what the hell would that feel like?

James strode forward with grim deliberation. He sensed his team moving with him, and then peripherally Ebon and Ivory Hydra behind, followed by the three Golem teams. Fifty-four high ranking killers. Fifty-four of the most advanced fighters that had survived the apocalypse thus far, with another nineteen such groups advancing on the dead zone from all points of the compass.

James resisted the urge to grin, to walk faster.

Serenity had the bullpup at her shoulder, hands cradling it, gazing up the block with the stubby rifle. Becca had her Bushmaster up, Smite activated, her posture almost identical to Serenity’s though her rifle was nearly twice the length.

“Permission to engage, boss?” asked Serenity.

“Let ‘em know we’re here.”

Serenity glanced sidelong, gauging something, and James only understood what when she started firing and brass cartridges started flying out the side, passing right behind James to ring out on the street.

The Tavor wasn’t automatic, but Serenity’s rate of fire was still remarkably accelerated; she began to aim and unload on the distant Nemesis 2’s, the echo of gunfire sharp and loud in the narrow street and joined by the report of other guns from all around the dead zone.

Becca didn’t have Deadeye, so she waited calmly as they continued to advance, and soon enough Nemesis 2’s leaped to the ground, their agility unnatural, insectile in their grace, and began rushing down the block toward them, scythe-arms raised.

James half-expected her to unleash a hailstorm of lead, but at first Becca was as precise as Serenity, squeezing off her shots, aiming for the white masks, drilling neat little holes in each, cartridges ejecting rapidly from the side of her gun.

They kept on advancing, the sound of gunfire now ubiquitous, both Serenity and Becca walking slowly and firing with care, each Nemesis taking about half a dozen carefully placed Smite rounds to the mask before dropping, limbs sprawling, large abdomens and thoraxes crashing to the ground.

“Shields, eyes on our flanks,” James called, fingers rippling on the fire-axe’s haft. “Let’s avoid surprises.”

Half a block to go. The Tavor’s mag just dropped out of the gun when emptied, and Serenity drew a new one from a vest pocket, slammed it home, and resumed drilling.

“Yo, I got a level,” said Denzel.

“Same,” said Bjørn, surprise evident.

James kept stealing glances at both women. Where Becca was solid professionalism, her braid dancing on her back as her shoulders absorbed the recoil, Serenity was laser-focused lethality, her bullpup having virtually no recoil, its muzzle swinging to and fro as she found new targets and hit them.

“Look sharp now,” James called out. The pink wall segments were right up ahead.

Don’t think about what they’re made of.

“Level,” called out Joanna triumphantly.

“Same here,” said Jason, his voice quiet, intense.

But there wasn’t time to figure out what was going on. Both women had dropped at least a dozen of the Nemesis 2’s, their precision and head shots doing more damage than Delvecchio’s spraying.

They reached the alien wall. It rose the height of the three stories, was perhaps a few inches thick, and its surface was swirled and variegated in hue, ranging from salmon pink to deeper dappling’s of umber, while here and there were white, fibrous streaks that could have been liquefied bone. Its bumps and whorls were set, and in a sudden rush of anger and disgust, James raised his axe and stutter stepped forward to swing at the closest edge that reached across the block to the other side.

He swung, two-armed, and the axe-head bounced off as if he’d swung at a stone wall. Hands burning, arms buzzing with the impact, James frowned, stepped back, and activated Smite.

Gray flames licked down the length of his axe, and when he swung this time a huge chunk of the wall shattered off into large flakes.

“Here they come!” said Bjørn, his tone calm but tense. “Looks like a wave.”

Nemesis 2’s were boiling out of the surrounding buildings, their legs blurring, their bodies inky black, their sneers universally sadistic. They scuttled forth like a kicked hornet’s nest, out of doorways and windows, emerging from all the buildings contained within the perimeter.

Becca shifted to full auto; the Bushmaster suddenly roaring in a staccato blur as she targeted Nemesis after Nemesis. Serenity fired even quicker, slammed another mag home, kept taking down the enemy as they came - but there were too many.

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“I begin,” said Sarah, and even over the gunfire James heard her whisper. A complex circle began to burn white around the floor, overlapping the road’s tarmac, glowing under parked cars, flowing over and onto sidewalks, three or four yards in radius, encompassing everyone as they fell back.

The circle was… gorgeous. Faint curtains of white light rose from the curling lines, shifting and rising and falling as they moved with Sarah, and James wanted to study its complex patterns.

But now was not the time.

Shimmering shields of force appeared on their flanks, angled to push Nemesis 2’s into a funnel before their moving circle, appearing here, waiting for a demon to hit it, then flickering away once the demon’s course was corrected to guide another.

The first demons hit the circle’s outer edge and slammed to a stop, their scythe-arms carving at the air, scoring deep grooves in the white light that arose from the ground, but which healed over time and again as their blows bounced off.

But Sarah was forced to a halt; she leaned forward, grimacing, but couldn’t force the dozen Nemesis 2’s that had gathered before her back.

Both women slammed in more mags.

“Level,” shouted Denzel again.

Your rank is now Supplicant 3

You have 5 unspent points.

“Fucking hell,” whispered James, summoning his sheet and quickly spending his points on Arete, bringing to 45 and his Aura to Level 8. “All right. My turn.”

He stepped forward, right up to the now constantly burning white circumference of the protective circle and swung his axe, activating Sacred Strike.

A blast of white flame washed over the four closest Nemesis 2’s who were packed so closely together they fell under his attack. For a second they were little more than shadows in that flaming glory, and then they collapsed, and the circle moved another yard forward before hitting more resistance.

James activated Smite, went to hack those Nemesis 2’s that scuttled in, but his aura blazed forth, resplendent and bright gray, washing over the demons at a distance of eight or nine feet, and immediately they began to burn like sheets of paper held too close to a living flame. Their exoskeletons began to grow dull, to turn gray, their limbs curled in upon themselves, their legs buckled, and they shrieked and threw themselves forward, only to bounce off the white wall.

“Can’t hold much longer,” gasped Sarah.

James glanced around rapidly. The shields had failed to keep the demons away from their flanks. Behind them Ebon and Ivory were facing smaller numbers without the aid of the Protective Circle and advancing more slowly for it.

By far most of the Nemesis 2’s were targeting Crimson Hydra, but even as James looked, he saw more of those in the backrows peel off to attack the less protected prey.

“Fuck it.” James inhaled deeply and threw himself into where the demons were thickest, swinging his axe and unleashing another Sacred Strike. Another four Nemesis 2’s died, and more fell upon him, only to begin immolating on his bright aura.

James strode forward, the demons before him losing their vigor and speed, hacking with abandon, his Smite cutting and shearing the demons apart.

While the aura torched them, it didn’t kill them outright; they kept trying to slash at him, falling forward, and were it not for the shields that kept popping up on his sides James would have been cut apart several times over.

A burst of bullet holes appeared in the mask of a demon to this right. James ducked around it and hacked another demon in the neck as his aura washed over it, then stutter-stepped back and buried his axe’s head in third demon’s chest.

Your rank is now Supplicant 4

You have 5 unspent points.

“Yes!”

James poured the points into Arete. His Aura bounced up to 9, and his mystical pool of divine strength grew.

He wanted to laugh. He felt himself a god of vengeance. Unstoppable. Black ichor splashed across him, and his aura extended outward now ten feet in every direction, bathing Nemesis 2’s before they could even close, causing them to crack and fall apart, their joints shattering, their arms swinging wildly, their masks going black.

James pointed his axe toward one concentration and unleashed his third Sacred Strike. Turned his axe as if it were a shotgun and unleashed a fourth.

Another seven or eight Nemeses died.

“Fucking level!” shouted Denzel.

“Level,” called out Becca, not looking up from her gun. “Taking Dark Vision. Done.”

“Supplicant 1!” Joanna punched a fist into the air. “Taking Remove Fear.”

“Level,” whispered Yadriel, words carrying like a wind blowing through a cemetery. “Dark Energy Siphon.”

And black mist began to flow from the closest handful of Nemeses toward his outstretched hand, condensing into a thick stream as it disappeared into his palm.

James paused, shoulders heaving, and saw Yadriel’s eyes turn jet black, sclera and iris both.

“Oh,” he gasped, and then he laughed, the sound close to being unhinged. “Oh…yes.”

And he leaped out of the protective circle, bounding forth with the same flea-like spring of the nemeses, to fall upon the closest demon, his baseball bat swinging and catching the demon across the chin.

Its mask shattered, its head wrenched around, and it fell in a jumble of segmented limbs to the ground.

No aura, though, James realized, as Yadriel fell into a neat crouch. The kid had no aura at all.

“Second wave!” shouted Bjørn.

James looked up. More Nemeses were racing down the center of Franklin Avenue toward them, hundreds of them, coming in a tide of oily black limbs and white masks, leaving a central pink structure they’d been building under the demonic symbol.

“Come on then!” laughed Yadriel, rising and spreading his arms wide. “Come see the true meaning of fear!”

And he burst into a sprint, racing toward the oncoming tide.

“Yadriel!” roared James and ran after him.

The kid leaped even as scores of Nemesis 2’s leaped at him in turn. Yadriel extended his hands, drew black mist from a half-dozen of them, his laughter rising till one slashed him across the stomach as it flew by, disemboweling him.

He fell and disappeared into the mass of demons.

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