Hello future readers! It may come as a surprise, but I managed to survive. We snuck into Denver like ninjas, or maybe some special forces. Well, the gold rankers did. My group and most of the others were little more than distractions. Denver was exclusively controlled by the vampires, as they had killed all other monsters and turned them into puppets.

  I made a light show with my sigil and got their attention. We fought hard, but we had chosen extremely defensible locations so we didn’t have it too bad. Dad on the other hand had to fight the big boss. Well, he showed up exchanged a few blows before fleeing. The boss vamp still died because they left an ICBM in his throne room rigged to blow. (Don’t ask how they got it, I’ve been trying to find out, but no one will tell me.) I guess the Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles need to be added to the list of vampire weaknesses. You know alongside garlic, intersecting lines, and being damp in the right liquid.

  Day 132, Owen Landers

  Bella was exhausted. It had been a long time since she’d felt this way, maybe not since the night she’d stayed up with Sammy at the hospital after her husband was in that car wreck. Back then days had blurred together and sleep had become optional. Even with all the stress, Bella was more than happy to carry her daughter. Sammy was still asleep in her arms, she felt so light now, like she had when she was a toddler.

  She followed Asura as he led them onward. Bella couldn’t see what was supposed to be their tent. At least, that’s what Silas had said they’d be given. So long as she could get some sleep, Bella didn’t care where it was.

  She was surprised by how much the short fight had taken out of her. Bella liked to think of herself as strong, and she was, but thirty minutes of fighting felt like an entire day’s worth of labor. Her muscles burned. Her stamina had flagged long ago, and she’d ignored it, pushed through it, forced herself to keep moving. It was a trait that all competent mothers developed.

  Then it had all ended suddenly. An explosion of debris. No gradual taper like other disasters, no slow winding down as the work came to a close. This had ended in a flash or at least that’s how it felt, leaving all that exhaustion and adrenaline with nowhere to go. It slammed back into her like a wave hitting a wall, rebounding and crashing over her, making it hard to keep her eyes open.

  That fog made her miss the first red flag. Rahul had grabbed Silas and pulled him aside for a conversation. On its own, that wouldn’t have been too strange, but why now? There was nothing so urgent that it couldn’t wait. Whatever Rahul needed to say could have been said later. Still, it wasn’t enough to worry her, not by itself, so Bella followed Asura without comment.

  The second red flag came when Asura veered away from the tents being set up and headed instead toward the wall, where all the restaurants were located. Bella was led through what looked like it had once been a gift shop, though it was hard to tell. The metal shelving units had been torn down, likely melted and reforged into the armor worn by the monsters they’d just killed.

  Asura guided her through the ruined storefront and into what must have been a back room or packing area. Beyond that was a small office. Inside, two beds had been set up. Several fast-food tables had been dragged together with padding stretched across them to form makeshift cots.

  Bella frowned, “I thought you said we were getting a tent.”

  Asura snorted. “Yeah. Evidently, Silas’s abilities scared the boss bad enough that he said you lot needed to be treated well. Otherwise, your friend might drop a building on our heads too.”

  The explanation, strange as it was, sat better with Bella than the idea that they were being helped out of pure kindness. That, at least, she could understand. She nodded and stepped inside, carefully laying Sammy down on one of the padded tables. Sammy didn’t stir, as Bella whispered a small bedtime routine over her. She hadn’t done something like that in months.

  Bella turned around just in time to see Asura close the door. She blinked, a flicker of surprise cutting through her fatigue. Why would he close the door? She placed a hand on the door handle and pushed. It didn’t move. Frowning, Bella applied more force. The knob sheared off in her grip.

  “Asura, what’s going on?” Bella yelled, preparing to knock the door off its hinges.

  “I wouldn’t,” Asura said.

  “Why the hell not,” Bella hissed.

  “Well it would be a waste of the chloroform that we are pumping into the room,” Asura said nonchalantly.

  Bella’s addled mind took a moment to understand what the man was talking about. Once she did, Bella slammed her shoulder into the door. The door groaned, but was far sturdier than it should have been.

  Chloroform didn’t work like the movies, there was no pristine white rag and no instant darkness. It took minutes to take effect, minutes she didn’t have. She’d spent too long tucking Sammy into bed.

  Her shoulder hit again. Solid wood cracked. Bella staggered back and charged once more. The world tilted. Her teeth ground together as she fought the dizziness. Think, she told herself, in a bout of desperation she tried to use Hearth Conserver to make herself more durable. If she could make her body denser or tougher, maybe it would take more of the gas to put her down. It didn’t help. The haze didn’t thin. The room still swam.

  She slammed into the door again. Nothing. Something was braced on the other side, the hinges had already warped inward, screws straining to keep their grip on the door frame, but whatever was holding the door shut was sturdy. It wasn’t Asura, he wasn’t strong enough to stop her. Bella raised both hands. Heat gathered, her palms glowing.

  “I wouldn’t,” Asura said calmly from the opposite side of the door, “There’s a combustible gas in there. You would likely survive the explosion. Your daughter wouldn’t.”

  Bella snarled, the glow on her palms dying away, but punched the door anyway. Her relic knuckles bit into the wood, gouging deep furrows. Her legs buckled. She staggered sideways and collapsed to her hands and knees, lungs burning.

  Why? Why couldn’t she save her daughter? Sammy lay peacefully on the bed, unaware, chest rising and falling in soft rhythm. Bella tried to stand and failed. Her vision tunneled as the door finally swung open.

  A man stepped inside, dragging two metal tanks fitted with masks. Likely canister filled with more chloroform. He wore a smirk.

  “You know,” he said lightly, “I lied about the explosive gas.”

  Bella reached for him and couldn’t close the distance. Her body betrayed her. Willpower wasn’t enough to overcome this kind of sleep.

  ?

  -Silas-

  Silas’s breathing turned ragged. Across the room, Rahul watched him carefully.

  “What do you mean?” Silas demanded. “You said this was about your people. You just want more power and are willing to sacrifice innocent people to do it.”

  “No, I am a patriot first and foremost,” Rahul replied. “I saw a way to improve the capabilities of my nation and I took it. On the scale of nations, three lives are quite cheap.”

  Silas felt something cold bloom in his chest.

  “You gave me a leash and a reason to grab it,” Rahul continued. “Your friend and her daughter are sedated and vulnerable. Cooperate, and they remain unharmed. Refuse, and I will hurt them, not kill them. That would lose me any control I would have, at least until we can find your wife as a more permanent solution.”

  Rahul stood and walked toward the door. “So. Do I have your cooperation? Is it really so bad to stay here and make weapons?”

  Silas’s thoughts spiraled. He wouldn’t get home. Bella and Samantha were hurt because of him. Abby might die because of him. No, not because of him. Because of Rahul. His hands shook. Rage bubbled up, familiar and ugly. The same rage that had once caused him to break his hand in his first days in Hell. His breathing hitched into hyperventilation.

  Silas muttered a mantra he hadn’t chanted in a long while, “Survive. Get home. Find Abby.”

  Again. Again.

  Rahul frowned, “You’re not in the right headspace at the moment. I’ll return later.”

  He opened the door. A switch flipped in his mind. Silas had once sworn he’d walk through rivers of blood to get home. It had sounded noble then. Now it was time to live up to those words.

  A portal bloomed just on the opposite side of the door Rahul was stepping through. The man stepped through and reappeared on the other side of the small room, directly in front of Silas.

  Rahul’s eyes widened. Silas surged forward and seized him by the jaw.

  “What are you—”

  Silence punched him mid-sentence. The spiked knuckles on his gauntlet tore into Rahul’s throat. Rahul clawed frantically at his hand. The commander was stronger than Silas by a bit, he likely had a four in his body stat. However, strength didn’t matter when panic dictated movement. He guarded his neck, exactly as Silas knew he would.

  In a panic, Rahul shoved Silas back. The move would have sent him rolling if they weren’t in such a small office. Silas let his back hit the wall and used it to rebound back at Rahul. Anger ruled him now, more completely than the crows ever had.

  Rahul drew a kukri, lifting it defensively. Silas stepped to the side, into a portal, and emerged beside him. Rahul reacted too slowly, unused to the looped space that portals could create. Silas stomped down on the back of Rahul’s knee.

  Bone cracked and Rahul collapsed.

  Silas planted a foot between Raul’s shoulder blades, drew the man’s second knife, and drove it through the base of his skull. He twisted and pulled it free. A notification chimed somewhere in Silas’s mind. He ignored it.

  He stepped over the corpse and left. A guard stood on the other side of the portal, pounding uselessly at the shimmering purple surface. He shouted something in Hindi, but Silas didn’t care.

  Silas grabbed him by the arm and yanked him close. The guard reached for his pistol. Wrong choice, he was far too close to use anything other than his hand. Silas’s dagger punched through his heart. He shoved the body aside.

  They wanted to fight him? Fine, he was a soldier, that was in the job description. However, the moment they tried to stop him from getting home they became obstacles. The moment they touched Bella and Samantha. That was the moment they stopped being people. They became beasts.

  Silas moved through the restaurant, killing two more guards before entering the terminal once more. Blood was everywhere from the battle, so no one noticed that his was a bit fresher than it should be. Almost no one.

  Been Ras froze when he saw him. “What did you do?”

  Silas met his gaze with empty eyes, “Nothing.”

  Been Ras frowned, “Then where’s Rahul? Did you agree to his…”

  Silas moved as soon as Been Ras confirmed his involvement. Vitality surged, carrying him faster than a normal body could move. Been Ras reacted well, his military training kicking in, but Silas saw everything before it happened. The foot shift, the arm dip, the knife being drawn.

  Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

  If everything went along its natural course, Been Ras would push aside Silas’s arm with his palm. As Silas’s dagger pushed harmlessly past his face Been Ras would reciprocate with an almost undodgeable stab of his own.

  Silas slowed his thrust forcing the palm-heel block to catch the blade’s edge. Silas leaned into it, slicing through Been Ras’s hand to the bone. To his credit, Been Ras didn’t let the pain slow him. He still thrust with his own blade. Silas pivoted, the knife scraping a shallow groove across his armor instead of flesh.

  Silas whipped his arm back and carved across Been Ras’s throat. The soldier’s eyes went wide and for the second time, Silas watched a man panic over a destroyed throat. Silas kicked him onto his back and kept walking.

  Every IDF soldier in the room stared at Silas in horror. Silas didn’t care, taking a deep breath he yelled, “You have taken my friends. Find them, or die.”

  The soldiers didn’t hesitate and opened fire. They had limited ammo and were tired, but still were very accurate. Silas opened a portal in front of himself in the nick of time. To his surprise, the aperture started destabilizing under the gunfire. So using it as a shield was not always going to work.

  Could Silas kill the one hundred or so remaining soldiers? Not directly, but yes. Another portal blazed to life behind him, highlighting the wall in a vibrant purple glow. This one was much larger, being as big as Silas could make it. Silas knew how far the hallway to this terminal was. He also knew approximately where all the other ones were, assuming they were identical.

  The gunfire stopped impacting Silas’s portal shield and started pinging off the carapace of the world's biggest tarantula as it blitzed through the portal. Silas had never considered just how fast tarantulas were. One moment it was in terminal two the next it was in the midst of the soldiers.

  Silas quickly closed his portals, not wanting a second elephant sized creature to arrive. This thing differed from a tarantula in several ways. It had ten legs, not eight, but more importantly, the fur coating its body was made of metal spikes. So mantises weren’t the only source of metal in hell.

  The plus two arachnid killed nearly ten soldiers before any real defenses were mounted. Several tried to get to the fifty caliber guns, however, Silas intercepted them. Most of them were so focused on the spider that they never saw him coming.

  As far as monsters went, the tarantula was on the scarier side. It would dart forward, then balance on four legs while the remaining six blurred. Everything in the area would be battered and crushed before it rushed off again. Once in a while, it would stop to chomp a human before continuing its rampage.

  It was those food stops that ended up killing it. The soldiers had enough time to start shooting at the gaps in the legs while it was still. By this point, Silas was only keeping part of his attention on the battle. He was going through the tents, searching for Bella and Samantha, but they were nowhere to be found.

  Silas moved through the tents, finding no sign of Bella or Samantha. The “tents” were a joke, cloth sheets braced against overturned tables and partitions, all shoved up against the sides of the tanks. For support. They didn’t block the heavy guns or prevent the vehicles from rolling forward if ordered to move, but they did an excellent job of obscuring sightlines. Anyone watching from a distance would see only a maze of shadows and fabric.

  A spire of purple smoke revealed the death and purification of the tarantula. Silas checked how many IDF soldiers were left. There were still around fifty soldiers alive. The spider had been brutally efficient, killing and maiming with horrifying speed, but even then it had only taken thirty or forty before being put down. Silas himself had killed another four or five who’d tried to reach the .50 caliber machine guns during the chaos. That was why he’d opened a second portal and released another spider from the center of the tents.

  He’d considered pulling something through from the third terminal, but dismissed the idea. The soldiers could handle another spider. What lay on the other side of the airport, though, was an unknown. It could be some creature with a strange gimmick, that could wipe out the entire division before anyone figured out how to fight it. Then it would be just him with a likely disabled Bella and Samantha to protect.

  The second spider was smaller, only the size of a pickup truck, instead of the towering, elephant-sized monstrosity that had come before. Gunfire erupted almost immediately. Screaming followed and people began dying again.

  If Bella and Samantha weren’t in the tents, then they had to be somewhere else. Silas lit one of the tents on fire. Flames raced up the cloth, smoke rolling outward and filling the terminal. Anything to break line of sight. Anything to sow more chaos and assist the spider.

  He forced himself to think. Where would Rahul hide them? Rahul had deliberately kept him from seeing where their tent was. If Silas knew, he could portal there instantly. That meant Bella and Samantha were somewhere unexpected, somewhere Silas wouldn’t think to look.

  Unfortunately, rage made logic slippery. Also, he wasn’t confident in outthinking Rahul. So he decided to search everywhere.

  Starting near the hallway leading into the terminal, Silas moved room to room, searching through every one of the storefronts placed along the back of the terminal. The place was enormous, big enough to fit multiple football fields inside. Real football fields, not European ones. That left enough room for a few dozen shops.

  One shop was a bookstore, which surprised him. In a world dominated by biotech, paperback books were practically useless. Most of them were gone probably burned in the monster’s campfires. A few soldiers were hiding inside, having fled from the sudden appearance of the spiders.

  They tried to talk to him. None of them spoke English. Silas killed them anyway. He’d already mentally classified the entire IDF force as abominations. A few frightened followers didn’t change that.

  Next came a fast-food joint, the one they’d stolen barstools from earlier. He skipped it at first, then doubled back. Just because Rahul had been killed in there didn’t mean more rats hadn’t taken up residence. If Bella and Samantha were nearby, they would be in a vulnerable state. Cowards had an unfortunate habit of growing a backbone at the worst possible times.

  He was right. They were hiding behind the counter, shaking so bad that they were barely holding onto their weapons. Silas finished them off and moved on. By the time the soldiers finally brought down the second spider, only one or two dozen of them remained. Silas opened another portal to drip feed them more creatures.

  Something came through though it was not a spider. A pack of wolf like frogs bounced through. He stared for half a second. What the hell are frogs and tarantulas doing in the same cave? They were brightly colored and clearly toxic and just as fast as the spiders. It didn’t matter. Flesh Lord made him much better at dealing with poisoned frogs than armored spiked tarantulas, if the monsters came out on top in the fight.

  He let the conflict blend into background noise as he continued searching. Finally, Silas reached the right place. His blood ran cold.

  “I wouldn’t take another step if I were you,” a calm voice said.

  Silas froze. Asura stood ahead of him, holding Samantha in two of his six arms. The others held a sword and a pistol. The pistol was pressed against Samantha’s head while the blade rested casually on his shoulder.

  Sammantha was unconscious. Silas knew she couldn’t activate her armor sigil and deflect a bullet in that state. He wasn’t sure it was strong enough even if she had been conscious.

  “Take one more step,” Asura said, shaking the girl for emphasis, “and I’ll blow her brains out.”

  Silas said nothing. His father had been in similar situations before. An abusive husband would hold his wife and children hostage. Sometimes words were enough to diffuse the situation. Other times a sniper had to kill the man to save the others. Silas was not in the mood for diffusion.

  Asura smiled faintly. “I always assumed you’d be bad at hostage situations. You Americans are soft, you put too much value on life. We in the real world have to deal with hardship as a part of life. I think it… ”

  Silas opened a portal. It flared open just off to his right. The exit portal snapped open directly in front of Asura’s face, its edge hovering a hair’s breadth from his nose. Silas couldn’t open a portal inside a living being, souls interfered with powers like his, but he didn’t need to.

  While living creatures were off limits, his portal could cleave through mundane items and structures. Like a gun. Asura released a curse and tried to shoot Samantha. What remained of the barrel was no longer aimed at the girl's head, instead the bullet struck the wall beside Silas.

  Before the soldier could move, Silas reached through and grabbed Azura by the jacket, yanking him forward. It was awkward reaching around a hole in space like it was a room divider. Asura was nearly twenty feet away, but the portal bridged the distance instantly. Instinctively, Asura slashed with his sword, aiming for Silas’s wrist.

  The blade bit deep but Silas’s gauntlets had been reinforced beyond reason. They’d taken bites and slashes that should’ve left him crippled. The blade drew blood and bit into bone but it didn’t sever anything.

  Asura had nothing to brace against when Silas jerked him forward again, Asura’s body crossed the portal’s edge. The cut was clean. Asura was severed in half vertically. One half of him collapsed to the floor by Silas. The other, wide-eyed and still clutching Samantha, fell on top of her.

  Silas rushed forward, kicked the body away, and scooped Samantha up. Two fingers pressed against her neck. He sighed in relief when he felt a pulse. It was slow, but strong. He shook her gently, but she didn’t stir.

  He checked her head for injuries before concluding that some kind of sedative was used. Out of spite, he kicked Asura’s remains once more.

  “Don’t threaten my friends,” Silas muttered, “unless you’re ready to die.”

  If Samantha were here, Bella would be too. He found her not long after, prone on the floor, a dark bruise already blooming across the side of her face. Silas clenched his teeth, almost wishing he could revive Rahul just to kill him again.

  A pair of pressurized canisters lay nearby. Without thinking, Silas lifted the mask, pressed it to his own face, and inhaled sharply. A notification arrived just as he expected. Instead of ignoring it, like the rest of today, Silas accepted it.

  Notice: Flesh Lord has resisted the effects of chloroform on your body.

  Silas cursed. If Rahul had gotten the dosages wrong, the effects could be fatal. He looked between Samantha and Bella, fear tightening his chest, and prayed their vitality would be enough to resist the worst of it.

  Silas gently laid them down and paced back and forth through the stock room of the small gift shop. There wasn’t much he could do beyond keeping them safe. He considered his options and the pacing helped him organize his thoughts.

  What else was there to do? When he stopped and really thought about it, the solution was obvious. In the end, did it matter if every soldier at the airport died? As much as he wanted them dead, his goals had already been achieved. His anger was still demanding that he act, but with Bella and Samantha in his possession, he no longer needed to fight.

  Outside, gunfire still echoed faintly as the remaining soldiers fought the frogs he’d released. The sound was distant now, background noise. Silas had wanted an airplane. Rahul had promised him one, but it was painfully clear Rahul had never intended to keep that bargain.

  Even if Silas did take an airplane, the odds of finding someone who actually knew how to fly a plane were close to zero. Anyone capable of doing that would almost certainly be in the IDF and Silas doubted they’d volunteer after he killed their leader.

  So, was there any reason to stay? He couldn’t think of one. Sure, he might be able to grab sigils, but those were easy to get later. Easy compared to everything else he’d already done. Once he’d settled on his decision, Silas opened a portal this one a mile away.

  He took three trips. One to make sure a monster hadn’t taken up residence in his bus. Then another to bring the others through. He laid Bella and Samantha across the seats of the bus, adjusting them carefully, then moved to the driver’s seat and closed the portal behind him.

  Taking a moment, he went through his notifications.

  Notice: You have pushed Flesh Lord beyond its limits in an attempt to resist the control of Corvus Dominus. Flesh Lord has advanced to the new baseline. Your wisdom has increased to reflect this.

  Notice: You have demonstrated mastery of Flesh Lord by using it to defeat the control of Corvus Dominus. Flesh Lord has advanced to the new baseline. Your wisdom has increased to reflect this.

  Notice: You have used Portal Manipulator actively as a weapon. Due to the new application, it has advanced

  It was a good haul for one day's worth of work. He knew the crows were bad, but two ranks in Flesh Lord confirmed it. Still, it wasn’t enough. If there was one thing Rahul had taught him, it was that he was not yet strong enough. A lack of strength was the reason why Rahul felt safe in threatening Bella, Samantha, and Abby.

  The drive back was uneventful, mostly due to Silas skipping most of the distance. Instead of stopping at the gates or dealing with guards, Silas simply drove straight through a portal into the parking lot. The sudden arrival startled a few soldiers, but with radios down, the IDF had no idea what had happened between Silas and Rahul.

  “Any word from our people?” one of the IDF soldiers asked, shifting anxiously when Silas exited the bus.

  Silas looked at him coldly. Just because the man hadn’t been there didn’t mean he wasn’t affiliated with those who were. He shrugged. “They took heavy casualties, but they managed to take control of the airport. Last I saw, they held one terminal and were still clearing monsters from the others.”

  It was technically true. The soldier nodded grimly and hurried off to spread the word. Maybe, with more time, Silas would’ve cared that what he’d said was extremely cruel. However, he wasn’t there yet.

  He found Aaron and Mandy and moved them into the van. Both were still awake. When they saw Silas’s expression, neither of them asked questions.

  Before leaving, Silas raided the IDF’s pantry. They had moved most of their food there to keep it from being stolen, but now they were leaving and there was no reason to leave it. His four passengers could enjoy their Twinkies while they crossed half a continent.

  Silas climbed into the driver’s seat and pulled away. He skipped the outer wall with a portal and kept driving. The sun crested the horizon, spilling pale light across the highway. Silas realized his route passed directly by the airport the one they’d just destroyed.

  From the outside, it looked… untouched. Sure the windows in terminal three were cracked, but that was the only sign of the conflict that had occurred. Silas had wanted to believe what he’d done mattered, whether good or bad. It had certainly felt important. However, in the grand scheme of things, it was just another unknown room in a forgotten corner of the world. There was a real chance no one, aside from him, would even remember it happened.

  Then he saw the planes or at least what remained of them. They had been torn apart. Deep gouges scored the ground, trenches carved as though something impossibly heavy had slithered through the airport, crushing steel and concrete alike.

  Maybe there was still an intact plane somewhere in that mess. Silas didn’t bother looking harder. The past was the past. As that thought settled, a notice flashed into his vision.

  He checked the road, there was no traffic. One of the few perks of the apocalypse. He glanced back at the message.

  Notice: Fenris, Master of Atrocities and Innocent Bloodshed, approves of your actions. Would you like to receive a blessing from Fenris?

  Warning: Once received you will be sworn to obey Fenris in return for the following: Blessing of Fenris- All sigils can be grown through the act of bloodshed with more progress gained from untainted blood.