The Theocracy - The Blackened Cross - 37. Chapter 37

At first nothing moved in the murky shadow. Nothing at all. It was as if he was the last man in the world. He stood in the dark with his heart pounding in his chest, every muscle so tight he could hardly breathe. His vision had squeezed down to a single tunnel.

Something moved in the dark. A human figure darting across his field of vision like a bunny. A hysterical peal of laughter that depicted only madness. The figure stopped and turned to look back at him. The exaggerated features of a clown mask grinned back at him through a wild screen of curly blonde hair, and then was gone again when the figure disappeared into the trees. Another figure popped in and out of view from the opposite direction.

Something set off another alarm in his head. He winced. Already he could feel himself sweating from the effort of trying to keep his mind straight. What am I doing? What do I need to be doing right now?

He glanced down at his watch. He almost burst out into tears. Thirty seconds. Only thirty seconds had passed. He still had another nine minutes and thirty seconds before backup got here. Heidi and Little Annie, he reminded himself. They are my priorities. I have to get them out of here.

He turned to face the opposite hallway. The damned thing seemed to lengthen before his eyes, a cruel joke. On legs made of wood, he climbed the stairwell. He almost ran into Heidi who appeared at the top of the stairs with Little Annie in her arms. The girl slept undisturbed with her head resting against Heidi’s shoulder.

Don’t let her wake up, Vanus prayed to whatever benevolent force might be listening. Were there any benevolent beings out there in the great, vast Void? Whatever you do, let her stay asleep. Don’t let her witness this nightmare. Don’t let it change her for the rest of her life.

“Keep a hold of her…”

He almost screamed. A dozen alarms were going off in his head now. He felt his eyes shift within his skull. Clenching his teeth shut before he could make a sound, he gestured for Heidi to follow on his heels. She nodded. In the darkness he could smell the spicy smell of her fear-sweat mingling with his. They were both frightened. At the moment they were all children just trying to find a way to survive this mess.

He led her back to the front of the house. A familiar face waited for them in the driveway.

“Hello, Kaufman,” Leonidas said with a grin. Several human shapes stood around him, their faces covered in shadow. Already Anderson and he had begun to gather recruits for their infernal cause. His lips peeled back from a ferocious grin. “Long time no see.”

Van’s heart convulsed in his chest, struggling to pump blood into the rest of his body. He looked down at his watch.

Seven minutes left.

Distract them. You only have to keep them alive for the next seven minutes.

Vanus cleared his throat, hoping for a casual tone. “What are you doing here, Leonidas?” He scanned the figures before him, searching for another familiar face. He didn’t see one. “I don’t see your partner with you. Does Anderson know you’re here?”

A muscle in Leonidas’ face twitched, but he didn’t stop smiling. “I don’t need Anderson’s permission to do what needs to be done, Kaufman. I’m my own man.”

Something ugly inside Vanus grinned, happy for the opportunity to draw blood if only a little. “When have you ever been your own man, Leonidas? Not since you were thirteen, I bet.”

That was enough to wipe the grin from Leonidas’ face. The man’s eyes flashed with cold fury. “I’m especially going to enjoy when Chagidiel flays you alive, mind, body, and soul.” He tilted his head towards the night sky. “I know you got Anderson’s bitch and her little girl with you. I have no quarrel with them, just you. That’s all Chagidiel wants and that’s all I’ll give him. All you have to do to make this nightmare end for them is give yourself up.”

Clammy fingers clenched around the cup of Van’s elbow. Heidi’s frightened eyes looked up at him, her head shaking from left to right. Whatever she was shaking her head for, he could only guess. He took her hand gently. “Stay by the back door,” he said. He was breathing so hard it was almost impossible just to get the words out. “When you see the flames you run. You run and you don’t look back, you don’t have regrets, you just keep you and your daughter safe? Do you understand?”her hand. "Stay by the back door. When you hear the explosion, you run. You run with your daughter and you don't look back. Back up is on the way. Now go!"

He stepped out onto the porch, his staff in hand. He scanned the faces before him. More of the insane were gathering in front of the cabin from the trees. They carried pitchforks, chainsaws, torches, and signs with the symbol of The Blackened Cross spray painted in black. Leonidas, the instigator, stood at the center of it all. Slowly he fed his mama into his staff. With a push of his will he transferred the power from his staff into the wards surrounding the property. He drew an invisible line between he and himself. "If you want me, you're going to have come and get me."

He grimaced. Due to the charge building up in the wards, the alarms in his head had built into the highest pitch. Blood began to trickle from his ears and nose. The thought of buying time was the only thing that kept him upright.

He wasted a glance at his watch.

Five minutes left.

Too damn long, he thought.

"Get him," Leonidas said.

The mad burst into motion like a pack of rabid animals. They ran in a haphazard line towards the cabin, hooting and hollering with glee. After years of being locked up in the psych ward, they'd been given free rein.

Vanus let go of the charge. The air vibrated once before the front yard exploded in a burst of fire. The ignition scattered clots of dirt, grass, and kicking limbs everywhere. He could feel the heat of it on his skin.

He backed into the house, choking on smoke, blinded by it. A human figure leapt through the chaos, wielding a pair of garden shears. Vanus drove him back with a few blows from his staff. Each impact sent reverberations up his arms.

Another one to the right, another one to the left. They were trying to surround him. Or maybe they were trying to get past him to get to Heidi and Little Annie. Not happening, he thought. A woman darted towards him fast and low with a silver blade. He knocked it from her hand with a swipe of his staff. She jumped back with a yelp while another man stepped forward to take her place.

Vanus knew he could kill them if he wanted to. It would be the easiest thing to do, maybe even the safest; they were dangerous. Killing them would be easier than beating them back with a stick. That’s the difference between me and the Archons and death angels, he reminded himself. That’s what sets me apart.

He had to hurry. He had to move. Already they were backing him into a corner and there were more coming for the house. A few more blows from his staff and he was clear enough to back into the living room. Screams of agony sounded from inside. Glass shattered inside the house. Already someone was crawling through one of the windows.

Four minutes and fifteen seconds left.

A familiar shadow loomed out of the gloom.

“You’re just making it worse for yourself, Kaufman, and for them,” Leonidas wheezed. “You already know what awaits you. Are you really going to let that woman and her little girl suffer the same fate?”

“Don’t try to sound like you give a damn,” Vanus grunted through gritted teeth. He faced Leonidas with his feet spread apart and his staff in front of him. He didn’t have any fight left in him. Already he’d pushed himself too far. I shouldn’t have been fighting to begin with, he thought. “You’d watch them burn just the same because that’s the only way you know how to get your rocks off.”

Leonidas cackled as if Vanus had just delivered a great joke. “Guilty as charged. Now if you want them to live, I suggest you put the staff down and give yourself up. It’s the only way to make this nightmare end.”

For Heidi and Little Annie if for no one else, Vanus thought. I’m sorry, Bazzelthorpe. Sorry I didn’t get to say goodbye a final time.

“Fine,” he heard himself with a resigned exhalation. “Have it your way.” He dropped his staff, admitting defeat. If it saved someone else - someone else truly worth saving - then wasn’t it worth it?

With a nod of his head Leonidas waved his hand.

A baseball bat to the back of the inner thigh broke bone and drove the death magician to his knees with a scream. Another to the back flattened him on his stomach. Rough hands dragged him across the floor into the open night air. For a moment he had an ephemeral view of the night sky. Cold night air, corrupted with the smell of smoke, caressed his bruised cheeks like a loving hand. How was he still alive? How was he still conscious?

Have I been broken down to my base yet? he thought

Leonidas’ shadow fell over him reeking of cold sweat. “Oh look what we have here,” he said in a cheerful voice. “Looks like we’ve caught ourselves a couple of rabbits.”

The meaning of his comment, the cheerful delivery of it, chilled Vanus to the core. It was enough to keep him from falling completely into darkness. Two people sized burlap sacks were being dragged towards the center of the yard beneath a large tree with a gnarled trunk. Something moved inside the bag.

“No,” Vanus heard himself say. He looked up at Leonidas with pleading eyes. “Don’t do this. You have me, you have what you need. You don’t have to do this…”

Leonidas scoffed. “This has nothing to do with you. This is for Anderson. He doesn’t realize what a favor I’m doing by removing all distractions.“

Vanus tried to stand but there was something wrong with it. Pain shot through his twisted leg. He screamed. A familiar voice from one of the bags called his name for help. There was nothing he could do. He was helpless. He could only watch as two hanks of rope were tossed over the tree branches. A few tugs of the rope and the bags were hoisted into the air where kindling had been gathered and set by the hands of the mad. Within a minute a sacrifice had been gathered.

The smell of gasolene burned his nose.

Someone held him down, the tread of a boot pressing down on his back. His body couldn’t take anymore damage.

A glance at the watch: Two minutes and thirty seconds.

There’s still hope, he thought desperately. There’s still time. They could come before…

There was no hope. There was no time left. With the bags secure in place the crowd turned to face the tree under Leonidas’ influence. With Leonidas taking the lead, they began to chant, dancing about hand in hand: men with women, women with women and men with men. They stripped off their clothes, offering their devotion to Chagidiel, the Blood-stained Patriarch.

“We burn the flesh so that you may rise from the heap of ashes…We offer you the meat of life straight from the infernal pit so that you may feast, so that you may take what is rightfully yours, so that you may make the sky burn as does the ground…”

They poured gasolene over the bags from a red plastic container.

Vanus could no longer hear anyone calling his name. What did it matter? Once again he’d failed? Once more innocent souls would die on his watch? Don’t quit your day job or anything, he thought stupidly, even as a part of him was aware that he was losing the final grip on his sanity; he could feel it slipping away from him, his hold on reality. That’s exactly what I’m going to do if I get out of this. I’m not fit to be an agent.

When they lit the flames he began to weep. It would have been worse if he could hear the souls inside screaming, but he only heard silence. He bent over and sobbed into the dirt, wishing the ground would swallow him whole. He did not fight when Leonidas’ shadow fell across him. He did not fight when he looked up to see Leonidas standing over him with a baseball bat in his hands.

“Nighty night,” Leonidas said.

There was a minute left on the clock.