The Ghost and the Darkness Volume 2 (The Fallocaust Series) (51 page)

Shit, this wasn’t going to end well; no way this was going to fucking end well. Do I leave now? One of my pointed teeth found the bottom of my lip and I bit down on it.

“It is what it is, Kessler.” I looked up and saw Elish crossing his arms back over his chest. The legionary forming a half-circle around Kessler, their guns drawn and pointed at Elish, Reaver, and Big Shot. Deek was standing in front of Reaver, a low growl tickling the inside of my chest cavity.

Kessler looked at Reaver and their eyes locked. Kessler tensed his grip around his gun; I could see his knuckles start to turn white.

“So this is where you’ve been? Where is your pet? Y-you… fuck almighty, Elish. You snatched Reaver in Aras didn’t you? I knew he couldn’t have vanished into thin air – it was you the entire time. Why?” To my surprise Kessler lowered his gun; his unemotional face starting to show signs of wear.

“I have my reasons. You know them and you know why, brother,” Elish responded, an acerbic taint edging his cold tones. “The most important question here… is how are you going to handle this? I suggest you take great thought in it, Kessler. Because how you handle this encounter right now is going to shape the rest of your immortal life.”

Like they were two junkyard dogs, Kessler and Reaver continued to stare one another down. “I know how I’m going to handle this already, Elish. I need no prompting from you. You’re going to give me Reaver and I won’t say anything to Silas. I’ll do that because you’re not only my brother, you’ve been my friend.”

“That’s not going to fucking –” Reaver shut his mouth as soon as Elish raised a hand.

My master turned back to Kessler. “The boy will not be leaving with you; you can get that notion out of your head right now. We’re on an important mission, a mission that, if we fail, can wipe out the entire north of the greywastes. I suggest you let me go, kill these legionary to keep their silence, and forget this ever happened, Kes-”

“HE KILLED MY SON, ELISH!” Kessler suddenly roared. At this outburst of emotion the legionaries raised their guns again, and I saw Reaver’s eyes quickly dart over to the guns stashed behind the bags.

Elish didn’t bat an eye. “He wasn’t your son. He was a chimera given to you, Kessler. If anything he was Nero and Theo’s son if you wish to get into genetics. Though I find this stance you have and the glint in your eye, rather humorous.” My master lowered his hands and took a step closer to Kessler, in response Kessler took one back. “For what reason do you think you have the right to give me orders? I know it was you who captured Reaver. I know it was you who handed him off to Nero to get raped and tortured for a month. Now tell me,
brother
, does Silas know of this yet? Because I know every last detail and it would please me greatly to tell King Silas what you let Nero do to Reaver.”

The crack started to form, but it was only for a fleeting moment before Kessler’s eyes hardened again. “Silas will soon forget what I’ve done once I hand-deliver Reaver to him. If not I’ll take the punishment. My loyalties are with my family and Silas. Threaten me all you want, traitor. I’m not leaving without Reaver; I suggest you cut your losses and come back to Skyfall. Stop embarrassing yourself by pretending to be a greywaster.”

“Go fuck yourself.” Reaver’s low voice brought another wave of tension into the already tense scene. I saw Elish grab Reaver’s shoulder as Reaver took a step towards Kessler and pull him back. My breath caught in my throat when I saw the legionary around them draw their guns up higher.

This wasn’t going to end well.

Kessler glared at Reaver. “I’ll be personally fucking you this time, boy. I will fuck you until
you
call me Daddy. I plan on fucking you all the way to Skyfall.”

Nope, it wasn’t.

Then hands on me.

I gasped from surprise as I was grabbed from behind. I swore and suddenly cried out, a surge of inner anger coursing through me. I had been too engrossed in what was going on in front of me, I had shut my ears and my senses off to what was happening behind me.

I snarled and swore as two legionary dragged me into the camp, both of them holding my arms and another one with a gun pointed to my head. I tried to drag my feet, tried to struggle until the tip of the gun roughly knocked my temple sending a shot of pain through my skull.

I heard Elish suck in a breath. I didn’t want to look at him; I didn’t want to see the disappointment on his face.

But my eyes found his anyways and when I looked up I didn’t see disappointment – I only saw fear.

I stared back at Elish; I stared at my master with the floodlights still on him, making him look like an ethereal being, a demigod dropped down from the heavens. Fear was not suited for his face, fear was not suited for
him,
but oddly, I didn’t feel scared to see him like this. It drew up something inside of me that I don’t think even he knew I had.

Because as I watched his purple eyes widen and his lip tighten, something inside of me shifted, something I think broke away from me. The boy who clung to his master’s cloak as he shielded him from everything bad, crumbled off of me like I was shedding dry mud.

I think I knew this was up to me now.

Kessler grabbed me roughly by the collar and pulled me close to him. I could smell Old Spice aftershave on him and the stench of gun powder.

“Interesting fucking find, huh, Elish?” I heard Kessler laugh, knowing like we all knew that Elish was going with him. “So now I ask you… what now? Do you want to come with me like a traitor and present yourself in front of the king. Or do you want to hand Reaver over to me and I will give you your squalling infant back?”

Elish looked at me, Reaver fuming beside him, specks of black dripping from Reaver’s clenched hands. I saw Big Shot behind the two of them too, holding onto Deek’s collar, staring at me with his own green eyes wide.

“You are making grievous mistake after grievous mistake, Kessler,” Elish replied coolly. “I’m giving you a single warning: hand my cicaro over to me. And if you dare threaten his life a second time, I will make you regret it.”

“Making your own threats, huh?” Kessler said. I felt the cold tip of an assault rifle get pointed to my head, I hadn’t realized it before but I had started to growl. The anger was rising like lava, coating my chest and shooting its white hot anger throughout my body.

No one talks to my master like this, not even the Imperial General.

“You’re in no position to threaten me,” Kessler went on. “You got ten seconds, Elish. Let me take the clone or I’m shooting your husband on the spot.”

My master took one last look at me then to Reaver.

Reaver gave him a slight nod, and I lost it in that moment.

“Don’t do it!” I suddenly yelled through a snarl. “Don’t you dare, I’m fine! He’s more important! Finding them is more important! GO! RUN!”

Suddenly a thunder clap of sound, and a wave of heat that seared my brain and blinded me of all my senses. I stumbled, my world spinning around me.

I heard the dog give off a vicious snarl and more gun blasts.

Elish screamed. Elish screamed? I fell to the ground smelling the dense and musty earth, and put my hand to my head feeling numb wet flesh where my scalp used to be.

I withdrew my hands and looked at them, they were slicked with blood. My head started to feel funny, colours were staring to appear where there had once just been grey.

“Jade? Jade?” The air broke with the sound of gunshots. Reaver ran past me, he had his gun in his hands and there were sparks of light erupting from it.

Some on it, some around it… my vision was starting to… to go glassy, hazy… bright…

“Jade. Maritus?” My head flopped back and everything was upside down, then his hand on my skull, trying to stem the blood. But what was wrong… did I get shot?

No.

I was a chimera, I… I needed to act like it…

“Come on, little husband, look at me.”

“Jade?” his voice broke. I heard a shudder come from him, a choked cry, and a warmth start to come to my head, an energy I had never felt before. It seemed to gather around me, inside me and out, like I was slowly drawing the energy of the universe into my body.

“What have I done – maritus, don’t leave me.”

Elish held his hand out to Jade’s head, his white skull visible from the piece of scalp that had gotten torn off from the gun blast. Elish wasn’t sure how bad it was but he could see skull and the path of the bullet a strip of char on the exposed bone.

“Maritus?” The gun blasts and the shouting behind Elish meant nothing, their mission meant nothing. Every seed that Elish had ever planted, seeds he had been tending for over twenty years now meant little to him as he held the husband’s head in his hands.

Jade’s glassy eyes barely moved, and though there was only a small amount of blood seeping from the cicaro’s skull Elish couldn’t tell just how badly the gunshot was. All he knew was that he had to get Jade back to Skyfall as quickly as he could.

Then, like a dozen tentacles had burst from the night to drag him back to hell, Elish felt hands grab him. With a bellow of rage Elish jumped to his feet and took a swing. His fist connecting with the face of one of the legionaries, and as he punched the soldier with all his strength he could feel the soldier’s jaw shatter underneath his fist.

More people grabbed him, then the feeling that something was thumping against his back. Elish whirled around and went to punch the person who shot him but Kessler saw him coming. The Imperial Commander raised the butt of his gun and cracked it over Elish’s head.

Around him the legionaries were holding Reaver, the dark chimera bleeding from the head, neck, and chest. He was riddled with crimson holes as was Big Shot beside him. Deek was nothing but a mound of grey fur by the ash-covered fire pit, still and silent.

“Don’t fuck with my family, Elish,” Kessler replied coolly. “You let him kill my son, I will take your fucking husband in return. It could have been different, but that ship has sailed. Get all of them into the plane, finish off the dog and the ugly one.”

Elish was on his knees, his chest rising and falling as his energy got zapped from the bullets lodged in his back. Elish looked up at Kessler, dressed in his imperial black and blue combat armor and cape, holding a gun to his head.

Kessler’s face was stern, lined face firm, and his grey eyes blazing with the fire only a man who had lost a son to torture and murder could wield.

So I have lost everything then?
Elish glared at Kessler, trying even in this submissive position to keep his chin held high and his shoulders square. He had had to face King Silas many times this way, and he knew even in the grievous of situations that he had to keep calm.

The man will pay, he might value his family but I have his heir under my own thumb. I need to get Jade out of this situation. I will pay Kessler back for this later, tenfold.

“Take Elish to the plane, and on second thought – put a bullet in the pet’s head. Finish him off and make sure Elish sees it.”

“Don’t you touch him!” Elish roared, at the same time Reaver leapt to his feet, both injured chimeras gaining strength from Kessler’s final words. Another gunshot went off behind them, landing in the grey ash beside Big Shot, a burst of dirt flying up into the air.

Elish pulled his arms free and attacked Kessler, taking the Imperial Commander down to the ground as more gunshots broke the night air.

Elish punched Kessler. The Imperial Commander’s head snapped back, his nose now crushed against his face.

Kessler responded with a hard blow to the back of Elish’s head. Elish braced himself but the bullets in his back continued to drain his energy; when Kessler hit him again he started to see his vision get framed in a blurry haze.

Kessler got up and kicked Elish in the side. Elish gritted his teeth, all of his remaining energy stores now being used to keep himself conscious.

Kessler rose, and to further humiliate Elish, he spat on him.

“That’s for Timothy, you fucking traitorous piece of shit. Don’t fuck with my family.”

Elish clenched his teeth; he opened his mouth to deliver what he knew would be his last scathing remark when he heard a small voice sound only a few feet away from him.

“Don’t fuck… with mine.”

Elish’s head quickly turned towards the voice. His eyes widened as he saw Jade standing up, his yellow eyes vivid and glaring at Kessler.

All at once Kessler whirled around, seemingly crazed with anger. He opened his mouth, his arm rising towards Jade as he shouted at the remaining legionary to shoot him. Elish shouted at Kessler but a moment later he stopped, his tongue seemingly gluing itself to his mouth as he witnessed what happened next.

There was a surge of energy, a dark matter unseen to the naked eye but vivid in Jade’s eyes. Like a smoke this very energy coated the yellow in the boy’s eyes, making them appear so black it seemed to confuse ones own senses. A black so condensed and dark, it was as if you were peering into the universe before the sun’s creation.

Elish stared at the boy in awe as this energy drew into him, filling Jade’s body with its invisible yet depthless black. This was no sestic radiation, no explosion of white energy, this was something else. An ability, a power that even Silas couldn’t wield properly.