The Last Hunter - Collected Edition (108 page)

33

Cresty-Alpha!
I think, sending out a command that gets a loud roar in response. The cresties, natural fighters and killers have no doubt been impatiently waiting for their chance to join the fray. Well, now they’re going to get it.

With a thunder that matches that of the approaching Nephilim, the dinosaurs race out from around the base, joining the front line of hunters. Grumpy finds me and lets out an annoyed sounding grunt. He’s not happy about being sidelined for so long.

“Quit whining,” I tell him and he crouches down. I climb onto his back and I’m happy to see many other hunters and cresties joining forces as well. Em and Kainda climb onto Zok’s long back, ready to continue the fight. But we can’t see what’s coming from here, even from the back of a thirty foot tall cresty, and that’s not a good thing.

“Fall back to the tanks!” I shout, and I then remember to think the command. As one, the force of dinosaurs and hunters races back toward the tanks, which are still firing over our heads, smiting the distant Nephilim forces. Before the concussive force of each fired tank shell becomes almost too much to bear, and before we put ourselves in the tanks’ sights, I turn Grumpy around and the rest of my army follows suit.

Further away from the behemoth, I can see the bottleneck again. It’s a mess. Nephilim bodies litter the area. Some are clearly dead, the shapes of their bodies barely discernable. Others are moving still, healing from wounds that would have killed a mortal. But the wave of monsters flooding into the valley continues...as does the barrage keeping them at bay.

A never ending stream of missiles and high caliber tank and artillery shells rain down on them, rocking the valley with thunder and cloaking the scene in smoke. But the effort is paying off. Not only are many Nephilim dying under the force of the barrage, but the number getting through and continuing the charge are manageable.

Hold your positions
, I tell my front line.
Save your strength
.

During the momentary reprieve, while trying to regain some of my own strength, I turn my eyes upward to the cliffs. The winged warriors are all airborne, battling with the helicopters in a deadly aerial dance. The warriors outnumber the choppers by a large margin, but the helicopters are fast and can strike from a distance. Despite the modern advantages, it’s still a losing fight. As I watch, a warrior with little regard for his own safety, perhaps empowered by the knowledge that he will heal, or simply looking forward to the pain, tackles a helicopter. He slams into the side of the chopper, flips it upside down and as the rotor blades propel the vehicle toward the ground, he hangs on for the ride, laughing sadistically all the way down. The pair slams into the side of the temple where the helicopter explodes. I can’t see what happens next, but I think I hear a fresh spat of gunfire over the din of the continuing battle.

Are you okay?
I ask Luca.

What was that?
he asks, which I suppose means he’s fine.

Don’t worry about it,
I tell him.

Getting light headed,
Merrill thinks, joining the mental conversation. He’s been blowing that horn non-stop from the beginning of this battle. Without a breather, he could pass out. Luckily, he’s not alone under the temple.

Have Aimee take over for a bit,
I tell him.

Then, to Kat, I think,
what happened with the Nephilim on the temple?

Mira got him,
Kat replies.
XM-29. Explosive rounds. It was messy. If too many more of these guys bite it inside the base, we’re not going to be able to maneuver
.

She’s worried about the Nephilim blood. If it gets on anyone’s skin, it will result in a horrible death. That said, the blood could also be diluted with water and used to quickly heal our wounded.
Just don’t walk through it barefoot
, I think to her, and then I transmit my thoughts about using the blood for medicinal purposes to the medics set up beneath the temple.

Kid,
Kat says.
You’re doing a good job. If things go south, I’m proud of you.

I don’t have to think my thanks, she can feel it through Luca.

As for our current predicament,
Kat thinks,
the cliffs are clear. Have the snipers take out the big guys’ knees. Then you can take them before they get up.

Before she’s even done thinking the idea, I shoot the order off to the snipers gathered from around the world and sense their aim shift as one.

Just in time, too. The first Nephilim warrior—a mammoth specimen wielding a mace that looks more like a spiked wrecking ball—leaps on top of behemoth’s loose body and then off again, shaking the ground with his girth. He bellows at us, trying to put the fear of his demon fathers in our souls. But we stand strong and wait.

Undeterred by our lack of fear, the giant charges. Through the symphony of explosions, both near and distant, the scream of jets and missiles, and the staccato pop of several thousand guns, I hear Aimee take a deep breath through the speaker system. It’s followed by a blast of the shofar that dwarfs Merrill’s practiced efforts. I feel its supernatural cleansing effect sweep through my body.

The wave of sound strikes the big Nephilim head on. He flails wildly, dropping the axe and sprawling to the ground with all the grace of a younger me. A lone cresty without a rider takes advantage, charging ahead and descending on the giant with all its primal fury. The giant, unable to defend himself, is quickly dispatched as the dinosaur snaps its jaws down over the warrior’s head, twists and pulls.

The line of cresties roar in response, as though cheering on their comrade.

But the dinosaur’s victory is short-lived. Five more Nephilim warriors arrive. Then ten. The cresty manages to escape their grasp, but only because Aimee’s shofar blast is still sounding.

Suddenly, the power of the shofar is reduced. The volume drops by twenty-five percent. I glance back and see one of the speakers, a giant arrow piercing its black case. A second arrow cuts through the sky, piercing a second speaker. There are a total of eight speakers lining the walls and towers. At this rate, they’ll all be destroyed within the minute. I look up and find the culprit. A winged warrior hovers high above, ignoring the helicopters, which are almost all destroyed or out of ammo. His aim is uncanny, even for a Nephilim. Given his wings, scorpion tail and blood red attire, he is one of the higher echelon warriors and likely known as a god. The bow and arrow helps identify him. Apollo, Greek god of archery. The giant nocks another arrow and lets it fly. Before it can strike a third speaker, I divert its course with a gust of wind. The arrows strikes one of the armored tanks and shatters.

I turn to Kainda and Em, pointing up at Apollo. “I need to stop him!”

“Go!” Kainda shouts. “We can handle this!” She leaps from Zok to Grumpy, claiming my prehistoric steed as her own. “Go!”

“Be careful,” I tell her.

I can see that my worry aggravates her, but then she softens and says, “You, too.”

I launch skyward, propelling myself past the sound barrier with a boom that drowns out the cacophony of explosions. Apollo lets another arrow fly, ignoring my approach. I snap it in two with a blade of air, protecting the third speaker yet again.

Whipsnap cuts through the air, projecting an invisible blade toward Apollo. My aim is true, but I’m struck in the side and the blade fades to a blunt wind just before reaching the archer-god.

My body plummets while my dazed mind regains its senses. When it does, I look up to find Apollo, but my view is blocked by outstretched wings. A warrior wielding a long spear drops toward me. He’s got one eye, which is odd for a Nephilim, but it reveals his identity: Odin, grandfather of Ull, who was my master until I killed him.

The spear surges toward my face, but I manage to duck to the side. But the attack was a ruse. The true attack comes from the right. I tense up, coiling my atoms to form an impregnable layer of skin, but I’m a moment too late. The tip of the weapon pierces my side and an all consuming fire billows through my body.

I scream in pain, still conscious, still in control, but in absolute agony. I don’t have to see the weapon to know what has happened. I’ve been stung by Odin’s scorpion tail.

Odin circles and comes back for another attack, but he’s not alone. Twenty winged warriors are with him and they are a veritable Who’s Who of the ancient world, identifiable by their weapons, headdresses and garments. The Greek gods: Zeus, Poseidon, Hephaestus and Hermes. The Norse: Tyr, Heimdall and Baldur. The Egyptian: Ra, Anubis, Horus and Osiris. There are several more, but the one that really stands out is the Sumerian god, Enlil, brother of the slain Enki and leader of the Nephilim warrior clan in Nephil’s absence.

This group is basically the Special Ops of the Nephilim. They are the oldest and most skilled of their kind. And each and every one of them has their killer eyes set on me.

I swing Whipsnap toward the group, intending to cut them from the sky, but the movement causes a flare of agony to explode from my stung side. The air-blade is never even formed.

I cannot win this fight. Not yet. So I flee. And as I do, another speaker is destroyed.

Then another.

The sound of the shofar dwindles by half. It will soon disappear. And when it does, our advantage will be lost, and maybe the human race along with it.

34

I fly up, keeping ahead of the monsters at my heels. I can focus on flying as it takes minimal effort to control the small forces affecting me, but I won’t be able to fight until the stinging poison is flushed from my body. Luckily, I am capable of repelling it from my body, I just need time.

I find it in the clouds.

A curtain of white cloaks my body. Out of view, I angle my ascent, pick a random spot and stop, hovering in the upper troposphere. I can hear the frantic wing flaps of the Nephilim searching for me, but visibility is zero. They’ll have to run into me to find me.

With the sound of the raging battle echoing below, I clear my mind and focus my attention on my own body. I can feel my muscles, bones and blood. And I can feel the toxin injected into my body. First, I isolate it, separating the foreign fluid from my own, and then I force it back, through my veins, through the meat of my muscles, and push it back to the wound through which it was injected.

I clench my teeth tightly. The poison fights me, clawing at my body, burning with the fury of Odin himself. With a last push, the toxin seeps from the wound in my side. I glance down and see the clear, water-like liquid drip down my side. Using the wind, I scour the fluid from my body and dissipate it into the atmosphere.

Cleansed of the poison, I feel my strength return, but I’m drained. The hunter in me gets angry.
Ignore your pain,
I think.
You are immune to it.

Then I remember who spoke those words to me. I was still young and recently freed from the feeder pit, begging for scraps of food and obeying his commands like a dog. Immunity to pain was one of the first lessons he taught me. I find it disturbing that his advice could help me now, but I employ the lesson.

The clouds thin as I descend. Then they fade and I am exposed.

The warriors are on me immediately, but they’re expecting a wounded adversary, not capable of defending himself. What they get is something else entirely.

I swipe Whipsnap around, directing a blade of wind at the first two warriors to reach me—the Egyptians, Anubis and Horus. Their ancient style helmets, fashioned to look like the jackal and falcon, fly free, along with their heads. Their bodies topple from the sky, limp and lifeless.

As the others emerge from the clouds and soar toward me from every side, I rush out to face the nearest—Odin. The ancient giant screams something at me, presumably in Norse.

I have no idea what he’s said, but I reply with a shout of my own. “I’m going to send you to meet your son and grandson!”

The insult here is that there is no afterlife for Nephilim and joining his slain offspring is impossible, unless you count oblivion. He roars in response, thrusting with his spear, trying for a repeat of the tactic that worked before. But this time when he goes to sting me, the tail is missing, removed by the very air around him. Directing the wind with my thoughts, I dismantle the angry warrior and let his pieces fall from the sky, but the wind catches his massive spear.

I turn toward the shout of another god, rushing in. Odin’s spear flashes past me, flying toward Tyr, no doubt out to avenge the Norse clan’s fallen leader. Instead, the spear finds its mark at the center of Tyr’s head, striking the protective metal band with such force that it cuts straight through.

Another warrior falls from the sky.

Then two more.

Then four more.

Those that remain realize that I cannot be taken and flee toward the ground and the battle below. As I give chase, I see that the situation on the ground has become dire. The force of cresties and hunters has been reduced by half. The wall of warriors attacking them is thick and growing in number with every passing moment. A flood of warriors are surging into the valley, no longer hindered by missiles or shelling. And those that are on the front lines, fight at full strength. The shofar has been silenced.

As I drop from the sky, Luca’s thoughts reach me again. I hadn’t realized I was out of range. And it’s not just Luca’s thoughts. It’s
everyone.

“Out of ammo,” I hear from an artillery gunner.

“Going down!” a pilot thinks in fear.

“Under attack!” a ship captain says, turning my attention to the sea, where several flying warriors are assaulting the ships.

“Fall back!” This one comes from a hunter at the front line, and I shout against it.
No!

Fight!
I urge.

Ground-Beta!

Thankfully, the men and women below haven’t lost their senses and are still responding to my orders. Gates to either side of the base open and soldiers from a dozen different nations flood out, carrying an array of weapons—assault rifles, machine guns, rocket propelled grenades, anti-tank missiles and flamethrowers. And they come out shooting with whatever ammunition they have left.

The remaining warriors descending ahead of me must sense me closing in. They break hard for the back of the valley and I think they want me to follow. Ignoring the trap, I drop straight down, aiming for my original target.

As I flash past, I doubt Apollo even feels his own death. One moment, he was targeting a cresty, the next he was cleaved in two.

I return to the battlefield, landing in front of Grumpy. I push at the Nephilim with the strongest wind I can muster and launch fifty of them flying back. I turn and look over my shoulder. Kainda is still atop Grumpy. She has a bleeding gash on her forehead, but she’s suffered far worse. Em is still here too, but she’s on foot.

I look for Zok and find the dinosaur twenty feet away, slumped over on her side. The massive chest no longer rising or falling. Another casualty.

Modern soldiers swell our ranks, using their long range weapons to stumble the approaching warriors. Mira and Kat arrive with them, both carrying the XM-29 assault rifles.

“Any bright ideas?” Kat asks.

“Working on one now,” I say, only half present.

“Make it snappy, kid.”

I ignore her, reaching out to the elements around me, setting something in motion that nearly drains me to the core. I fall to my knees and clench my eyes shut. It’s like lifting an elephant. Then it’s done. The thing is set in motion and takes on a life of its own. No longer fully exerting myself, I recover some.

“Just a few minutes,” I say weakly.

“Here they come!” someone shouts. I look up to see an endless horde of warriors charging toward us. Sun glints off their massive weapons and bathes them in a holy glow that feels blasphemous.

“Can you do anything?” Mira says, placing a hand on my back.

I try to stand, but find my legs unwilling. “Not yet,” I say.

“Behind us!” someone else shouts. “They’re coming from both sides!”

How is that possible?
I wonder, as I turn around to look. There were a few warriors at sea, but not enough to instill the level of fear I hear in the man’s voice. Then I see them. Twenty-five of the giants, each carrying another, for fifty total. The force pounding down on us from the front is far vaster, but these fifty, attacking our rear, will crumble our defenses.

But there is something off about these Nephilim. They look...too big. Taking my spyglass from its pouch, I look at the approaching force.

I gasp, sounding like Em.
Hold your fire,
I think to what remains of the human resistance.
The force approaching from the east is friendly!

Just as the thought reaches my army, they arrive.

The winged giants release their cargo, dropping twenty-five Nephilim dressed in white. The thirty-foot warriors, wearing golden armbands, belts and protective head gear, are striking, almost glowing. The ground before me rumbles as the largest of the group lands nearby. He turns his head to me, looking me in the eyes.

Cronus!

The Titans have left the refuge of Tartarus, risking oblivion to save the human race. And they’re not alone. There are twenty-five gigantes, the two-headed monsters who stand at least sixty feet tall and delight in killing Nephilim the way Nephilim delight in pain. The gigantes descend into the Nephilim horde, swinging thirty-foot swords in both hands.

A large gigantes settles to the ground gently, just fifty feet away, slowing himself with his massive wings. Gigantes are one of the most repulsive creatures I’ve experienced in the underworld. Their skin wraps around their bundles of muscles and their organs individually, so you can see gaps between sinews and dangling, skin-wrapped guts. Their two heads are concave on top, like their brains were scooped out. Their teeth chatter loudly, manically, and air hisses through the gaps in their cheeks. Their solid black eyes are unnerving and their three-fingered hands and feet have thick black talons. They are hideous, and I’ve never been more glad to see one.

The big one turns its two heads toward me, each speaking one word at a time. “Little one, get up and fight.”

I sense that it recognizes me. This is the gigantes I faced in Tartarus, the one that pulverized me and took pleasure in it. My stomach twists, but then I shout at the thing. “We’ve been fighting. It’s your turn now!”

The gigantes snarls at me, but then lunges forward, casting down a strong wind as it leaps several hundred feet and lands among a mass of startled Nephilim, cutting them down.

Cronus shouts back to me. “Solomon! Where is the shofar?”

“In the temple,” I shout back.

“We must have it!” he says. “It is the key to everything!”

“It won’t work,” I argue. “There are too many of them!”

“It only needs to work on one,” he says, and then stands. He raises his sword high into the air. “Humans!” His voice is thunder itself, the voice of a Titan. “Attack!”

Cronus charges, heading for the Nephilim army, with twenty-four warriors and thousands of humans by his side. Now that, is leadership. In the wake of this furious charge, this final charge, I find myself alone on the ground, weak and unable to move.

I want to join the fight with every fiber of my being, but I’m worn out. I can barely stand.

Shofar,
I think to no one in particular.
I need the shofar...and a shot of adrenaline.

If there is a reply, I don’t hear it. Maybe Luca is unable? Maybe the strain finally got to us both? I try to stand, but a wave of dizziness keeps me down.

“Don’t move,” a woman says.

“Regain your strength,” says another.

I feel a hand on my back. Mira.

I look up and find Mira and Em kneeling by my sides and Kat and Kainda standing guard.

“I’m coming!” I hear another voice cry out.

I recognize it immediately. I should, I heard it for the first half of my life. “Luca,” I mumble. “No.”

I turn to find the small boy sprinting around the line of tanks, the shofar under his arm. Merrill and Aimee rush out behind him, clearly trying to subdue the boy and return him to safety, but they can’t catch him.

“Go back!” I shout to him. “Go b—”

Something in the air shifts, like a wave of pressure, returning my attention to the battle.

Our force, even strengthened by the gigantes and Titans, have been repelled. They’re retreating toward us, pursued by countless Nephilim still pouring through the bottleneck. Beyond the bottleneck, I see the second behemoth, closing in, to seal the gap or simply trample us. I reach out with my senses. It’s almost here. The timing is right, but I’m too weak to do anything but kill us all.