Arise (Book Three in The Arson Saga) (9 page)

“Don’t let him!” she shrieked, the skin on her neck bubbling. “I…can…help you.”

“How?” Arson wanted to know. His eyes, ready to spill, begged to know.

“I have…a code too.” Her neck was singed and crusted black when she turned and pointed to the metal cart she had been dragging, the cart with wheels that screeched eerily as it scraped against the floor.

“Can it get me out? Can it set me free?” Arson asked.

It was too late. A final cry erupted from her mouth as her body wilted. At once, the spell she’d put on Adam ended. He gasped eagerly and cursed. The vile word reverberated off every corner. He rose and started to walk, muscles obviously sore.

Caution kept them at a distance from each other.

Adam eventually moved closer. Arson took a step back, thinking he’d trip over the metal cart, the one the burnt-up child had said held a code. But the cart had been incinerated along with her.

Chapter Twelve

“Are you crazy?” Arson
shouted. “You burned one of the codes that could’ve gotten me out of here!”

“Still so much to learn. Are you blind, or just willfully naïve? You were present for that little showdown just now, right? You saw what she did. That’s
your
power working against us through some stupid memory, Arson.”

“I don’t have telepathy.”

“So sure, are we? You have no idea what you can do yet. You gave her the ability to shut my mouth, to stretch me so far my bones almost snapped. Maybe you’ve been sitting on that little upgrade all this time, and it took a little memory from your
scandalous
past to call it forth. You clearly don’t know yourself.” The sarcasm in Adam’s tone was grating. “And as a side note, that twisted gleam in your eye when she was trying to pull me apart told me you kinda liked it. That dark side of you is very much alive. We’re not different at all, no matter what you believe.”

Arson stood rigid and tight-lipped at the cruel realization.

“You have to be more careful with these ideas crawling around in this playground with us.” Adam finally caught his breath.

“You let her out. This is your fault.”

“Newsflash: She got out long before I dropped in on the party. You and I both know that.”

“But I locked her up.”

“You’re right. You did. And I unlocked her, to prove something to you.”

Arson pensively pinched his eyebrows together. “Is she really gone this time? Is the code lost?”

“You’re still operating under the belief that she was actually telling you the truth.”

“Why would I lie to myself, if it was me who created her?”

“Look, I don’t know. But frankly, we don’t really have the time for a paradoxical philosophy lesson, so just forget about her. I mean it. Let’s concentrate on getting you in that room.”

“Adam. Is she gone?” Arson aggressively asked again.

“Your old man found a way back. Nothing is permanent. The memories need time to reboot, but they’re getting quicker. Which means little Susie Antichrist could show up again at any time. Last warning. Do not give in to them. You can’t trust the ghosts in here. Get that through your head.”

“Turns out I can’t trust you either.”

“Enough already! I held back information for your protection. It was necessary. I am the only one trying to help you. Or is that not enough to earn your trust? Yes, I let some stuff out on purpose. Alert the press, but everything in here is here because of
you
.” Adam breathed heavily, his voice starting to crack. “The truth is that you haven’t been strong enough to get yourself out. I took a risk, a chance to try to initiate what you couldn’t.”

“So you don’t believe in my powers? You don’t believe in me!”

“You’re weak. Your father tried to manipulate you. That little girl tried to manipulate you. You were so close to cracking too. It’s like a part of you feels as if you belong here or something. Do you really even want to get back to the real world?”

“That’s a ridiculous question.”

“Is it?”

“Yes, I want to get out!”

“They’re dangerous, man. I can’t be sure what’s on the other side of this door. So you have to trust me from here on out. We need to work together.”

Arson nodded, still wary of trusting fully. As he approached the massive door before him, he managed to take only four steps before his foot got caught by something. A mutilated hand. The grip held him like quicksand. “I can’t move,” he told Adam.

Glancing down, he spotted a pair of beady eyeballs glaring up at him from inside the floor. In seconds, he noticed the hands that he had felt were now enveloping his ankles completely. Struggling but unable to get himself free, Arson watched the malicious entity expose its wrist and unleash a congregation of microscopic insects. The vermin raced up his leg, biting and chewing and stabbing with their sharp, needle-like teeth.

“Do something!” he screamed.

Adam aimed his palm at the floor and released a stream of energy. The ground instantly liquefied, and the hold on Arson’s foot dissolved.

“What was that thing?”

“A manifestation of your fears, I imagine.”

New suspicion climbed their bones. They stood back to back, waiting for replaced violence. The hallways were quiet, but Arson still heard the sound of a pipe dripping water.

“I’m really thinking it’s time to see what’s behind this door,” Adam frantically suggested. “You enter first. This is your world.”

“Not by choice.”

Just then, a revolving metallic disc tore out of the darkness and flew toward their heads. Arson dropped to the ground to avoid a wound, but the edge of the razor scraped Adam’s temple. A thin line of blood sprayed the air.

Arson fought hard to focus. What he could make out immediately were figures cloaked in white linen appearing and disappearing from the walls. Like fluid, they dripped and were again absorbed at will, rapidly. They showed themselves only to unleash weapons in the form of sharp rings. Blind creatures they were, with human faces and reptilian bodies. Their scabbing lips secreted a milky, yellow substance as every fierce grunt reverberated through the floor.

“Are you kidding me?” Arson rolled about a half dozen times to avoid having his organs speared.

“Make them stop, Arson.”

“Does it look like I can make them stop? In case you haven’t noticed, they’re trying to kill me.” Arson somersaulted forward, dodging an incoming scythe. Every attack ushered in a new weapon. He remained on his back and tilted his neck to the side while the tip of the blade trimmed several hairs on his jaw.

Arson concentrated on the sporadic shapes protruding from the concrete surfaces then sinking back into their liquid portals to escape like vapor. He focused intently for the next several seconds. This all reminded him of a video game. Games required strategy. With an outstretched hand, Arson launched a twirling, enflamed spire toward a single aggressor. A deep breath later and a piece of the figure’s cloak singed off and wilted.

Arson gritted his teeth, frustrated. “They’re too fast!”

“You’re holding us back,” Adam said. “End this!”

“I’m trying!” Arson unleashed a series of flaming spheres. One after another after another. He was sure he’d destroy some of them. But every sphere missed its target. Arson took a deep breath and noticed his veins shift, his thoughts spiraling. He forced every stray idea back to the center of himself. From his fists erupted a spear of ice. It was launched without a second thought. The tip pinned one of the menaces to the wall. A loud squeal echoed off the surrounding lockers. He didn’t wait for the cloaked figure to die before unleashing a sequence of ice javelins.

Three down before the next blink.

“It seems Lassie’s learned some new tricks. Nice,” Adam teased, dodging a bullet. Another new weapon. “Keep it up, boy.”

“Guns? These creatures have guns?” Arson replied, the sound of each pulled trigger nearly rattling his eardrums.

“I believe the correct term is reptilian, wall-passing…ninja mummies…or something. They don’t respond well to the term
creature
.” A heavy grunt. “It offends them.”

“I’d hate to offend.” Arson didn’t share the same sense of mordant pleasure from the moment. Adam was the one telling him to end this whole battle, to break inside that room, yet the more he studied Adam’s moves between each breath, he noticed there was a terrible cruelty laced inside every offensive strike. A piece of him enjoyed this, or maybe just enjoyed seeing Arson scramble around like some amateur.

His sight suddenly bloomed. He could see everything so clearly. He had to destroy all attackers and survive. If the digital arena had taught him anything, it was that video games were just a reflection of reality. Kill the opposition and endure. And while his gaming experience was limited, the few times Arson had actually played, he’d been rather good.

“They’re fast but not invincible,” Adam said, shifting out of place as another cloud of bullets divided the air. There wasn’t time to be afraid. Adam dove forward, spinning like a human corkscrew out of range, the bullets chewing through drywall and metal instead. His escape tactic was a breathtaking display of agility. He used Danny’s body like he’d been wearing it for years.

The mummy suddenly retreated into the wall with a hiss and resurfaced from a new corner with another weapon, this time a bow. Jagged arrows protruded from a grey, slimy spine. The nightmarish thing peeled the arrow’s thin, cylindrical shape from its spinal column and barely flinched when the hooked tip took a sliver of mucus flesh. When the mummy finally unleashed the arrow, it penetrated Adam’s calf and lodged into muscle.

He dropped to his knees with a curse. “You thought I didn’t believe in your powers, Arson. I do. But…now’s your chance to put any and all doubts to rest.”

From the corner of his eye, Arson caught sight of a swarm of undead corpses creeping closer. Where had they come from? He looked to his left, and there they were. Then shifting to his right, and there they were. An increasing number of lethargic, hungry groans climbed the pipes and shot cold splinters up his back. Their feet dragged, some twisted; many limped, missing feet altogether, resulting in eerie, determined staggers. The sliding of dead flesh against the floor disturbed Arson to the core.

He made a dash toward the entrance. But a dagger met the door first, almost pinning his hand to the crumbling material. Arson fidgeted with the handle, shook the frame as hard as he could, trying to keep the frenzied thoughts of death at bay.

“Get that door open, Arson!” Adam, from his spot on the ground, still managed to resemble someone fierce and warrior-like, dodging a number of attacks and hawking a wad of red phlegm from his mouth. “They’re giving us hell for a reason. This could be the way out.”

“Right,” Arson shot back with clenched teeth. He found his hands getting colder, starting to vibrate. With his eyes, he followed a thin cobalt vein toward his wrist. When it reached his fingertips, the frost turned the handle to ice. He shattered it, but as he did, one of the cloaked reptile mummies appeared from the wall directly beside the door. The dead space where its eyes should have been shot a needle of terror into his subconscious. The figure squirmed, putrid saliva oozing out of a gaping, twisted jaw. Arson palmed the mummy in the nose. Blood instantly polluted the white fabric that bound much of the lower half of a mutated face.

But the strike wasn’t enough. The cloaked attacker shook its head, as if disappointed that the creator of this arena would attempt such a desperate, unplanned maneuver. Two slimy arms lunged from the wall and grabbed Arson by the neck. For the first time, he gazed at the shadowy entity, studying the cracking flesh that bordered black eye sockets. He cringed at how hideous, rejected color dripped from decaying lips. A wrinkled throat bobbed as the mutant mummy swallowed and grunted, satisfied to have the creator in its clutches.

“Now…the god dies,” it seethed.

With flared nostrils, Arson answered, “I…created you. I can end you.” Touching his chilled palm to the mutilated grip cutting off airflow to his lungs, he watched the mummy freeze. It was a fearful and wondrous process eyeing the frost as it crawled up gruesome skin. Arson broke the disfigured hand completely off the remaining parts of his enemy’s body. But before letting the enemy disappear, he pierced through the cloak and located the heart. Like a frightened animal, the mummy squealed, terrified. Arson stroked the organ until it began to wilt in his palms. Then he pulled out his hand again and, with one breath, blew the ashes onto the figure’s face. In seconds, there was nothing left.

Sweat slipped down Arson’s spine. He turned to see if Adam was okay.

“Don’t freak out. You’re doing fine.”

“Adam,
you
don’t look so good.”

“I’ll survive,” he said, shutting his eyes as an aura of energy surged around his body. Some kind of force-field. “Won’t be able to keep this shield going for long. Make it count.”

Arson nodded. He shifted positions, now facing the swarm. Determined to kill the weaker elements of his being, he forsook the doorway and raced into the heart of his nightmare. In order to be truly free, he knew he had to finish this. An arrow whistled toward his chest. He held up his hand, and the arrow disintegrated. A bullet rushed to chew through his shoulder. He studied the tiny, cylindrical creation, as if he were moving faster than it was. Before it came in contact with his body, he breathed a cool breath, and the bullet froze. He crushed the substance easily in his hand.

Arson couldn’t really explain how it was all happening. How he had seemingly found balance between the frost and the fire—and so suddenly. But it was working. He was controlling them both. Incinerating the arrow felt like child’s play. And the bullet was nothing. Nothing at all. Arson raced into the swarm of undead, tuning out the moans of his companion. How far back Adam was, he didn’t know. At this point, that bloodlust, that enduring, sick glow he’d seen in Adam’s face, he now felt. He was utterly consumed by a new thirst. He
wanted
to kill.

Heavy, distorted breathing filled the air. Rotten breath created an invisible fog. The smell of decay and death surrounded him.

“I never asked for this! I never wanted it!” He charged the chaos. There looked like no end to it. Infinite hopelessness. Clenching his fists, he unleashed his first blow. A man’s head exploded upon impact. A chunk of pink meat tore out the rear of the skull. Arson followed it with a left elbow strike. His skin itched with teeth. Which one of them had dared to bite him? It soon didn’t matter. This would end, and it would be his undoing. He craved every splash of carnage, for what felt like the first time in so long. He’d gone ballistic before, gone nuclear. But this was different. And he wouldn’t stop until every last one was piled high in its own blood and excrement.

The bodies chanted his name, chanted Emery’s name, some kind of unholy chorus. He never wished upon this song before, but still it came, like a revelation.

How long could he wage this war?