Night Terrors 14 – Demonian
MJ Banks
Walking down the street with music at his ears walks John Mark, the late evening with the dark moon languid and moored beginning to show, the steps beneath his feet are hidden behind themselves unnoticed and hastily kempt, so unsurely consumed by the sounds of his mind. His day has thrived where the towers of the metropolitan city built on high to view the preserve land had provided him lessons in the new school of thought for the new breeds such as him, a swift and light elusive plighted slight. Purified in the bedlam of hate the suffering and fire that fueled the massive city was no more than that which keeps an empire that now sooths and shelters him, flashing memories of artillery training and effluent bloodletting buckets do so much lest convince him all the same that he is home in the night once more.
Dusk consumes the paths of the upper city street where smoke and dark shop windows with protective gates resemble caged mirrors and deafening shadows. A pernicious thief walks the street behind him at one block’s length also trailed himself by a band of men with white skin and black eyes and hair. John knows there is another behind him but not the many followers furthermore, he slows his travel and waits for an unwitting attack, when a gun presses against his back swiftly he rounds about shuffle, disarms the thief, with much ado pain, and pressure his face thrown against the wall and arms wretched behind the back but in different manners. At the end of the block, the group of villains with blackened eyes peers round the corner at block’s end, fearing discovery he takes the thief into the depth of the alley. The shadows watch and whisper, those that in effect are the awakening darkness. With grimace smile and malicious wiles, they watch the unknowing tyrant, chattering and crowing attacking their weak within a waiting murderous death of rite. John has his gun pointed to the base of the thief’s skull.
John: “What is your name?”
Harlan: “My name is Harlan.”
John: “It seems you have been placed in moratorium Harlan.”
At the end of the alley approach the men with soulless eyes again peering around the corner, draw their guns and slowly enter the alleyway.
John: “They’re here for me.”
Harlan: “You have a gun to my head.”
Isis: “Come with us spawn.”
John: “They will shoot through you any second, quickly reach back and take your gun.”
Harlan: “Just turn yourself in dude.”
John: “Do or die!”
Harlan reaches behind and his gun drops into his hands, John in judgment pushes him and begins shooting over his shoulder, the soulless creatures hide at the alley corners or rush ahead of the opening to the nearest cover.
Isis: “Get the demonian!”
Those in front fire pistols and press their position into the end of the alley, those at the rear have automatic rifles under long coats, a firefight consumes a world of shadow, the stern alarms sound complete with blinding strobe and deafening thunder, the agony scene does not impugn the hellish shootout only impedes its deadly massacre. Into the sublevels of Metropolis quickly haunts the gun battle with soulless vampire assassins hunting to capture or kill the demigod John Mark and his human conspirator accessory Harlan.
He kicks through a door designed to seal out rain and swing outwardly and runs into the halogen tunnels of the upper levels in labyrinth deep. A hallway behind open doorway of the comment booth allows a glimpse in passing of a gymnasium, this upper level a school of sorts, debris thrown in clamor alarms him of the pursuit advancement by a heap of vampire henchmen. Several layer downward through the edifice they chase, grief without friend or foe alike many innocent wounded. Through corridor and swinging doors he bounds for fleeting escape, fears rush him and innocent spectators flush crowd the halls as classes dismiss for interval, large students sack him only to be discarded like paper dolls thrown against the wind. Alarms sound as authority detects the several hunters chasing John without authentication, they begin shooting in attempt of clear sight through the masses and he shoots in return. The lights begin to flicker, slowly at first with a distinct interval causing the students to return to the classrooms, and as the lit intervals stammer and shorten sections of the premise become blockaded.
From a distant hallway, he sees a light at the end, choosing to live he flits to escape his pursuant fiends. Expedience if ever offers not preparation for his discovery as the light is from the glass floor of the commons, a transparent area in this school of the old city to view the new city built below it in mines, the heights of the great city beneath another. A startling halt at sight of missing floor he hazards haste and wastes no time in pocketing his gun and pulling to grenades while in quick step, at full pace he charges his grenades and falls spinning to look behind himself to view any followers. With arms spread, he lands backward holding the bombs and falling to thick protective glass begins a tumultuous blast for an opening that brings him to flight.
Singed and smoke clearing evinced of new light he waves to the watching trackers standing around the hole he has created shooting at him.
Isis: “Go after him!”
John falls to the burial city as he watches it rush toward him, he looks back to them this time to see them follow, high above the city below they each plummet one then the next until Isis jumps after him. John aims but does not fire, he waits until he can make a clear shot at Isis and does, placing a bullet into the vampire’s heart. After putting his gun away the shots behind him begin whisking through the air, he turns from the onslaught to the building as he narrows his span and speeds toward the building. His hope is to slide through a window, but instead slams a stoic wall, which reflects him to a terrace balcony level with stern collision, he aches and smokes like a lit loose cigarette, behind him fall his assailants who each pummel the building. Some with graceful landing like gargoyle talons hold and tear to landing atop the structure as if it were a nest, others of ill fate and unfortunate crush in collision at their deaths. Their leader Isis falls discordantly in massive waste of energy disconnected but able to crawl, when the residents come to assist and ascertain the damage and destruction takes a hostage to feed on their lifeblood to replenish his own. John lays in silence at the edge of consciousness.
Isis: “You cannot run demigod.”
John: “I have an idea…”
John draws his weapon and shoots him in the head, then fires on the others with skilled accuracy, though some shots miss or other to less fatal points at their torso he stands and takes true aim with his remaining bullets. Counting each shot, he saves the last for Isis, larger than his minions are he decidedly deserves another shot to the heart. He moves over ledge to a lower larger balcony, faster than the stairs now, the remaining vampires chase after him with great ease, dismounting the building and landing with great ease, one of them leaps and sacks John but is swung full circle into the turbine ventilation unit and liquefied. Second letches with the same leap and tow but thrown instead his turn through a single-width locked door. With dwindling pack, they cannot incarcerate him and he escapes in the building, lower levels add more area, a maze to confine pursuit.
Once confusion discovered and dead bodies recovered the authorities had found, much later in the morgue Isis escapes the mortuary with the blood of the mortician, as many vampires have done before him, half dying and half beyond mortality he raises from death and in vicious reprieve returns to his coffin for much desired rest.