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Description

A Fort on the Outskirts of Tremor City
USA, sunset

                A group of strange women stood in front of their heavily fortified house, watching a group of children play in their front yard.

“So…you really needed my help with this?” Absinthe, the green pixie, asked her companions.

“No,” the woman on her right shrugged, speaking through a thick Romanian accent, “But you were doing yourself no favors by staying cooped up inside.”

“Hmm,” the woman to her left lifted her gray and heavily stitched together hand into the air and let it drop down on Absinthe’s head, “Fresh air.”

“Alright, alright,” the green lady scoffed, pushing her arm away, “Easy Mongo.”

“Hrrm,” the bigger woman huffed, folding her arms in frustration, “You mean.”

“Uh, hey guys,” another woman above them, on the fort’s ramparts, called out, pointing to a spot off in the distance, “I think we got company.”

                They looked in the direction she indicated and saw the shimmer in the air before they noticed the sound, a piercing shriek that split the air and cracked like a whip before depositing two people practically on their doorstep.

“Well, that’s different,” Absinthe observed, pushing herself up into a standing position and popping her knuckles, “Let’s roll out the welcome mat.”

“No,” Illyra, the Romanian woman insisted, “Get the kids inside, we’ll handle this.”

“And you were the ones giving me shit about not getting enough exercise.”

“Hey!” Ichabod shouted at them, “Just to be clear, we’re not coming to start anything, we just want to talk.”

“Why does that voice sound familiar?” Absinthe wondered, but the larger woman on her left was already moving.

                She pushed past the green lady and Illyra, stomping straight into Ichabod as he walked forward. When the two would have collided, she grabbed him by the shoulders and sniffed him.

“Hi Anoushka,” Ichabod smiled nervously while desperately trying to signal for Melody to stay calm.

“Hmm, You different,” the large woman noticed, putting him down and checking the metal arm under the sleeve of his coat, “You hurt?”

“Perpetually,” Ichabod grinned genuinely, “But, I’ll survive.”

“Hrmm,” Anoushka nodded, then looked over at Melody, “Where little one?” she sniffed at Melody this time, “Mmm, this not her.”

“She…um,” Ichabod turned away, “She’s not here anymore.”

                Anoushka grunted sadly and plopped her hand on Ichabod’s head, almost knocking him over as she tousled his hair.

“Cute as you two are together,” Absinthe insisted as she stepped between them, “What do you want?”

“I think you’ve figured it out,” Melody stated.

“Probably,” Absinthe grumbled, and nervously wrung her hands, “But he’s not here.”

“You can find him,” Ichabod told her bluntly.

“Most definitely, but I won’t,” Absinthe sighed, “If you’re here then you’re hunting him, I’m not about to let you…”

“Actually he thinks I’m dead.”

“Wha…the Hell did you pull that off?”

“Not important.”

“We cut a deal with Collins mother to hold over his soul after he died and then brought him back after Collin’s back was turned,” Melody explained.

“Huh, yeah, that’d do it,” Absinthe mused, then looked at them curiously, “Then what the Hell are you doing here? I mean, you guys are essentially in the clear, so, just…hide.”

“Um, you notice how your husband hasn’t come back home?” Ichabod offered.

“Partner but…” Absinthe folded her arms, “Okay, I’m listening.”

“It’s complicated, but…basically we tricked him into turning his attention to the guy who hired him and he’s probably in over his head by now.”

“Uh-huh,” Absinthe’s eyes narrowed, “And you tricked him into this?”

“Well…we knew he would and we didn’t stop him.”

                In response, Absinthe pulled back her arm and punched Ichabod in the gut hard enough to lift him off of his feet and left him coughing on the ground.

“Meh,” Absinthe shrugged afterwards, “Fair is fair, let’s find the idiot.”

“Kaff…g-glad we coul…could come to an understanding,” Ichabod grumbled as he tried to collect himself, “But we don’t need your help, we just need some blood.”

“A locator spell?” Absinthe considered, “That could work, but, I’d prefer to ride along on this if you…”

“I’m hearing two heartbeats,” Melody insisted, cutting her off and drawing a look from everyone present, “I’m monitoring you to see if you’re lying,” the angelic statue admitted, “But I’m hearing two heartbeats, you don’t have two hearts, do you?”

                Absinthe just stared back at her in shock.

“Um…” She finally managed to stammer out, “Hey, buy me a drink first why don’t ya…”

“You’re pregnant,” Ichabod surmised.

“Well…yeah, I mean, you didn’t know that? What were you talking about you wanted blood for.”

“You two have been screwing for a long time,” Ichabod snapped, then jabbed his thumb at Melody, “She figured she could make it work,” he sighed, shaking his head, “We can’t take you with us.”

“It’s cute you think you have a choice but…”

“No!” Ichabod stepped away, turning his back on Absinthe, “Jesus Christ, no…”

“Hey!” she reached out, trapping him in a telekinetic field, “Where the Hell do you think you’re go…”

                Absinthe paused in her threat when Melody reached out and placed a finger against her throat. The two shared a look and Absinth relented, letting him go and discontentedly folding her arms.

“You shouldn’t make choices for people,” Absinthe grumbled.

“I’m not,” Ichabod snapped back, “I’m making a choice for Me, because ‘I’ am not putting your baby in danger.”

“Where are you going?” she repeated.

“Somewhere else,” Ichabod muttered.

“So you don’t have a plan-B do you.”

“I’ll figure something out!”

“Tell me that you won’t kill him!” she shouted, then sighed, raising her hands in surrender, “Okay, fine, I am grief with child and unfit for combat.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“I want my child to be born with a father, I want him Here!” she pointed to the ground in front of her, “Tell me you will make that happen, and I’ll show you where he is.”

“I… can’t make that promise.”

“Yes you can.”

“Really it’s up to him.”

“But I’m not talking to him,” she stepped towards him, looking at Ichabod intently, “I’m talking to you, tell me, you’ll bring him back home.”

“I’ll do…” he tried to be firm with her, but looked into her eyes and cracked, “I promise.”

“Good,” she reached out and placed her thumb against his forehead.

    Closing her eyes, she reached out with her mind and searched for Collin and finding him half a world away. For the briefest of moments, their tree minds jointed together, showing him images of alleyways, dark tunnels, skulls, corpses, a street sign, and the Eiffel Tower.

“Did you catch all that?” she asked, breaking the connection.

“Paris?” Ichabod wondered.

“I guess so,” she moved away, “Have fun.”

                He watched her walk away and called out.

“I meant what I said,” Ichabod told her, “Everything in my power, everything I can…”

“I know,” Absinthe told him without looking back.

Paris, France
The Catacombs Beneath the Sewers
A Few Hours Later

                The thing in Collin’s hands was still moist, rotted to its core, but taught and spongy, not nearly as brittle as the rest and much harder to disable. Cutting it wasn’t an option, the remaining flesh absorbed most of the damage, protecting the bones and more important organs beneath. So he grabbed it instead, ignoring the pinpricks to his side from the knife it wielded, and tried its best to use to gut him. Firmly grasping the flailing corpse between his hands, Collin stepped on its groin and started to pull at its neck until the spine finally severed and came slithering out of its shoulders like a sickening wet straw.

                The corpse’s body went limp and he focused on the chattering, gibbering skull in his hands, squeezing the head until it popped like rancid cottage cheese, and he shook the remains off of his fingers to join the pile of bodies on the floor. It had taken weeks to reach this point and hours just to get this far. He had a guide, of sorts, a thug working for the Organization, that Collin was strong arming into cooperation, but that man hadn’t lasted longer than the top layer of the sewer system. Now, he was alone, in the dimmest of lights, finding his way through not by instinct or knowledge, but by the trail of victims they kept sending his way.

                In silence he trudged ahead until the clotted gore across the ground finally ran clean and stopped tugging at his shoes as he attempted to pass. Running his hand over the wall, Collin tried to move forward, but had to admit that he was hopelessly lost. With no better idea, he closed his eyes and sat down at the center of the cavern, trying to stretch his ears to, possibly hear something, a voice, a noise, a clue. He was surprised when someone touched him on the shoulder, and almost turned about to cut them, but managed to control himself.

“You don’t belong here son,” the old homeless man insisted, “And if you sit too long on the floor, the rats’ll be after you.”

“I’ll manage,” Collin insisted, pulling himself up and starting to walk away.

“Look, son, you’re new to this, right?” the old man offered in a compassionate voice, “Living on the streets, it’s not easy, but you need to learn the ropes if you want to survive.”

“Wait, you’ve lived down here for a while?”

“Well, yes, I…”

“Is there any place down here that you would call dangerous?” Collin wondered, “Some place you would say is ‘off limits’ or just…genuinely evil?”

“That’s a bit…odd, but…I suppose yes.”

“Good,” Collin turned back to him, “Lead me there.”

“Are you certain?”

“Look, I got people to kill, either help or get out of the way.”

“Well, if you insist son,but…There’s no where to lead you.”

“But you just said…” Collin started only to get punched in the face before he could finish the sentence.

“There’s nowhere to lead you,” the old man smile down on him, raising a deformed cancerous lump of an arm, “Because you’re already there.”

“Well, at least this won’t get boring,” Collin smirked before launching himself at this new opponent.

MI-79 Headquarters, Southern Wales
At That Moment

                Scarlet stood before the group that had gathered in the briefing room, file in hand.

“When I formed this team, I made you all a promise,” she told them sincerely, “I swore I would never lie to you, all of our missions,” she opened the file and scattered the pages across the conference table in front of them, “On the table, up front and honest, our targets, and our goals.”

“Our mission,” she took a deep breath and tucked her hands behind her back, speaking to them as professionally as possible, “Is to Kill Victor Crowley, a demon sorcerer whom we believe will be using his abilities and position to summon a form of ungodly eldritch horror which will destroy everything in its path, but that is not why I’m asking you to do this.”

“This has not been passed through committee, we have not been sanctioned to act, we have no back-up, and if any of us are apprehended, we will be sent to jail, disavowed and abandoned, for my order, for my vendetta,” she closed her eyes and waited, “Having said this, I will understand if any of you wish to leave now, but understand, accepting this mission means there is no turning back.”

“Ma’am,” Slice stood up from the table to his full and impressive height, hands clasped in front of him as he head his chin up, “I think I speak for everyone in this room when I say,” he looked her in the eyes as he spoke, “Damn the consequences, we would all follow you into Hell.”

“Don’t ever try to speak for me white boy,” Rojo spoke over a low chuckle in his throat, “But, yeah, why not, we’ve done crazier shit for less.”

“Well…” Harriet put in, as she looked over one of the file pages, her feet propped up on the table as she leaned back in her chair, “I don’t know about crazier, but, you’re not the only one with a vendetta.”

                She tossed down the page with her father’s picture on it and looked away.

“I am moved by your words,” Scarlet told them, opening her eyes at last, “And what about you Mr. Crowley.”

“Huh?” Ichabod suddenly perked up, he had been attending the meeting as more of a token gesture than anything and had all but drifted off while waiting.

“We are relying on you as our expert in this matter,” Scarlet continued, “You know the man after all.”

“I…guess…” Ichabod nervously glanced over at Melody who only shrugged, “I mean, I’ve only fought the man once before, he’s…um…he’s using a Dullahan as a familiar, currently, and it has a fairly devastating physical attack…”

“Anything else?” Scarlet practically demanded.

“I…pfft,” Ichabod threw up his hands in defeat then collected himself, “The man’s arrogant, but it’s not because he’s stupid, he’s obscenely well versed in magic and the power’s he’s working with are nearly unfathomable, so, on the plus side, he should at least be easy enough to locate, if you were trying to probe me for a weakness to exploit,” Ichabod shrugged, “He’s a demon now, and all that that entails, but he should have had enough time to close off the major gaps in his armor, and, he’s been dabbling in necromancy and, if I were a betting man, I’d say he’s probably holed up in the catacombs, meaning he’s likely got more than enough fodder to rain down on us.”

“You are just a ray of sunshine aren’t you,” Rojo scoffed.

“Also there’s the Garuda,” Ichabod continued on, “She’s probably still working with him, powerful fire based abilities, regeneration, durability, and the only way I can figure to kill or incapacitate her is to douse her in water, like an ocean or a river.”

“…Oh, no, please go on,” Rojo laughed madly, “Tell us about his five-pound cock that fire’s purple lasers from the tip.”

“They’re green actually,” Ichabod responded in a deadpanned voice, “Don’t put anything past him, DON’T underestimate him, if you get the chance, go for the kill and never look back,” he looked around the room at everyone staring at him with their jaws hanging open and shrugged, “Okay, that’s all I got.”

“Very well,” Scarlet walked around the room handing out headsets, “I will be communications and off-site ops, secure channel is 3, as always, and my field name for this mission will be Red-Flag,” finishing her rounds, she nodded to the group and gave them all a stern look, “We leave in Twenty ladies and gentlemen, use the time wisely.”

Back in the Catacombs

                One monster had turned to twenty before Collin had time to react and, once again, he was standing ankle deep in blood and gore, breathing hard and trying to find his bearings.

“I must say Mr. Napier,” a voice called out from the darkness, “You do good work.”

                Collin looked towards the voice only to be blinded by a sudden flash of light and attacked from behind. Mecelit Tak grabbed hold of his arms, burning him while lifting him off the ground. He lashed out at her, stabbing at her with dozens of scythes, forcing her to let him go, but, as he dropped, the Dullahan came out of nowhere, impaling him in the chest and hurling him into the floor. Collin hopped back to his feet and lunged at the Dullahan ready to rip it apart, but wound up tripping forward when a skeletal hand erupted from the floor, clutching at his feet. He hit the dirt again and they started to appear in numbers, holding him down in their undead grip.

“And you truly do such great work,” Victor emerged, swaggering towards Collin with a lit flashlight in one hand, “My work of course.”

                With a shout of rage, Collin managed to pull himself free and struggled back against his attackers. The Garuda came after him again and he tackled her down before cutting her throat, then traded blows with the Dullahan before managing to slice its arm off. At last, he turned to Victor and came charging at him, only to meet a wall of bone. Victor raised his hand to summon a grasping mass of tendrils, all formed from twisted, rotten spines, that instantly bound Collin to the spot and slowly began to pull him down into the dirt.

“Ah, yes, power,” Victor continued on, pacing around Collin’s body as he screamed in pain, “That’s all anybody ever thinks about.”

                In the background, the others recovered, Mecelit Tak’s wounds erupted into plumes of flame before sealing themselves, and the Dullahan turned to shadows, evaporating, then swallowing his severed arm in the mist and reforming, complete once more.

“But that’s only a part of the equation,” Victor sighed, “Scaling correlates to everything, a thousand gigawatts of power also means a thousand gallons of blood, a thousand hours of prayer, a thousand…well you get the idea, oh, no sir, an undertaking such as this cannot be done without the proper preparations, not the least of which,” he knelt down in front of Collin who had been pulled into the ground almost up to his waist, “Defining the parameters of the affected area.”

                Collin snarled back at him, unable to move, unable to attack, until a scythe burst unexpectedly from his chest and aimed itself for Victor’s face, only to be stopped by the Dullahan. Victor didn’t even flinch.

“Don’t hold it against us,” the older man shrugged, “But, then again you did agree to a partnership, so, we used you, to draw us a nice tidy little circle of blood for our ritual.”

“The only help I’ll give you…”Collin growled back as the spines choked off his oxygen.

“It doesn’t have to be like this you know,” Victor pulled back, standing up straight, “I’ll make you the same offer I made to my own son.”

“The one you killed?”

“Don’t play the saint,” Victor smirked, “Whose hands are cleaner, the man carrying the severed head, or the one with the axe? Meh, something to ponder as you struggle to breathe.”

                With a sudden burst of strength, Collin’s arm burst free from its bindings and stuck itself into the ground, clawing at the floor while he was pulled down up to his shoulders.

“I’ll get out!” he declared, “I’ll get out and I’ll kill you!”

“Or I’ll bury you again,” Victor shrugged, “Though, hopefully, by that time, we will be gone, Fare thee Well Mr. Napier, and better luck next time.”

Description

A Fort on the Outskirts of Tremor City
USA, sunset

                A group of strange women stood in front of their heavily fortified house, watching a group of children play in their front yard.

“So…you really needed my help with this?” Absinthe, the green pixie, asked her companions.

“No,” the woman on her right shrugged, speaking through a thick Romanian accent, “But you were doing yourself no favors by staying cooped up inside.”

“Hmm,” the woman to her left lifted her gray and heavily stitched together hand into the air and let it drop down on Absinthe’s head, “Fresh air.”

“Alright, alright,” the green lady scoffed, pushing her arm away, “Easy Mongo.”

“Hrrm,” the bigger woman huffed, folding her arms in frustration, “You mean.”

“Uh, hey guys,” another woman above them, on the fort’s ramparts, called out, pointing to a spot off in the distance, “I think we got company.”

                They looked in the direction she indicated and saw the shimmer in the air before they noticed the sound, a piercing shriek that split the air and cracked like a whip before depositing two people practically on their doorstep.

“Well, that’s different,” Absinthe observed, pushing herself up into a standing position and popping her knuckles, “Let’s roll out the welcome mat.”

“No,” Illyra, the Romanian woman insisted, “Get the kids inside, we’ll handle this.”

“And you were the ones giving me shit about not getting enough exercise.”

“Hey!” Ichabod shouted at them, “Just to be clear, we’re not coming to start anything, we just want to talk.”

“Why does that voice sound familiar?” Absinthe wondered, but the larger woman on her left was already moving.

                She pushed past the green lady and Illyra, stomping straight into Ichabod as he walked forward. When the two would have collided, she grabbed him by the shoulders and sniffed him.

“Hi Anoushka,” Ichabod smiled nervously while desperately trying to signal for Melody to stay calm.

“Hmm, You different,” the large woman noticed, putting him down and checking the metal arm under the sleeve of his coat, “You hurt?”

“Perpetually,” Ichabod grinned genuinely, “But, I’ll survive.”

“Hrmm,” Anoushka nodded, then looked over at Melody, “Where little one?” she sniffed at Melody this time, “Mmm, this not her.”

“She…um,” Ichabod turned away, “She’s not here anymore.”

                Anoushka grunted sadly and plopped her hand on Ichabod’s head, almost knocking him over as she tousled his hair.

“Cute as you two are together,” Absinthe insisted as she stepped between them, “What do you want?”

“I think you’ve figured it out,” Melody stated.

“Probably,” Absinthe grumbled, and nervously wrung her hands, “But he’s not here.”

“You can find him,” Ichabod told her bluntly.

“Most definitely, but I won’t,” Absinthe sighed, “If you’re here then you’re hunting him, I’m not about to let you…”

“Actually he thinks I’m dead.”

“Wha…the Hell did you pull that off?”

“Not important.”

“We cut a deal with Collins mother to hold over his soul after he died and then brought him back after Collin’s back was turned,” Melody explained.

“Huh, yeah, that’d do it,” Absinthe mused, then looked at them curiously, “Then what the Hell are you doing here? I mean, you guys are essentially in the clear, so, just…hide.”

“Um, you notice how your husband hasn’t come back home?” Ichabod offered.

“Partner but…” Absinthe folded her arms, “Okay, I’m listening.”

“It’s complicated, but…basically we tricked him into turning his attention to the guy who hired him and he’s probably in over his head by now.”

“Uh-huh,” Absinthe’s eyes narrowed, “And you tricked him into this?”

“Well…we knew he would and we didn’t stop him.”

                In response, Absinthe pulled back her arm and punched Ichabod in the gut hard enough to lift him off of his feet and left him coughing on the ground.

“Meh,” Absinthe shrugged afterwards, “Fair is fair, let’s find the idiot.”

“Kaff…g-glad we coul…could come to an understanding,” Ichabod grumbled as he tried to collect himself, “But we don’t need your help, we just need some blood.”

“A locator spell?” Absinthe considered, “That could work, but, I’d prefer to ride along on this if you…”

“I’m hearing two heartbeats,” Melody insisted, cutting her off and drawing a look from everyone present, “I’m monitoring you to see if you’re lying,” the angelic statue admitted, “But I’m hearing two heartbeats, you don’t have two hearts, do you?”

                Absinthe just stared back at her in shock.

“Um…” She finally managed to stammer out, “Hey, buy me a drink first why don’t ya…”

“You’re pregnant,” Ichabod surmised.

“Well…yeah, I mean, you didn’t know that? What were you talking about you wanted blood for.”

“You two have been screwing for a long time,” Ichabod snapped, then jabbed his thumb at Melody, “She figured she could make it work,” he sighed, shaking his head, “We can’t take you with us.”

“It’s cute you think you have a choice but…”

“No!” Ichabod stepped away, turning his back on Absinthe, “Jesus Christ, no…”

“Hey!” she reached out, trapping him in a telekinetic field, “Where the Hell do you think you’re go…”

                Absinthe paused in her threat when Melody reached out and placed a finger against her throat. The two shared a look and Absinth relented, letting him go and discontentedly folding her arms.

“You shouldn’t make choices for people,” Absinthe grumbled.

“I’m not,” Ichabod snapped back, “I’m making a choice for Me, because ‘I’ am not putting your baby in danger.”

“Where are you going?” she repeated.

“Somewhere else,” Ichabod muttered.

“So you don’t have a plan-B do you.”

“I’ll figure something out!”

“Tell me that you won’t kill him!” she shouted, then sighed, raising her hands in surrender, “Okay, fine, I am grief with child and unfit for combat.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“I want my child to be born with a father, I want him Here!” she pointed to the ground in front of her, “Tell me you will make that happen, and I’ll show you where he is.”

“I… can’t make that promise.”

“Yes you can.”

“Really it’s up to him.”

“But I’m not talking to him,” she stepped towards him, looking at Ichabod intently, “I’m talking to you, tell me, you’ll bring him back home.”

“I’ll do…” he tried to be firm with her, but looked into her eyes and cracked, “I promise.”

“Good,” she reached out and placed her thumb against his forehead.

    Closing her eyes, she reached out with her mind and searched for Collin and finding him half a world away. For the briefest of moments, their tree minds jointed together, showing him images of alleyways, dark tunnels, skulls, corpses, a street sign, and the Eiffel Tower.

“Did you catch all that?” she asked, breaking the connection.

“Paris?” Ichabod wondered.

“I guess so,” she moved away, “Have fun.”

                He watched her walk away and called out.

“I meant what I said,” Ichabod told her, “Everything in my power, everything I can…”

“I know,” Absinthe told him without looking back.

Paris, France
The Catacombs Beneath the Sewers
A Few Hours Later

                The thing in Collin’s hands was still moist, rotted to its core, but taught and spongy, not nearly as brittle as the rest and much harder to disable. Cutting it wasn’t an option, the remaining flesh absorbed most of the damage, protecting the bones and more important organs beneath. So he grabbed it instead, ignoring the pinpricks to his side from the knife it wielded, and tried its best to use to gut him. Firmly grasping the flailing corpse between his hands, Collin stepped on its groin and started to pull at its neck until the spine finally severed and came slithering out of its shoulders like a sickening wet straw.

                The corpse’s body went limp and he focused on the chattering, gibbering skull in his hands, squeezing the head until it popped like rancid cottage cheese, and he shook the remains off of his fingers to join the pile of bodies on the floor. It had taken weeks to reach this point and hours just to get this far. He had a guide, of sorts, a thug working for the Organization, that Collin was strong arming into cooperation, but that man hadn’t lasted longer than the top layer of the sewer system. Now, he was alone, in the dimmest of lights, finding his way through not by instinct or knowledge, but by the trail of victims they kept sending his way.

                In silence he trudged ahead until the clotted gore across the ground finally ran clean and stopped tugging at his shoes as he attempted to pass. Running his hand over the wall, Collin tried to move forward, but had to admit that he was hopelessly lost. With no better idea, he closed his eyes and sat down at the center of the cavern, trying to stretch his ears to, possibly hear something, a voice, a noise, a clue. He was surprised when someone touched him on the shoulder, and almost turned about to cut them, but managed to control himself.

“You don’t belong here son,” the old homeless man insisted, “And if you sit too long on the floor, the rats’ll be after you.”

“I’ll manage,” Collin insisted, pulling himself up and starting to walk away.

“Look, son, you’re new to this, right?” the old man offered in a compassionate voice, “Living on the streets, it’s not easy, but you need to learn the ropes if you want to survive.”

“Wait, you’ve lived down here for a while?”

“Well, yes, I…”

“Is there any place down here that you would call dangerous?” Collin wondered, “Some place you would say is ‘off limits’ or just…genuinely evil?”

“That’s a bit…odd, but…I suppose yes.”

“Good,” Collin turned back to him, “Lead me there.”

“Are you certain?”

“Look, I got people to kill, either help or get out of the way.”

“Well, if you insist son,but…There’s no where to lead you.”

“But you just said…” Collin started only to get punched in the face before he could finish the sentence.

“There’s nowhere to lead you,” the old man smile down on him, raising a deformed cancerous lump of an arm, “Because you’re already there.”

“Well, at least this won’t get boring,” Collin smirked before launching himself at this new opponent.

MI-79 Headquarters, Southern Wales
At That Moment

                Scarlet stood before the group that had gathered in the briefing room, file in hand.

“When I formed this team, I made you all a promise,” she told them sincerely, “I swore I would never lie to you, all of our missions,” she opened the file and scattered the pages across the conference table in front of them, “On the table, up front and honest, our targets, and our goals.”

“Our mission,” she took a deep breath and tucked her hands behind her back, speaking to them as professionally as possible, “Is to Kill Victor Crowley, a demon sorcerer whom we believe will be using his abilities and position to summon a form of ungodly eldritch horror which will destroy everything in its path, but that is not why I’m asking you to do this.”

“This has not been passed through committee, we have not been sanctioned to act, we have no back-up, and if any of us are apprehended, we will be sent to jail, disavowed and abandoned, for my order, for my vendetta,” she closed her eyes and waited, “Having said this, I will understand if any of you wish to leave now, but understand, accepting this mission means there is no turning back.”

“Ma’am,” Slice stood up from the table to his full and impressive height, hands clasped in front of him as he head his chin up, “I think I speak for everyone in this room when I say,” he looked her in the eyes as he spoke, “Damn the consequences, we would all follow you into Hell.”

“Don’t ever try to speak for me white boy,” Rojo spoke over a low chuckle in his throat, “But, yeah, why not, we’ve done crazier shit for less.”

“Well…” Harriet put in, as she looked over one of the file pages, her feet propped up on the table as she leaned back in her chair, “I don’t know about crazier, but, you’re not the only one with a vendetta.”

                She tossed down the page with her father’s picture on it and looked away.

“I am moved by your words,” Scarlet told them, opening her eyes at last, “And what about you Mr. Crowley.”

“Huh?” Ichabod suddenly perked up, he had been attending the meeting as more of a token gesture than anything and had all but drifted off while waiting.

“We are relying on you as our expert in this matter,” Scarlet continued, “You know the man after all.”

“I…guess…” Ichabod nervously glanced over at Melody who only shrugged, “I mean, I’ve only fought the man once before, he’s…um…he’s using a Dullahan as a familiar, currently, and it has a fairly devastating physical attack…”

“Anything else?” Scarlet practically demanded.

“I…pfft,” Ichabod threw up his hands in defeat then collected himself, “The man’s arrogant, but it’s not because he’s stupid, he’s obscenely well versed in magic and the power’s he’s working with are nearly unfathomable, so, on the plus side, he should at least be easy enough to locate, if you were trying to probe me for a weakness to exploit,” Ichabod shrugged, “He’s a demon now, and all that that entails, but he should have had enough time to close off the major gaps in his armor, and, he’s been dabbling in necromancy and, if I were a betting man, I’d say he’s probably holed up in the catacombs, meaning he’s likely got more than enough fodder to rain down on us.”

“You are just a ray of sunshine aren’t you,” Rojo scoffed.

“Also there’s the Garuda,” Ichabod continued on, “She’s probably still working with him, powerful fire based abilities, regeneration, durability, and the only way I can figure to kill or incapacitate her is to douse her in water, like an ocean or a river.”

“…Oh, no, please go on,” Rojo laughed madly, “Tell us about his five-pound cock that fire’s purple lasers from the tip.”

“They’re green actually,” Ichabod responded in a deadpanned voice, “Don’t put anything past him, DON’T underestimate him, if you get the chance, go for the kill and never look back,” he looked around the room at everyone staring at him with their jaws hanging open and shrugged, “Okay, that’s all I got.”

“Very well,” Scarlet walked around the room handing out headsets, “I will be communications and off-site ops, secure channel is 3, as always, and my field name for this mission will be Red-Flag,” finishing her rounds, she nodded to the group and gave them all a stern look, “We leave in Twenty ladies and gentlemen, use the time wisely.”

Back in the Catacombs

                One monster had turned to twenty before Collin had time to react and, once again, he was standing ankle deep in blood and gore, breathing hard and trying to find his bearings.

“I must say Mr. Napier,” a voice called out from the darkness, “You do good work.”

                Collin looked towards the voice only to be blinded by a sudden flash of light and attacked from behind. Mecelit Tak grabbed hold of his arms, burning him while lifting him off the ground. He lashed out at her, stabbing at her with dozens of scythes, forcing her to let him go, but, as he dropped, the Dullahan came out of nowhere, impaling him in the chest and hurling him into the floor. Collin hopped back to his feet and lunged at the Dullahan ready to rip it apart, but wound up tripping forward when a skeletal hand erupted from the floor, clutching at his feet. He hit the dirt again and they started to appear in numbers, holding him down in their undead grip.

“And you truly do such great work,” Victor emerged, swaggering towards Collin with a lit flashlight in one hand, “My work of course.”

                With a shout of rage, Collin managed to pull himself free and struggled back against his attackers. The Garuda came after him again and he tackled her down before cutting her throat, then traded blows with the Dullahan before managing to slice its arm off. At last, he turned to Victor and came charging at him, only to meet a wall of bone. Victor raised his hand to summon a grasping mass of tendrils, all formed from twisted, rotten spines, that instantly bound Collin to the spot and slowly began to pull him down into the dirt.

“Ah, yes, power,” Victor continued on, pacing around Collin’s body as he screamed in pain, “That’s all anybody ever thinks about.”

                In the background, the others recovered, Mecelit Tak’s wounds erupted into plumes of flame before sealing themselves, and the Dullahan turned to shadows, evaporating, then swallowing his severed arm in the mist and reforming, complete once more.

“But that’s only a part of the equation,” Victor sighed, “Scaling correlates to everything, a thousand gigawatts of power also means a thousand gallons of blood, a thousand hours of prayer, a thousand…well you get the idea, oh, no sir, an undertaking such as this cannot be done without the proper preparations, not the least of which,” he knelt down in front of Collin who had been pulled into the ground almost up to his waist, “Defining the parameters of the affected area.”

                Collin snarled back at him, unable to move, unable to attack, until a scythe burst unexpectedly from his chest and aimed itself for Victor’s face, only to be stopped by the Dullahan. Victor didn’t even flinch.

“Don’t hold it against us,” the older man shrugged, “But, then again you did agree to a partnership, so, we used you, to draw us a nice tidy little circle of blood for our ritual.”

“The only help I’ll give you…”Collin growled back as the spines choked off his oxygen.

“It doesn’t have to be like this you know,” Victor pulled back, standing up straight, “I’ll make you the same offer I made to my own son.”

“The one you killed?”

“Don’t play the saint,” Victor smirked, “Whose hands are cleaner, the man carrying the severed head, or the one with the axe? Meh, something to ponder as you struggle to breathe.”

                With a sudden burst of strength, Collin’s arm burst free from its bindings and stuck itself into the ground, clawing at the floor while he was pulled down up to his shoulders.

“I’ll get out!” he declared, “I’ll get out and I’ll kill you!”

“Or I’ll bury you again,” Victor shrugged, “Though, hopefully, by that time, we will be gone, Fare thee Well Mr. Napier, and better luck next time.”