Peter Clines - Ex-Communication

“But we’re safe inside, right?” Barry waved his arm at the window. “That’s the point of the symbols.”

Max shook his head. “We’re not safe. This isn’t remotely safe anymore. This is like being out in the middle of the ocean, a thousand miles from anything, on a six-dollar pool raft with a great white shark circling you. Except the raft has a hole in it and the shark’s armor-plated, on meth, and has a laser cannon mounted on its skull. That’s about how ‘safe’ we are.” He started to pace. “The wards only block his essence. They meant he couldn’t make someone pop inside the Mount. Once he’s got a body he can walk over those hexagrams just like you or me. And then everyone in here dies.”

Danielle played with the edge of the map on the table. “You sure do talk a lot about how awful this thing is.”

“Because I know you’re not getting it,” snapped Max. His pacing carried him from one side of the room to the other. “You all keep thinking back to George beating up a zombie, half-breed version of Cairax and telling yourself it’s no big deal.”

“And this is worse?” asked St. George.

“It’s the worst thing ever. Period. Every book you’ve read, every movie you’ve seen, this is a thousand times worse. This is one of the things every single villain you’ve ever heard of is based off because he’s so evil, knowledge of his existence leaks between dimensions. He’s so terrifying that when a bunch of idiot Satanists set him loose in the fourteenth century his name entered the language and became the word for plague.”

Freedom crossed his arms. On opposite sides of the room, it made him and Stealth look like a set of mismatched bookends.

“Remember when he bit you?” Max asked St. George. “Yeah, you do, don’t you? First time anything had hurt the Mighty Dragon in, what, two years at that point?”

The hero reached down and rubbed his arm.

Max nodded. “You want to know what you tasted like, George? You tasted scared. Fucking terrified. I was dead and in a possessed body and I could taste your fear on my tongue. That’s how strong it was.”

He stopped pacing and pointed at the window. “That thing out there, his whole existence boils down to two things. Fear and death. Someone being scared of dying is like sex for him if sex gave you a full stomach and did your laundry. Someone dying is him getting that rush on New Year’s Eve at midnight. And once he’s got a host, believe me, it’s going to be midnight here in the Mount for a very, very long time.”

The room got quiet. They all stared at the window. Max put his hands on the table and let his head hang.

“Okay,” said St. George. “What do we have to do?”

The sorcerer shook his head. “I’m not sure,” he said. “This is way bigger than anything I ever planned on. I mean, even in my worst-case scenarios I never figured he’d get a usable host. Once he’s flesh …” Max shrugged.

“You claim the demon was once set loose during the Middle Ages,” said Stealth. “How was it defeated then?”

“I don’t know,” said Max. “The details are fuzzy. The popular theory is Pope Clement the Sixth tricked him into touching the fisherman’s ring. Instant discorporation, but it killed Clement, too.”

“So we need to find the ring,” said Barry. “Okay.”

“It is reasonable to assume the ring is on the far side of the planet,” said Stealth. “At last report, Pope Benedict was sequestered in the Vatican during the outbreaks. It is likely the ring is still in that region.”

“Knowing where it is doesn’t help us if we can’t get there,” said Freedom. He looked at Stealth. “Unless there’s more you’ve been holding out on me, I don’t think we have a transcontinental jet anywhere in the Mount.”

“I could fly it,” said St. George.

“No offense, sir, but flying four hundred miles out to Krypton was tiring for you. We’re talking more than twenty times that, half of which is over open ocean.”

“Bigger issue,” added Danielle. “It all involves going outside and crossing those spell-circles.”

“The ring’s a nonissue,” said Max. He waved a hand at Barry. “The only one who could get there, find the ring, and get back in time would be Zzzap, and he wouldn’t be able to pick it up.”

“Why are you certain of this timeline?” asked Stealth.

“I told you, there’s a bunch of rules to this. For any sort of conscious possession to work, astral cords have to be intertwined, souls married, contracts have to be agreed on, all sorts of stuff. It takes time.”

“Contracts?” asked Freedom.

“Yeah, contracts. Agreements. A demon can’t just jump into your body like it’s a car with the engine running. You have to agree to it. It can lie and cheat and bend words, but there needs to be an agreement. A contract.” He shook his head. “I think our best bet is going to be killing him.”

“Killing him?” Freedom echoed. “Can we do that?”

“I didn’t say it was a good bet. I just said it was our best.” He pressed his fingers against his temples for a moment. “We’re trying to kill a concept, an idea made flesh. So we have to fight it with an idea that’s just as powerful. We’ll need a sword.”

“A sword?” repeated Freedom.

“Is there an echo in here?” Max furrowed his brow at the oversized captain. “Yes, a sword. A long piece of metal with a handle and a pointy end, symbolic since the Garden of Eden.”

“Does it have to be a certain type of sword,” asked Barry, “like a broadsword or a claymore, or would anything do?”

“We’re not going to beat it with a collectible lightsaber, if that’s what you’re asking,” Max said. “It needs to be a real weapon, not a display replica or something. Preferably silver or silver-plated. Even just silver inlays on the blade would be great. If it’s spilled some blood, too, great. Past that, anything goes.”

“There are three museums with historical edged weapons within a mile of the Big Wall,” said Stealth, “and very likely several dozen personal collections with functional swords. However, all of them are beyond your wards.”

“You said I was strong enough for the possession,” said St. George. “Does that mean I could make it out to find a sword?”

Max shook his head. “Strong enough to survive it. It’d still feel like getting kicked repeatedly in the balls by a horse, even to you. Plus he’s got a few million exes out there. Each body gives him a couple seconds to beat the crap out of you.”

“I could take it.”

“Be realistic, George. You know how hard he can hit.”

“I could fly—”

“Even if you flew out of here, he could go for the possession and then beat you unconscious when you fell out of the sky.”

“If we cannot go beyond the seals,” said Stealth, “how do you expect to fight Cairax?”

Max shrugged and stared at the table for a moment. “We wait for him to come here.”

“Whoa.” Barry raised his hand. “Weren’t you just saying him getting in here was extremely bad? Like crossing-the-streams, end-of-life-as-we-know-it bad?”

“We don’t have a lot of options,” said Max. “First things first. We need a sword.”

“The scavengers,” said Freedom.

“What about them?” asked Danielle.

“They carry a lot of nonstandardized weaponry,” he said. “Lady Bee tells me some of them use knives, machetes, other things they find out on runs. Maybe someone’s found a sword and brought it back here.”

“Only one of the scavengers carries a sword,” said Stealth. “Daniel Foe wears a replica katana in a back sheath. He wears it as an attempt to look imposing, hoping to impress Lynne Vines. He has never drawn it.”