Peter Clines - Ex-Communication

Behind the demon, Max leaped from the rooftop and drifted toward the ground. Clouds of light billowed off his hands like steam. His lips were moving, but St. George couldn’t hear the words.

Cairax Murrain stalked forward and St. George threw himself at it. He thought of every Conan and Beastmaster movie he’d watched as a teenager and brought the sword down with a roar. The demon put up its arm and the blade bit into the flesh. It felt like cutting into a tire. The hero pulled back and swung the blade again. It cut into the meat of Cairax’s forearm and hit a bone that could’ve been solid rock.

Something snapped in the sword’s handle. St. George felt the twang of breaking metal and the blade rattled against the guard. He pulled his arm back and the sword fell apart in his hands. The pommel and guard dropped away. The blade tipped and fell back over his shoulder. They all clattered on the pavement.

He stood there for a moment holding the hollow hilt.

The demon let out a deep laugh. “You face me with toys, little hero?” it rumbled. “You dishonor your namesake.”

There was a blur of motion, a hot rush of pain, and St. George was hurtling through the pet store. He shredded his way through two sets of shelves, smashed some glass terrariums, and plowed into a checkout counter. He hit the wall, felt the cinder blocks crack, and dropped to the floor. His chest was wet, and a few spots of blood spread across his tattered shirt.

The floor was trembling, like a low-level earthquake, and by the time he recognized the rhythmic tremor as footsteps Cairax had grabbed him by the head and hurled him back out into the street. He struck the rear of a car. The bumper wrapped around him, the trunk collapsed, glass shattered, and St. George found himself in the backseat.

The ground shook again. He pushed himself free of the wreckage. He grabbed the loose bumper and swung it like a bat. It hit Cairax in the side of the head with a shriek of metal on bone, tore in half, and sent the demon stumbling back. St. George leaped into the air, pulled back his fist—

—and plunged back to the ground. He hit hard, and the confusion of it dropped him to his knees. He tried to push off, to get himself moving again, and the ground pressed up against him. His body was too heavy to move. His head settled against the ground and he heard Cairax Murrain moving behind him. It was chuckling.

Max stepped into his line of sight. The sorcerer pressed his palms hard against each other, his fingers tickling his wrists. A crackle of static surrounded his hands, like the St. Elmo’s fire that marked doomed ships.

“Told you to watch your back,” said Max. He walked over to stand by the demon. “You’re not going to believe me, but I’m really sorry it had to go down like this.”

MY FIRST THOUGHTis “No.”

Just “No” over and over again. I end up shouting it. Not that anyone can hear me. When you’re dead, people tend to ignore you.

Of course, I’m not really thinking or shouting. I have no language in this state. Barely have consciousness. Just enough to know how screwed I am. The image of Burgess Meredith with broken glasses appears and vanishes before I can understand why it’s relevant.

This can’t be happening. It’s stupid. It’s ridiculously stupid. I planned for everything. Broken wards. Magical interference. Demonic vassals. I even took precautions against my death. Only an amateur wouldn’t.

I didn’t think about undeath, though. I mean, why would I have planned for a zombie apocalypse? The whole idea of it’s ridiculous.

This can’t be happening!

I died. I know I died. The death shudder, the last breath, the silver cord parted. I even pissed myself. I’m dead. I should be free, but

I’m trapped in here.

No. No. No. No. No.

The Marley’s gone wrong. I can feel it. It’s like a door that opened enough to let you see out, but not enough to fit through it. I’m bound here. Right here.

I’m trapped in a zombie. Stuck inside the reanimated corpse of a demon. A scrap of consciousness in the back of a dead brain. At least until one of these trigger-happy soldiers decides to …

Oh. Oh, no. Oh, Jesus. I’m bulletproof. They can’t shoot me in the head. I’ll be trapped in here forever. No, no, no, no!

No, be calm. No, I won’t. Stealth had the Dragon putting down all the superhuman types who changed. He’ll find me—find Cairax—break his neck or crush his skull, and that’ll be that.

Of course … we fought once before and it’s not like he hurt me. Hurt Cairax. He won the fight but only because I backed off.

I realize I’m much more conscious than I should be. Enough so that I can understand that I shouldn’t be able to think about why I can think. Something has changed in the dark corners of the mind. Something has been added to the mix, something not-me I can differentiate myself against.

And then I realize what it is. I realize what’s just woken up in here with me. Oh, no, no, no, no, this can’t be happening. This cannot have gone so wrong. It just can’t.

The Marley’s trapped him in here, too.

Trapped him in here with me.

I scream for a month. Or maybe two.

If I was using vocal cords to scream, they would’ve gone hoarse ages back. They might have snapped. But this is a silent scream. It goes on and on.

Again, I have no language, because I’ve been blinded to everything except the pain. Now that we’re alone at last, Cairax Murrain is making me pay for binding him in the Sativus. Lacking his usual tools, he’s forced to use what he has at hand to torture me.

My memories. Memories of every scrap of physical, emotional, or spiritual pain I’ve ever suffered. Thirty-three years of agony.

I’m hurled across the room during an exorcism and my elbow breaks as I hit the far wall. I find the letter from Marie-Anne saying she’s left me for Anselm. A tooth cracks as I bite down and the cold air hits the nerve. The flu wrenches my stomach and my throat convulses from food and bile going the wrong way. An excruciating hangover at nineteen. The bitter cold outside the womb. A sharp kick to the testicles six months before I die, followed by a rifle butt to the jaw.

And of course, again and again, the feeling of my flesh turning inside out when I use the Sativus medallion to take possession of Cairax’s body. Every muscle in my body spasms. Horns tear through my forehead. New teeth shred my gums and lips. Talons rip open my fingertips. He appreciates the irony in this. What was torture for him is now torture for me. After my death I make the transformation tens of thousands of times more than I ever did in life.

After two months of screaming, or maybe three, he stops. I don’t know why. When he talks to me, it’s with the voices you hear in the back of your head. He speaks with the sound of imagined conversations and half-remembered dreams.

It shall give me great pleasure to destroy you for this disgrace, little soul .

I shout back, “No.” My voice only sounds different because I want to be heard. In this place, in the state we’re in, neither of us has a real voice.

To make one such as me a mortal plaything is a dishonor beyond measure. To sully the unholy titles of Cairax Murrain with acts of selflessness and charity. To make mortals cheer my name when they should shriek and cower and beg. Such a painful insult must be returned in kind .

I manage another “No” before he begins again.

My screams are the chorus for a symphony of pain that goes on for another four or five months without interruption. Almost half a year with every agony of my life on a loop. The tattoo needles stab down again and again. A kneecap shatters on my twenty-eighth birthday. Three fingers burn on the stove when I’m four. An absolutely gorgeous dead woman bites down on my tongue and tears it away. My skin crawls with infection while the straps bite into my wrists and ankles. My dog, Muggsy, hit by a car and dies in my arms when I’m nine. A broken nose in a bar fight. Marie-Anne tears away a clump of my hair for the doll and leaves my scalp bleeding.