Atlantis Unleashed (46 page)

For our final grand gesture, I propose that we truly merge into one being, more powerful together than either of us could ever be apart,
the Nereid said, a dark glee in his tone.

“If you're going to go, go big,” Justice said, laughing. “Let's do it.”

As one, both sides of his being—both halves of his soul—crashed open the doors and shields and walls they'd built up between them over the long years of his existence. Power, finally unfettered, raced through his body and energized him with the towering force of a typhoon.

Laughter burst out of him at the sheer joy of so much power sweeping through his body—waves and waves of pure, silvery power. Suddenly, he knew what he might be able to do.

There was a chance. A tiny one, but still a chance that he was going to live through this.

Just one final thing. Bending down, he found a smooth stone on the ground, far from the riverbank where it had been polished by the water. Opening up his heart and his soul, he focused all of his emotion to absolute truth and poured it into the stone.
I love you, Keely, and will love you until all of the oceans vanish from the desolate plains of the earth. Know now and always that you are my heart, my soul, and my life.

He clenched the stone so tightly in his fist that it hurt and then slowly opened his fingers. If his plan failed, it would be enough.

It would have to be enough.

Justice was still laughing with the joy and force of the power crashing through his body when he reached the front of the temple. The two vampires who stood at the entrance sneered at him.

“Laugh now, mortal, for our leader will kill you slowly.”

“Nice. Original with just that hint of melodrama,” he said, thinking of Ven's usual responses to situations like this. “Now give me the girl.”

“Move back and kneel to your better, fool,” the uglier of the two vampires said. “He comes now.”

“I kneel to none but Poseidon,” Justice said calmly, drawing his sword. Poseidon's Fury gleamed like polished silver under the twilight moon. “Bring me the girl now or the two of you shall die cursing your names.”

They looked uncertainly at each other, clearly hearing the promise in his voice. But then the sound of many voices came from the entrance, and a swarm of vamps came out of the temple.

He'd been way, way off in his estimation. There were nearly one hundred of them, give or take a dozen.

He was a dead Atlantean walking.

But by all the gods, he could bluff.

“Bring me the girl now,” he repeated, this time talking to the peacock of a man in the pseudo-ancient Mayan getup. Maybe he thought it made him look more important. Kingly, even.

Justice didn't give a damn what he looked like. He just wanted Eleni.

“Bring me the girl, or I will cause the biggest shock wave you have ever seen to explode every single one of you into an oozing pile of slime.”

The peacock bared his fangs. “I am Gultep'can, and you are a petitioner at the feet of my greatness.”

Justice shrugged. “Not much for feet, greatness or otherwise. I only petition to the greatness of Poseidon, and not very often.”

“Your sea god is a puny weakling compared to the glory of Anubisa,” Gultep'can sneered.

“I know your goddess, up close and personal,” Justice said with loathing. “But we can play ‘my god is greater than your goddess' later. Right now, you have ten seconds to bring me that girl, alive and unharmed, or you are all going to face the true death on the eleventh.”

Gultep'can's eyes flickered just enough for Justice to realize that he was buying the bluff.

“Bring the girl,” Gultep'can ordered. “I am the mighty Gultep'can and I proposed this bargain, and so I do decree that it will be so.”

Yeah, way to save face. But Justice didn't care how it happened, so long as it happened. For now, the vamps were keeping a healthy distance. Clearly they'd heard what had happened to their buddies the night before.

But that wouldn't last long if he didn't back up his threats with action. And the problem was that he just didn't know if the shock wave would kill Eleni, too, if he released its power. Last night it had only killed vamps, but had that been a fluke? Until he could fully understand and control his new, unified powers, he would not risk her life. If she still had a life to risk.

Finally, his mental countdown at nine seconds, he heard the most wonderful sound in the world. Eleni's tiny voice.

“Señor Justice! You came! I knew you'd come!”

One of the vamps came out of the entrance, dragging her by her thin dress, and then let her go at a gesture from Gultep'can. She ran toward Justice as fast as her little legs could carry her and jumped into his arms. He hugged her quickly and then put her down at his left side so his sword arm was free.

She trustingly slipped her hand in his and looked up at him. “When you make the beautiful waterspouts, can I watch?”

He squeezed her hand. “Eleni, I don't have time for games right now. You are going to head back to the village for me, over that ridge, okay?” He pointed up the slope exactly at the point where Keely and Alejandro lay, hidden from view.

“But I want to stay and help,” she said.

Justice tried to be patient with the traumatized child in spite of the fact that dozens of vamps were skulking closer and closer to them. He put the stone in her hand and folded her fingers over it.

“You are a very brave girl, but you can help me most by doing what I ask. Give this to Keely for me, Eleni. It's very important. Now, please go and find—”

“Keely and Alejandro, yes, I know. They're right over that hill,” she said artlessly, tightly holding on to the stone. “Will they let me help load the shotguns?”

Her innocent question, born of her psychic gift, galvanized the vampires like a lightning strike through water.

“You dare to try to betray our bargain?” Gultep'can roared. “Kill them!”

“Run,
now
, Eleni,” Justice shouted over the din. “I'll protect you while you get away.
Run!
”

Eleni ran. He barred the way to her, sword flashing and striking death into any vamp who tried to get past him. He fought like he'd never fought before, but there were too many. They came at him from all sides, striking and biting and clawing, and soon he bled from a score of wounds, but he managed to keep any of them from following Eleni.

“We're here!” Keely's voice rang out and Justice saw her step out from behind a tree, shotgun braced against her shoulder. “Eleni, come to me! Run faster!”

Gultep'can screamed out commands and his minions went running in every direction. “Get her! Get the child! Kill Justice before he can bring the earth's anger again!”

Four of them rushed Justice, grabbing him by each of his arms and legs and sinking four sets of fangs into him. He threw back his head and howled out his pain and rage, but they were vampire strong, and he was bleeding from dozens of wounds. Four against one was too much.

Yet another wrenched his sword out of his grasp, but the hilt set the bloodsucker's hand on fire and the flames rushed up its body until it was a stinking pile of ash with a sword lying on top of it.

Justice watched in anguish as more of them started up the hill toward Keely and Eleni. “Keely,” he roared. “Get out of here.”

Eleni reached Keely as he watched and immediately dropped into a ball at Keely's feet. The thunder of shotgun fire boomed out; first once, then twice, and Justice saw that Alejandro was in the game, too. As he watched, every one of the villagers stepped out of their hiding places, guns aimed and firing.

They thought they were protecting Keely, he realized, despair flooding him. All they were doing was getting themselves killed, and her with them.

Keely's heart started beating again when Eleni reached her, safe and seemingly relatively unharmed. But it stopped again when she realized Justice was buried under a sea of vampires who were slowly biting and clawing his flesh from his body.

There was no way anybody could survive that.

With shaking hands, she settled the stock of the shotgun more firmly into the hollow of her shoulder, aimed at one of the vamps holding Justice, and fired. The report nearly deafened her, and she reflexively flinched. When she opened her eyes, she saw the now-headless vampire's body falling to the ground.

Another shotgun blast sounded from very near her, and another vamp's head exploded. Alejandro.

She turned to him and he gave her a thumbs-up, smiling grimly. “If we're going to go out fighting, let's at least give them a fight,” he yelled.

She nodded, no time or energy for talking, and took aim again.

In the space of seconds, two of the vamps holding him had been blasted to the true death. Justice grinned at the sight of Keely and Alejandro standing practically shoulder to shoulder, firing on the vamps.

Two to one was great odds, never mind the blood pouring down his face from a head wound. He slumped into a sudden deadweight, going down and taking his two remaining captors with him. It was a simple trick to snap one's neck and then roll over the other one, grab his sword, and chop through its neck. In a flash, he was back up on his feet and back in the fight, slicing and stabbing and hacking.

Gultep'can waded into the battle, his eyes glowing a vicious red, and tossed his own vampires away from him so he could clear a path to Justice. “I will kill you myself,” he snarled.

“Come and get me,” Justice taunted, beckoning.

A space cleared out between and around them, just like it had in the schoolyard battles Justice had fought as a child. What a circle life was. He'd started out fighting bullies in a ring and now he would die that way.

But he was taking Gultep'can with him.

He shifted a little, so he could see Keely. The vamps had stopped stalking her as they all rushed over to watch their nasty-ass leader mop the jungle floor with Justice.

“Read the stone,” he shouted as loudly as he could. “And get the hells out of here. Now!”

A rushing movement at the corner of his peripheral vision alerted him, and he turned fast, but not fast enough to avoid the dagger Gultep'can hurled at him. He caught it in the ribs and staggered back. He ripped the dagger out of his chest and hurled it on the ground, then started laughing again. “Is that all you got? Big bad vampire god wannabe and all you got is a little knife?”

Gultep'can, enraged beyond all reason, howled and screeched and dove straight at him. Justice blocked the worst of the blow and sliced his sword out as best he could in the close quarters, slicing a long gash up the vamp's abdomen.

“You'll die slowly for that one,” Gultep'can screamed, holding in something that looked a lot like a piece of his intestines.