Infernal Revelation : Collected Episodes 1-4 (9781311980007) (20 page)

"You don't know what you're facing,"
Melchizedek said.

Lily turned to him. "Listen to him,
Barny."

A sneer curled Barny's lip. "Call me
Barnabas. I'm done pretending I'm something I'm not. Human? I
always knew there was more to this, more to me. Why fight it? Barny
was a lie, and if you had any sense you'd call yourself
Lilith."

She shook her head, trying to come to terms
with what Barny was saying, and failing. "My name is Lily."

"Hide from it all you want. I won't hide
from Porter, or anyone else."

Melchizedek spoke quietly. "You don't know
how powerful he is."

Barny picked up a burning branch out of the
fire and squinted at it. The wood ignited, incinerated almost
immediately. "I don't care how strong he is. I know how powerful I
am."

Melchizedek drew his shadows around himself.
"You're a fool. If you fight, you will die. Or worse."

Barny flicked his hand, scattering wood-ash
to the breeze.

"Come with us to El Paso, Lily," Delilah
said. "There's nothing left for us here."

"I can't abandon my family," Lily said. "Not
if there's a chance we can fix this."

"We're your family," Delilah said.

"No," Gideon pulled her aside. "Let her
stay. We can't force her. We have to respect her decision."

Tears welled up in Delilah's eyes.

"Stay with me," Lily said. "I'll talk to my
dad, maybe he can--"

"I'm not willing to wager our lives on
that." Gideon put a protective arm around Delilah.

"Gideon--"

"I'm sorry." He shook his head. "We've made
our choice."

Delilah's voice was quiet, almost
indistinct. "If... if things don't work out here, come find us in
El Paso."

Gideon turned to Jessie. "What about
you?"

"I made the choice to defy my parents," the
girl said. "And stand with my brothers and sisters."

"You don't have to, Jessie," Lily said.

Jessie walked over to her. "If you're
staying, I will stay with you. Come what may."

Lily gave her a quick hug. "What about you,
Melchizedek?"

"I know too well what Porter can do." He
turned to Delilah. "Do you need a lift to El Paso?"

"No." she said quickly. "No, that won't be
necessary."

"Very well. If we don't meet again--" he
trailed off.

The shadows around him deepened, and he was
gone.

Lily stood with Jessie, watching as Gideon
left with Delilah, feeling like everything had gone utterly,
terribly wrong, but unable to figure out any way to fix them.

She noticed that someone else was missing.
"Where's Barny?"

Jessie shook her head, a small frown on her
face.

***

It didn't take the
local police long to find Porter once he'd crossed the threshold
into town. He stood patiently, waiting in the middle of the street,
while a pair of patrol cars pulled to a stop ahead of them. Two men
emerged from each vehicle, one of them badly beaten, sporting a
cast and a neck-brace.

"Porter!" the injured man called.

His badge identified him as Sheriff. Porter
remembered having met the man once. Cedric, Cedar, Cermak.
Something. Didn't matter.

"Bob said you were on your way. Didn't
expect you to get here so quickly."

Porter watched the man, taking the measure
of his injuries. The bruising wasn't defensive. Whomever had hurt
him had done it quickly.

"I just want you to know that my men and I
are here to offer you our full support to resolve this situation as
quickly and with as little collateral damage as possible."

Porter folded his arms.

The Sheriff watched him, waiting, and grew
nervous. Porter could smell its stink.

"So if there's anything you need--"

He spoke. "You know where they is?"

The Sheriff stopped. His voice had that
effect on people, sometimes.

"Sometimes the town youths meet at the old
drive-in theater, up that way."

Porter turned.

The Sheriff took a step after him. "If
there's anything we can do?"

The killer looked back over his shoulder.
"Stay out of my way."

He stepped, leaving the patrol cars far
behind him.

CHAPTER THREE

The man didn't look
like much to Barnabas.

Kinda homely, kinda dumpy. Long gross
stringy hair, dirty-ass coat. Built like a barrel, in bad need of a
shave.

At least thirty, thirty-five. An old
man.

Barnabas grabbed the baseball bat out of the
back of his pickup.

"You're the big bad boogie man that has Mel
pissing his pants?" he called. "You're who I'm supposed to be
afraid of?"

The man stopped, still two dozen yards
away.

"Porter, right?" Barnabas walked towards
him, idly swinging the bat against his leg. "Why exactly are you
such a holy terror?"

Porter didn't respond.

Barnabas found the silence a little
off-putting. "You look like a homeless guy. That your deal with
Carter? Three squares and a cot if you kill children for him?"

He'd been hoping to get more of a rise out
of the guy, but there was no back and forth, no chatter. No
banter.

"Nothing to say?" Barnabas studied the
stranger, and realized that the man wasn't evaluating him back. He
was just... watching. Waiting. Unconcerned. There was no boasting,
no bragging, no mind games, just a steady predatory gaze, and that
unnerved Barnabas more than anything.

And then Porter moved. One moment he was
half a block away, and the next he was grabbing Barnabas by the
collar and belt, spinning him, hurling him across the street into
the side of his truck. Barnabas felt his spine take the impact,
felt the metal deform and bend around him, and then Porter was
there again, pulling Barnabas by the shoulders, driving the broad
flat of his knee into the young man's gut.

The breath left Barnabas's lungs in an
explosion of pain, and he was air-born again, thrown over Porter's
shoulder into the street. He hit the asphalt and bounced, rolled,
coming to rest in the gutter.

He sucked in air, exhaling it with a ragged
cough, surprise and fear finally catching up with him. Porter was
fast, impossibly fast, and hit harder than Gideon.

He rolled over, onto his side, onto his
knees, and scrambled to his feet. Each movement felt slow, way too
slow, and he expected the stranger to be upon him at any moment. He
spun wildly, looking for his opponent.

Porter was still standing next to his truck,
his eyes watching him with dispassion.

Barnabas hadn't been ready, and it had cost
him. Maybe he'd underestimated--

Before the thought could even complete
itself Porter had crossed the distance between them. Barnabas
struck out reflexively, swinging the bat at the flutter of
movement. He felt a moment of savage hope when it connected, but
the man's form seemed to melt away before his strength, turning
what he was sure was a solid hit to a glancing blow. Porter
followed its momentum to spin around Barnabas.

The jock found himself grappled from behind
and hurled backwards, flipping head over heels into and through
someone's bay windows.

He lay, stunned, bleeding from several small
cuts onto a plush living room carpet. He was dimly aware of a woman
screaming, and wished she'd shut up and give him a hand.

A shadow cast itself across him, and he made
out Porter's bland features looming above him. The man crouched,
reaching with dirty fingers for his face.

"No!" Barnabas screamed, terror breaking his
daze.

He felt a momentary tingle, and then a rush
of air as the carpet around his body burst into flames.

Porter drew back, but Barnabas grabbed the
hem of his coat. "Burn you rotten bastard! Burn!"

He concentrated, clenching his muscles, and
the very air surrounding him ignited.

His grip burnt through the man's coat and he
lost sight of Porter through the flames, drawing satisfaction from
the last vision of the man trying to shield his face with his
hands.

***

Lily had been running
towards the sounds of violence since her supernatural hearing had
first picked them up, and was nearly blinded when the house ahead
of her had erupted into flames. She skidded to a stop, recoiling
from the sudden wave of heat, turning away from the
fireball.

"Barny!"

He came stumbling out of the flames, naked
and hairless, leaving singed footprints as he staggered across the
lawn. He made it almost all the way to the sidewalk before
collapsing.

She ran to his side, sliding in the grass
beside him. "Barny! Are you okay?"

He rolled onto his back, coughing. Though
unburnt, his body was red and swollen with what would probably
become ugly bruises. "Did I get him? Porter?"

Lily looked up at the raging house fire.
"Yeah. I think so."

A pained smile crossed Barny's split lips,
and Lily could see that his teeth were bloody. "Good."

"Can you walk?"

"Nothing broken." He rolled to his side with
a wince. "Far as I can tell."

She helped him to his feet. "What was he
like?"

"Strong. Fast."

"Faster than I am?"

He shook his head. "In a different way.
Can't explain it. He didn't move normally."

Lily looked back at the fire. "You did
that?"

"He was killing me. What choice did I
have?"

"I'm not judging you," she said. "I just
hope that Mrs. Richards got out okay."

Barny didn't turn to look. "Yeah."

A dark shape leapt through the flames,
scattering debris around itself. Lily watched with fascinated
horror as Porter landed in a crouch on the lawn, then slowly
stood.

"Fuck!" Barny yelled. "Run, Lily! Run!"

His terror lit a fuse within her and Lily
grabbed Barny, gathered him up in her arms, and ran off down the
street. His nudity didn't matter, the awkwardness of carrying him
like a baby didn't matter. His weight felt like nothing in her
arms, and fear lent wings to her stride.

"Shit! Duck! Shit!" Barny screamed, staring
past her.

Instinctively she obeyed, ducking to the
street and shielding him with her body. A great grinding and
scraping came from behind as a late-model sedan hit the ground and
skipped, barely clearing the top of her head. She chanced a glance
backwards and saw Porter standing in the street, another sedan
raised impossibly over his head.

"Go!" Barny shouted. "Go! Go!"

Lily ran to the side, the car smashing
against the pavement where she'd been standing just a moment
before. Her flight was panicked, terror driven by the inhuman
killer behind her.

"Look out!" Barny yelled.

She hooked to the left around an old
sycamore as something massive whizzed through the air past her. She
rounded the corner of one of the houses lining the street.

There was an explosion behind her as Porter
smashed through its living room, sending dagger-shaped wood
fragments hurtling through the air.

"He's inhuman!" she screamed.

"Go!" Barny yelled.

Porter was suddenly in front of her,
sawn-off shotgun in his hands.

Lily back-peddled and he fired.

Barny cried out in pain as his shoulder
exploded into a mass of blood and tissue.

"Shit!" She held him tight and ran the other
way, down the street.

"Left!" Barny yelled. "Go left!"

She turned, running up someone's -- Jessie's
-- lawn.

"Jump!"

Again she obeyed, her speed and the strength
of her legs carrying her through the second floor window into the
hall. She stopped to get her bearings, and a moment later heard a
crash from the floor below.

"Go!" Barny said, his voice weaker.

She had no idea how much blood he'd been
losing, but felt its sticky warmth running down her back, felt his
grip on her shoulders weakening.

Porter appeared at the second-floor landing
but she was already running, moving past him to leap through the
window at the other end of the hall. She landed, took two steps,
and jumped again, sailing through the air.

When she was young and just starting track,
she'd had dreams like this, running so fast she could escape the
earth's pull.

Of course, in those dreams she wasn't
carrying a naked bleeding boy and nobody was trying to kill her,
but you couldn't have everything.

***

Lily didn't realize
she was heading home until she saw her father's car in the
driveway.

"I'm going to get you help," she said to the
boy in her arms.

Barny didn't respond. She hoped he wasn't
dead.

She ran in through the front door.
"Dad!"

Her father wasn't in the living room.

She lay Barny down on the couch, carefully,
gently, and ran into the kitchen. "Dad!"

She ran up the stairs and into the hall,
calling for her father, gripped with fear that he'd been hurt, that
he'd abandoned her.

He was waiting in his room, next to a
half-packed suitcase.

"Dad!" she said. "I need your help! Barny's
been shot!"

"Oh, darling," his eyes were red from
weeping. He reached for his adopted daughter, but she backed
away.

"He's bleeding!"

"There's nothing you can do, Lily. It's too
late."

"No, he's not dead. Where's mom?"

He straightened and went back to his
packing. "She's on her way to her mother's."

"Porter's after me," she said. "And
Barny."

He stopped, staring at his precisely folded
socks. "I know."

"How do we stop him?" she asked. "What do I
do?"

He started folding again, faster,
furiously.

She grabbed his arm. "Daddy!"

"Nothing!"

She recoiled from his anguished cry.