Feros and the Underworld Prince (53 page)

“
CHEZA! Airi!”

(Twenty seconds)

“
You watched me take your girlfriend. You watched me take your daughter. Now you get to watch me personally take your wife.” Horus tells me while slowly walking towards Cheza.

My rage takes over as something more primordial than my Drive fuels me. I watch the silver in my arm drain as it turns jet black; I assume that my helmet has done the same. I bring both my arms up to my head and quickly twist it back into place.

(It seems that the Void is recognizing you as being worthy of more power)

“
Hey, Unclefucker!” I call out to Horus with my helmet modulated voice having eliminated the higher pitches.

“
*Sigh* By the gods, do you not know when to give up?” Horus slowly turns around as I stand up.

(Let us show him the true power of the Void)

“
Fine… I guess I’ll just have to beat you to a pulp, shatter both of your legs, and then force you to watch!” Horus shouts and charges at me.

I simply stand there while he closes in on me. He takes a swing at my head and I move my left hand up to intercept it.

“
So it seems that you’ve figured out the trick.” Horus says as a bit of uncertainty crosses his face while I hold the ball in my left hand.

“
Disperse
.” I command.

The ball, handle, and even Horus’s glove, turn to smoke and disappear. Horus now looks very uncertain about the whole situation as he jumps back to put some distance between us. I slowly walk towards him until Horus’s eyes flick upward, at which point I lunge at him as his aura flares. Horus barks a spell that sounds like “Avum-cay,” blasting a hole in the ceiling. I barely miss him as he flies up through the hole; of course a sky god would be able to fly. Horus is already fifty feet away and fifty feet up by the time my boots hit the rooftop, a distance that is too far for me to jump. When I realize that he’s headed in the direction of Shehar’s gate, I roar my frustration at his fading form.

(So you are just going to allow him to escape? Perhaps I was mistaken in choosing you after all)

No. He’s not getting away. I won’t allow it.

I sprint at full speed for the edge of the rooftop before throwing myself at Horus. I quickly sail through the air and close the gap between us to about twenty feet before I start slowing down. Damn it! I’m not going to catch him!

(But Master, you are already within range)

I hold my blackened left arm out in front of me as I start to fall. Eight black tendrils shoot out of the holes in my arm, piercing Horus’s shoulders, hands, thighs, and feet before they hook around each and pull him towards me as he screams in pain. We both start falling like rocks as he isn’t able to fly now too. I point my arm downward and the tendrils move Horus beneath my feet. Horus’s aura starts to flare so I quickly bend down and stick my left hand in his beak while wrenching his head back.

When we are about ten feet from the ground, I withdraw my hand from Horus’s beak and flick my left arm downward. The tendrils slam Horus into the ground with enough force to slow my descent and cause a crater in the tiled ground. The tile underneath me tips me off that I’m not just in any old section of Shehar; we appear to be in the courtyard of the Taj Mahal, if the Taj Mahal had dozens of different jinn that have been interrupted in the middle of a firefight and are now staring at Horus and I. Horus is still dazed when the tendrils lift him upright and pull him into my left fist.

“
THIS! IS NOT! GOING! TO BE! QUICK!” I shout as I play paddle ball, with Horus’s face being the ball and my left fist being the paddle. I’ve just now realized that I sound quite a bit like James Earl Jones when my voice is modulated in this way; it’s not quite as eerie as the other voice, but it is far more badass.

“
THIS! IS NOT! GOING! TO BE! PAINLESS!” I scream, punching Horus’s face with each exclamation so that he can’t cast any spells.

“
YOU ARE! GOING! TO SUFFER! FOR WHAT! YOU HAVE! DONE!” I yell as I reach around to my pack and grasp the hilt of my dagger with my right hand.

Horus’s swollen, bleeding eyes widen as I grasp his tongue with my left hand. He frantically tries to pull his head back when he sees the dagger moving slowly towards his tongue. I enjoy every decibel of his ungodly screeching that erupts as I slowly saw through his tongue; thankfully gods don’t have blood so I don’t have to worry about losing my grip! His tongue will regrow, but I should be able to finish before it gets a chance to.

“
Now that I don’t have to worry about you casting any spells, how about we have some real fun?” I softly ask into Horus’s ear as I retract my helmet, not wanting a filter for what comes next. I hold my left arm out as the tendrils hold Horus up about five feet from me. Focusing completely on how I felt when Addie died, a black ‘snake’ forms in my hand.

“
You know what to do.” I whisper to it.

The snake shoots from my hand and moves around Horus’s body before traveling up it. Unlike before, mere contact with the snake doesn’t result in all of Horus’s skin being immediately stripped off, but it does strip off in the area the snake touches. A few moments later, Horus is completely skinless with the exception of his still feathered head. His screeching causes a shiver that is so deep that I think I might be having a seizure. I wait for about a minute as Horus’s skin regenerates, leaving Horus breathing heavily when it does.

“
Hmm… again.” I command the snake. I close my eyes and drink in the screams as though I were listening to an opera. Three minutes later, Horus’s skin has regrown and he’s stopped screaming.

“
Again!” I command, sounding absolutely giddy. Once again, Horus’s wails do not cease to please me. Another three minutes go by and Horus has healed.

“
Aaaaaaand once more!” I command, my tone implying that I should be bouncing and clapping. I hear myself chuckling in response to Horus’s screaming.

“
You know, it’s just not quite the same without the blood…” I tell Horus once his skin is back. “What should I do next… oh, I know!”

My tendrils lay Horus down while keeping his left hand up. The tendril in Horus’s left shoulder and the one in his hand start to pull in opposite directions while twisting his arm. I pour all the strength I can summon into the punch directed at Horus’s left elbow. At the moment my punch connects, the tendril in Horus’s hand twists and rips his forearm off. I laugh at his screams while the tendril in his hand releases the severed arm as it disintegrates. I repeat the process for his right arm and both legs, the legs taking quite a few more punches to break.

“
And finally, the Coup de Grace!” I exclaim whilst beaming.

The four newly unoccupied tendrils that I have surge into Horus’s chest and weave their way through his ribcage before pulling in opposite directions. I’m not entirely certain that the tendrils have the strength to do it alone, so the tendrils in his shoulders and thighs lift Horus up and repeatedly pull him into my punches. I start to question my capability to do this without my Mu-cutter until, a dozen hard punches to his sternum and collar bone later, I hear a marvelous crack as his ribcage gets torn asunder and his body starts to flake apart.

Going on instinct, I reach my left hand into his chest and place it on the golden mass. The golden mass in Horus’s body turns into black smoke and almost looks like it’s going into my arm. The inside of Horus’s chest seems to melt slightly once the smoke is gone; it kind of looks like lava that has solidified into volcanic rock upon cooling, with its smooth ridges leading back towards the spine. The absence of the golden mass stops the disintegration of Horus’s husk-like corpse, notifying me that my revenge has been achieved and that my fun is over… or is it?

I look around at the armed ifrits in front of me, and the marids and ghouls behind me, while smiling broadly. The soldiers all back up uncontrollably in response to my attention.

“
Oh, look… targets!” I announce just loud enough for them to hear. I feel a ripple of panic start to consume the jinn around me as a blur hits me from my right and tackles me to the ground.

“
COLE! SNAP OUT OF IT!” Cheza screams as she repeatedly punches me in the face.

Cheza gazes into my eyes, carefully observing while she stops punching me. As I wonder what she is looking at, an image is projected into my mind:

My face, contorted with an evil looking smile, but the things that are the most disturbing are my eyes. They’re completely black, and not black like pupils where they will show a reflection; no, my eyes are the kind of black that gives one the impression that they have the ability to suck the light out of a room. Cheza tackles me and my silver irises slowly surface as Cheza punches me. She stops and watches as the black fades to white in my eyes, and as the black fades to silver in my arm.

“
Cheza… I’m so glad that you’re okay.” I tell her, unable to look into her eyes; unable to admit that while I was killing Horus, at some point I had forgotten about Cheza…

“
Idiot… I was worried about you…” Cheza gently replies and leans over to kiss me. She sits up and gives me a stern look while straddling me.

“
You are not allowed to kill anyone else here, do you understand?” Cheza scolds.

“
But mooooooom!” I reply, causing Cheza to smile.

“
Well it seems like you’re back to your usual self. Can we go home now?” Cheza asks as she gets off of me and helps me to my feet.

“
Almost.” I tell her while turning towards the palace and engaging my helmet. The ifrits in front of the palace tense up and start to bring up their weapons.

“
If you have any sense of self-preservation, you will accept this hostile regime change and lay down your weapons! I will give you ten seconds to decide before I decide for you, despite what my better half just said!” I shout to the ifrit soldiers with my voice modulated back to ‘eerie’ levels instead of ‘Sith’ levels. They shoot glances at one another before an ifrit places his rifle on the ground and the others follow suit.

“
Smart choice boys… and girls.” I say as I look at them and spot three ifrits that are about a foot shorter than the rest, realizing that they’re female ifrits, a fact that is difficult to tell under their modern combat armor.

I grab Horus’s husk by the neck and drag it along as I head up the white marble walkway towards the palace. At the end of the walkway are two, twenty foot tall, white marble doors. I attempt to pull them open, but they refuse to budge; they must be barred. I free up my left hand by switching the husk over to my right before placing my left hand upon the center of the doors.

“
I create nothing. I preserve nothing. I only
erase
.” I say aloud as my arm momentarily flushes black.

“
Showoff.” Cheza thinks while grinning at me as the doors turn into smoke, revealing that a large marble crossbar is what was jamming the door; then that too, turns to smoke.

There is a wall of approximately fifty ifrit soldiers at the end of the throne room, about one hundred feet away, all with guns that are trained on me.

“
If you don’t want to end up like this guy, I’d suggest that you put down your weapons.” I tell them as I slowly lower the husk to the ground and slide it over to them with a kick, or at least that had been the plan.

The husk stops at about the halfway point. A single brave soldier walks over to inspect the husk while keeping his FAMAS rifle trained on me. Are the jinn sponsored by the French or something? Everyone and their mother has a FAMAS assault rifle, which is way too many for them to have gotten an illegal shipment; not to mention the fact that I haven’t seen a single gun of a different brand in this whole place. The ifrit taps the body with his foot to make sure that it won’t explode or something before taking a closer look at it.

“
HOLY SHIT! THIS IS HORUS!” The ifrit shouts. “You guys have to get a load of this, he is seriously fucked up!”

“
Yes, he is and I’m the one that did that to him.” I announce. I hear murmurs of disbelief so I turn around towards the door.

“
Can I get a witness!?” I shout to the ifrit soldiers that are standing around and watching me. They just look around at each other and then back at me. “Seriously? I’m trying to do this without having to kill anyone so if someone could just come over here and explain the situation so I don’t have to slaughter my way through your buddies to get to the king, that would be good.”