htm Hybrid Misfit (13 page)

Gene held his breath as he waited for the response. By throwing her support behind them, Mab had effectively silenced those who would have sat on the sidelines. Her words challenged them and also made it clear that those who abstained would not be kindly regarded.

His sigh of relief was washed away by the voices that rang out promising their support. Simon slapped Gene on the back and Gene almost fell over with his friend’s enthusiasm.

Gene knew he should be happier, but he couldn’t dispel a sense of unease. He longed to escape this tedious back and forth game the rulers played and check on Beth.
She’s fine and I’m turning into Simon, worrying about her safety all the time. Besides, if she needed me, she’d make a wish.

But no matter his reassurance to himself, he couldn’t stop the niggling doubt, and judging by Simon’s faraway expression, he wasn’t alone.

But politics forced him away from his unease.

Chapter Ten

I landed in Limbo on my knees, dry heaving and spitting. Not exactly an elegant way to arrive.

“And this is the abomination who is supposed to change Heaven and Hell?” said a guttural voice. The question was followed by a kick in my ribs. The force of the blow threw me back, and I lay on the dusty ground sucking in air.

A musical voice, that would have sounded beautiful if not for the condescension in its tone, replied “Yes, it’s hard to believe this human born creature has the power to destroy the status quo.”

Their insults really annoyed me. Wasn’t it enough I’d bravely decided to trade myself for my friends, did they have to degrade me, too? I sprang to my feet as anger fired up my adrenaline. I found myself facing the epitomes of good and evil. On the left, there was a huge black demon, replete with horns, coal red eyes and a general nasty demeanor. On the right was perfection itself in the form of a male angel with curly blond ringlets, eyes of a summer blue sky dressed in a white gown; the purity of which matched that of the angel’s outspread wings. What a shame the pretty exterior didn’t extend to its interior.

It baffled me that a creature thought to be good could be involved in something so evil, but as my father once told me, good and evil were all in the perception of the perpetrator. I hadn’t understand what he’d tried to explain at the time, but the wisdom he’d imparted made sense later when I met the doctors who experimented on me. They too thought they worked for the good of man. I disagreed.

But questions of right and wrong would have to wait. I had a more important mission. “Where are my friends?” I asked boldly.

The two beings stepped aside and I saw my friends, tied to stakes with gags stuffed in their mouths. Claire with a cut on her temple stared at me with eyes round with fright, her cheeks marked with tears. Lana, her face battered, looked fierce and I knew, if she could free herself, she’d say to hell with giving up. She’d fight to the death.

My heart squeezed tight. “I came as you asked. Now let them go.”

Then came the answer I’d expected. “Why would we do that?” replied the demon. “Once you’re dead, I look forward to taking the feisty one back to Hell with me. While Gabriel here has shown an interest in the little bunny.”

“That wasn’t the deal.” My fury bubbled inside of me. Had it just been me against the demon and angel, I was pretty sure I’d prevail, but behind my friends I could see the demonic horde on one side and the angelic detachment on the other.
Hot damn, just what is it they’re afraid I can do? That’s some serious backup considering they’re just going up against one hybrid misfit.

I wanted to know why they feared me. And then I wanted to make it come true. I’d had plenty of time to ponder the words of the prophecy and I had a theory, one that didn’t fully form until I found myself in Limbo again. All around me, the greyness called to me, it sent tingles throughout me and I could almost hear it whisper—/blood/. A plan unfolded in my mind—the odds of it succeeding were pretty slim and relied on several unknowns, but the consequences of doing nothing loomed over me even worse.

The demon laughed. “And who are you going to tell? You came here alone, you stupid Nephilim.”

“I am not a Nephilim,” I stated. I pushed my wings out with a shower of grey feathers and straightened my spine. The angel Gabriel’s eyes widened. I tilted my chin stubbornly. “I am a Hybrid Misfit, and I am done taking shit from either one of you. If you won’t free my friends, then I guess I’ll do it myself.”

I launched myself in the air before they could grab me and with a rapid flap of my wings, hurtled towards my friends. I yanked the dagger I’d hidden on my person when I’d arrived under the guise of puking and sliced at the bonds that held my friends.

I’d no sooner pulled Claire’s gag free than she shouted, “Behind you!”

I ducked without looking and swept my feet in a semicircle. I snagged the black demon who staggered, revealing the angel with a gleaming sword behind him. I rolled on the dusty ground vaguely noticing a rumble. I hopped up to my feet and sprinted away from my friends in the hopes of luring my foes after me. It worked, kind of. While Gabriel and his demon friend stalked me with furious eyes, I could see their respective armies advancing on my friends.

I wanted to scream in frustration. But I hadn’t given my friends enough credit, for while Claire was a bunny and low on the food chain, Lana wasn’t.

Free of her gag and more pissed than I’d ever seen her. I halted and gaped as a sudden breeze, smelling strongly of brine, ruffled her green tinged hair. I could see her aura swell as she gathered power. Then she opened her mouth and sang. Even though her melody wasn’t directed at me, I staggered under the weight of her anger. It halted the advancing army in its tracks, but not the two advancing on me.

The moment had arrived, did I fulfill the prophecy in the way I’d deciphered it, or did I call for help, and postpone this moment to another time?

I am not a coward. And I’m tired of running.

I met the angel and demon, my gray wings and clothing a symbolic mix of the two strains of DNA bound to me. I was neither good nor evil; I was just me, something in the middle. I danced for my survival. Hopping and twisting to avoid the fatal blows they threw at me, I waited for my moment.

There to the left, I saw it. I raised my arm and blocked the black slashing claws of the demon. Burning pain shot up my arm as he opened a large gash in my flesh, the blood instantly welling. My arm fell limply to my side just as the angel with his silvery sword sliced at my other unprotected arm.

I grinned as I sank to the ground on my knees, my blood spraying from my matching wounds. I peered up at the beings, one so ugly it hurt and the other so bright it hurt even more. “Thank you,” I said through the pain scalding its way through my system.

The demon frowned at me, but the angel’s eyes opened wide and he stared down at my blood which dripped in fat plops onto the grey, dusty ground.

I could still faintly hear Lana singing and as I stared down at the lifeless surface that soaked up my blood like I sponge with nothing in return, I realized, a tad too late, that my theory was perhaps wrong.
I don’t understand. I translated the fairy Queen’s words; Hail the blessed one for her blood shall destroy the boundaries.
I was certainly bleeding, but unfortunately, I didn’t hear or see any sign that I’d fulfilled anything other than my own death.

I slumped forward onto the dusty ground as my life force leached from me to disappear into the parched wasteland. The shadows of the pair who’d struck the killing blows, covered me.

I made a wish.
Gene, I need you.

Chapter Eleven

Simon saw Gene’s face blanch.

“We need to go now,” the Djinn announced. “Beth’s in trouble.”

Simon clasped his friend’s shoulder and without a word of warning to the assembly, they popped dimensions right into a scene of nightmare.

And noise.

Simon winced as a siren’s song vibrated loudly around them. It only took a moment to take in the scene and it wasn’t hard to figure out what had happened given the players. The stakes with hanging strands of rope stood sentry to Lana who sang her siren’s heart out. Claire, brandishing a dagger, stood by her friend, protecting her from two armies that while frozen for the moment, were fighting against the siren’s spell. All that, however, paled at the sight of Beth’s form crumpled on the ground. Even worse, the figures of a demon and angel stood over her, their arms lifted to deliver fatal blows.

He let his fury go. “No!” With a roar of rage which thundered and shook the ground, his dragon burst forth. It startled the pair who thought to end his
one
’/s/ life, and he gave a snaggle tooth grin as they turned to face them with their puny weapons.

Now they die.

Simon wasn’t the only one enraged. Gene finally lost his cool, his human form disappearing in puff of smoke to reveal his true Ifrit shape. Massive, and formed of a black cloud with glowing eyes, Gene’s voice boomed. “Death to the ones who hurt my beloved. War to those who supported them!”

Simon bellowed in agreement, the ground before him frosting a path to the two whose life would be measured in seconds. Gene whirled from the leaders leaving them to Simon’s mercy—or lack of. While the Djinn threw devastating bombs at the armies, Simon lumbered after the heads of the angelic and demonic forces.

Ice dragons might not get involved often, but when we do, the enemy dies.

The cowards finally stopped scurrying to face him. Simon spared them no quarter. He inhaled and blew out, directing the stream of icy breath. He froze the demon and angel, turned them into living sculptures, unable to move, unable to scream, but able to see their destiny approaching. Simon grinned, a fearsome sight on his dragon visage, then, with a sweep of his paw, he shattered them.

Turning about to aid Gene in destroying the armies who’d gathered, he discovered the tides had changes. Their newly found allies from the meeting had joined them. Ranks of fairies, gnomes, dwarves and a host of other creatures advanced on the armies of Heaven and Hell, who in turn backed away, their resolve wavering without their leaders to bolster it.

A flutter of movement caught Simons’ eye and he turned, only to have his eyes caught by Beth’s still corpse. His rage evaporated in a wave of grief, and he shrank back into his male form. He’d barely changed before was running to her side. He knelt beside her.

Across from her prone body, Gene fell to his knees as well.

“Oh, Beth,” he whispered.

Simon couldn’t stand to see her lying face first in the dirt. Gently, he turned her body with Gene’s aid so she lay on her back.

He couldn’t stop his tears from falling, and they fell on the ground atop the blood sprouting green grass.

What the fuck?

And then shit happened.

As Simon watched with disbelieving eyes, the green fuzz spread outwards from Beth’s body and the blood pooled around it. Simon stood to look and watched as the vivid emerald color rolled across the open plain, its shocking appearance stopping the combatants in their tracks as they watched with slack jaws.

But that wasn’t all. From the ground turned green, vegetation sprouted. Flowers in a rainbow of colors popped free of the ground along with twigs that grew into small saplings with leaves of every color.

Simon pivoted, his eyes tearing as he realized that in giving her life, Beth had woken Limbo. And when the ground quaked a few moments later, it wasn’t hard to surmise that the walls penning Hell and Heaven, good and evil, had come down.

She’s freed everyone.
He wished he could be happier at the thought she hadn’t died in vain, but he was dragon and selfish. He would have forsaken just about anyone or anything to have her alive.

A gust of wind blew up out of nowhere and he turned at the tickling breeze’s insistence. He gasped.

Beth floated above the ground in an upright position. Her arms were spread wide and her head tilted back. She wore a beatific smile and when she opened her eyes, they blazed with a violet light. He sank to his knees, his eyes brimming with tears. Later he’d castigate himself for being less than manly, right now he couldn’t contain his joy that Beth lived, despite her actions.

I honestly thought I was going to die. I lay there face first in the ground and listened to Lana sing, cursing my stupidity.

When the boys arrived at my call, it broke my heart to hear the anguish in their cries of battle. I wanted to lift my head and tell them I wasn’t gone yet. But that took too much effort.

Instead, I closed my eyes and in the greyness of my mind, the tingle that was Limbo became more pronounced. Having my blood bonded with the soil of this place had deepened my connection with it, and more than ever, I could sense the life that brimmed just below the surface.

Well, what are you waiting for?
I asked.

As my heartbeat slowed, I realized what it wanted. Me.

I’ve given you my blood. I’m about to give you my life. What else do you want?

The answer, so simple would have made me laugh had I not rested on the brink of death.

I agreed to the terms.

My choice made, the snowball I set in motion started rolling and changing the world as we all knew it.

The pain that bit so deep into me faded as my body knit itself back together, a gift for the deal I’d made. My heart sped up and the hard ground beneath me disappeared as the power I set in motion lifted me up. I opened my arms wide and took what Limbo, almost an entity in itself, gave me. My lips curved into a smile as it taught me what I needed to know.

Then I opened my eyes and beheld the new realm—my realm.

The first thing I noticed was the color—vivid color everywhere, but on the heels of that I saw the stricken faces of my lovers. Poor Simon on his knees, and Gene, looking grey under his tan.

“You are in so much trouble, my darling,” Gene said in a shaky voice.

I smiled and laughed. “If it’s anything like last time, I can’t wait.”

My body drifted down until my feet touched the new ground of the world I’d helped create. Not that I touched it for long because Simon swept me up in a dragon hug of massive proportions.