Hellwalkers

  “It’s like you said, this place was a city, once upon a time. There’s nothing left, though, apart from the bones. Even the metal is crumbling in places. I mean, how long does it take steel to decay?”

  Years, she thought. Thousands and thousands and thousands of years.

  “So where, though?” she asked, prodding the wound in her leg and wondering why she could barely feel it. “I mean where is this place?”

  Marlow shrugged again.

  “Look, it doesn’t matter,” she said, almost choking on the words. “Forget the Engineers, forget everything. We’ve got to try to find our way home, right?”

  He shrugged a third time and she almost punched him for it. He must have seen the emotion there because he nodded.

  “Yeah, we have to try.”

  “So let’s try. Here.”

  She held out her hand and he took it, hauling her to her feet. There was still no real pain in her leg but it was stiff, and weak, and for a moment she wasn’t even sure it would hold her. She took a step—the loose skin flapping—then another, lurching like she was drunk. She wouldn’t be running any marathons, but at least she could move.

  Marlow kept his hand hovering there, ready to catch her. She slapped it away.

  “Don’t worry yourself, Marlow, you won’t have to drag me.”

  She walked out of the shadow of the column, squinting into the day. Her mind was a rowboat on an ocean of terror, she could feel the force of it beneath her, the depth of it, and its power, roiling on the very edge of every thought. It wouldn’t take much, she knew, for her to sink and never recover. It was only the thought of those Engineers, beaten by time into quivering shadows of their former selves, that kept her afloat.

  She wouldn’t be like them.

  She would not be like them.

  “Which way?” she asked, feeling the warm, sandy ash between her toes.

  Marlow scratched his bare chest.

  “I don’t even know what we’re looking for,” he said. “But there’s that.”

  He nodded to the horizon, to the pocket of darkness that sat there, like somebody had taken a pair of scissors and cut a slice out of the day. Pan looked at it for as long as she could, until it felt like her eyes were in a nutcracker.

  “Him,” she said.

  “Who?” Marlow asked, one knuckle between his teeth.

  “The Engineers. They were talking about somebody else. Him.”

  He will not find you here.

  She had no idea who he was, and what he’d do to them if he found them. But what if they wanted to be found? What if that was the only way to get answers? It had to be worth the risk. It had to be better than the alternative.

  Right?

  “Let’s go,” she said to Marlow before she could answer herself. “We’ll find him, whoever he is, sooner or later. We’ll figure this out.”

  That was the one good thing about hell, she realized.

  They were never going to run out of time.

  OLD FRIENDS

  They started to walk. It wasn’t like they could do anything else.

  Pan stumbled away from the broken bridge, down a slope that might have once been a riverbed but which was now just another scar on the face of this forgotten city. It, too, was inches deep with dust and they kicked up peacock tails of it as they walked. It landed in her eyes, impossibly fine, in her mouth, in her nose. She wore it like a second skin, and after a few minutes she stopped trying to wipe it away.

  She stopped trying to think about what it might be, as well, because it wasn’t sand, it was ash. It made her think of a crematorium, and that in turn made her picture the mountain of bones where she had been born here, all those bodies. Was that what she was breathing in? The dust of a billion dead?

  They followed the desiccated river as it wove its way in loose curves. Its banks were too high for them to see over and that was fine with her, because the less they saw of this place, the better. They just kept that impossible piece of missing skyline in sight. Time here was syrup-thick and cloying. That sun beat down on her like a fist, not hot exactly, just there.

  Another of those weird mechanical conduits ran parallel to the river, forged of bronze and copper and what might have been obsidian. It was bigger than the one they’d crossed back in the city, maybe twenty feet tall, stretching as far as she could see to each side. It seemed to flex, reminding her of a snake gulping down its prey. It was made of metal, sure, but there was something horribly organic about it as well. And it was kicking out a maddening hum, a deep, throbbing pulse that was amplified every time she looked up at it.

  The vibration was echoed in her, in the metal pieces of her new flesh. Even though she tried not to, she couldn’t help studying them—those layers of copper and bronze fused to her skin, to her bones, to her organs as well, because she could feel them there, rubbing. She scratched at her arms, her neck, until her nails bled, then she scratched some more.

  “Don’t,” said Marlow, after what might have been ten minutes or ten hours of walking. He held her hand, tight enough to stop her pulling away. He had blood beneath his nails too and his skin was ragged. “Don’t.”

  “I hate it,” she said, her skin crawling like she had chicken pox. She needed oven mitts if she was going to survive down here. “I hate that it’s inside me.”

  It was more than just inside her, it was her. She was forged from hell.

  “I know,” he said. “It sucks. But you’re not, I mean it’s not you. All this, Pan, it’s not you.” He prodded her in the side of the head, a little too hard. “That’s you, yeah? Your brain, your heart. How many times did the Engine make you whole again, after a mission?”

  She pushed a hand against her heart, against the mangled lump of gristle that had somehow kept beating even after a demon had put its bladed tail through it. Marlow was right, the Engine had repaired her back on Earth, and she’d never felt less human for it.

  “You might have a little bit of hell in you,” said Marlow, finally letting her pull her hand free, “but you’re still a hundred percent Pan. Ain’t nothing brave enough to try to take that away.”

  It still itched like a bastard, though.

  They walked for a while again in silence, Pan’s throat as dry as the riverbed. She was about to mention it to Marlow when she caught him looking back the way they’d come, dust caught in the furrows of his brow.

  “Something’s following us.”

  The ash erased everything they’d walked through, turning the world behind them into a blank page. But Marlow was right, there was something there. She squinted, seeing a mass of darkness swimming in the haze, like the body of a shark beneath its exposed fin. Whatever it was, it was big.

  “You think we should wait for it?” Marlow asked. “Might be on our side.”

  “No,” she said, scratching at her arm again. Nothing here was on their side.

  She started walking, faster this time, the sun grinding a path across the sky. There were times when it seemed to pause, where it seemed to do nothing but stare. She could feel it boring into her and twice she lifted her head ready to scream at it. Then it would lurch into motion again—too subtle for her to see but enough for her to feel, like she was on a fairground wheel that had started to turn. The motion sickness churned in her gut, and she almost longed for night, until she remembered what the dark would bring.

  It seemed like every other step she looked back, staring into that formless nothing, and every single time that lumbering shape would peel its way from the ash, matching them step for step. It might have been her imagination, but she swore she could hear it, too, a distant cry.

  “Can you make that out?” she asked.

  “You can’t hear it?” Marlow said, and when she shook her head he breathed out a sigh, wiping his chapped lips. “Your name, Pan. It’s calling your name.”

  It was this that made her stop, cocking her head and finally hearing it, a cry like a distant gunshot fired again and again and again.

  “
Pan.”

  She tried to turn away, tried to start walking again, but she couldn’t. She had to know what it was that called to her, what it was that hounded her through hell.

  And sure enough, just minutes later, it peeled its way from the ash. A man—a huge man—rolls of fat spilling out from him like a candle melting in the sun. He looked like he’d been fed through a wood chipper, a dozen scraps of skin barely held together and yellow stuff oozing out of the wounds. He pushed a smell before him the way a boat pushes a wave, a stench of old meat and sewage.

  He moved relentlessly forward, struggling with his own weight. Pan saw that there was something slung around his neck, but she couldn’t make out what it was. Only when the man lowered his head to it and Pan heard something rip did she understand it was food. He was chewing something; she could see his cheeks bulge, could see his throat flex as he swallowed.

  Her stomach growled before she understood what it was he was eating.

  “No,” she groaned. But there was no denying it. The man had halved the distance between them now and Pan could make out a grotesque figure strapped around his neck like a horse’s feeding bag—a hairless scalp, ridged with scars, a pair of eyes blinking up at the darkening sky. The figure was half eaten already, but she was still alive. There was no pain in her expression, just something defiant, something made of steel.

  And that’s what did it. Pan knew that expression, she knew that face.

  “Brianna?” she said, the word like a startled bird, leaving her mouth before she could stop it.

  The man kept walking, fixing Pan with two eyes as dark as pitch. His face was loose, hanging off him like a cheap Halloween mask, gaping holes worn through his cheeks and nose. But there was no mistaking that look of hate, a look worn not by a man but by a boy.

  “Patrick,” said Pan. “Oh God, it’s Patrick.”

  It was them, the twins who had worked with Mammon, whom she’d faced in countless battles—whom she’d sent to hell. The world was reeling and Pan realized it was because she was shaking her head, desperate to deny it. The last she’d seen of them was back in New York, the demons dragging Patrick and his wormbag sister into the molten earth. How had she not even considered the thought of meeting them here?

  Patrick’s face split open into a smile, his blunt teeth slick with blood. Then a noise spilled out of him, a wet, lurching groan. Brianna was looking, too, the stumps of her arms swiveling. She was giggling so hard her eyes had rolled back in their sockets.

  “Pan,” said Patrick. “Pan. Pan. Pan.”

  “Listen,” said Pan, trying to find the words in the chaos of her thoughts. “I know, I know we were wrong. I should have listened to you, I’m … I’m sorry. It was Ostheim, he—”

  “We didn’t know,” added Marlow.

  “I told you,” said Patrick, close enough now that Pan could see his spine, his ribs, in the pockets of his flesh. He was too tall—eight, nine, ten feet—and swayed like a snake in its basket, the movements hypnotic. “I told you we’d see you in hell.”

  “Please,” said Pan, barely able to speak past the lump in her throat, past the horror of what she had done to them. “Patrick, we need each other. We can help each other get out.”

  “You want out?” he said, spitting a blood-drenched laugh. “So did we. So did my sister. And we found a way.”

  Pan wanted nothing more than to turn and run but she held her ground, she had to hear what he was going to say.

  “We found a way,” he said again. “Because this place can’t hold us here forever. It can’t. How many times now, Brianna? How many times is it? Fifty? Sixty?”

  “What?” said Marlow, and Pan felt his hand on her arm. “Sixty what?”

  “How many times have I eaten you?” he said to Brianna. “Skin, bone, brain, eyes, every last scrap of you. You keep coming back, sister, but one day you won’t. You’ll be free.”

  Brianna screamed her lunatic laughter into his throat. He swung his head toward Pan and she could see his bared teeth through his flapping cheeks, she could see the hatred in his clenched jaw, the insanity that boiled in his eyes.

  “It’s only been a few days,” she said, thinking back to New York. But she knew that was a lie. It had been days on Earth, but this place was cruel. It might have been centuries since Patrick and Brianna had crawled up from the dirt. “Please,” she said. “We’re on the same side, I know that now.”

  He took a step toward her, using a filthy nail to fish a scrap of meat from between his bloodied molars. Then he laughed, hissing it through his nose.

  “I’ve been waiting for you for such a long time, Pan,” he said, taking another step. “I’ve had so many years to think about what I’ll do to you.”

  Another step, his arms reaching for her.

  “Why wait any longer?”

  NIGHTRISE

  He moved fast, faster than he had any right to with a body that huge.

  Pan was bolting, scrambling up the riverbank, but the monster was chasing, dwarfing her. He reached her before Marlow could even remember how to move, wrapping an immense hand around her throat. She hung there, punching, kicking, but Patrick was impossibly strong.

  “Hey!” Marlow yelled, breaking into a run. He bunched his fists, ready to knock Patrick down into the next level of hell.

  He never got the chance.

  Patrick didn’t hesitate. He didn’t gloat. He gripped Pan under one arm, grabbed her head with his hand, and pulled.

  “No!” Marlow screamed.

  Pan had time for a muffled cry, a final, unspoken plea for mercy.

  Then her head came off, blood misting over Patrick’s broken face. The boy’s bucket jaw stretched obscenely wide and he pushed Pan’s head into it, gagging with the effort. He cast her twitching body away, using both hands to shovel her head inside him until his cheeks bulged.

  Marlow’s legs gave up on him and he fell to his knees.

  “Nonono,” he said, not a scream but a whimper.

  Patrick turned to Marlow, those black eyes dripping glee. His jaw flexed and he crunched on Pan’s skull like he was chewing ice. It was the worst sound Marlow had ever heard and the horror of it pulled him up again, drove him across the dust. He roared, his fury like a furnace as he threw himself at Patrick.

  The impact knocked them both over, Patrick hitting the ground hard enough to make his gigantic body tremble. He grunted, spitting scraps of skull and hair—her skull, her hair—and Marlow clambered up him, grabbing handfuls of blubber. He drove his fist into the side of the monster’s head, feeling the old bone crumble. He hit him again, and again, then Patrick grunted like a bear, rolling to the side and bucking Marlow off.

  Marlow panicked, the dust in his eyes blinding him. Fingers wrapped themselves around his neck and clamped hard, hauling him up into the air. He could feel the strength there, knew that Patrick would rip his head off as easily as he had Pan’s. He kicked back, trying to find him, only to feel Patrick’s lips against his ear. The boy blew out a breath that stank of a butcher’s garbage bag.

  “Your turn,” he said, spraying him with pieces of half-chewed Pan.

  Marlow angled his head, saw that vast jaw open wide, saw the blunt teeth inside.

  “Haven’t you eaten enough, gordo de mierda?”

  The voice came out of nowhere, and so did the spear—piercing Patrick’s bloated flank, punching right through him. He grunted, his grip on Marlow’s throat loosening.

  A figure burst from the dust. It was a woman, short and lithe and wrapped from head to toe in brown rags. Only a pair of eyes were visible, dark and fierce. She was holding another spear in her free hand and she launched it. This one javelined into Patrick’s throat and he staggered back. Marlow squirmed out of his grip, dropping to the ground. The stranger grabbed the handle of the spear and ran up Patrick’s side, pushing herself away and ripping the blade free. She flipped gracefully in the air, landed, then thrust the weapon into Patrick’s eye.

  Patrick stumbled back another cou
ple of steps, his whole body shaking. His mouth was still full of Pan but he was muttering choked words. “Not over, not over, not over.”

  Then he hit the ground in a tidal wave of dust, spasmed, and fell still.

  The woman grabbed the spear and wrenched it free, then she rammed it into Brianna’s head, cutting off her inhuman laughter. She tucked the weapon beneath her arm then turned to Marlow, gesturing.

  “Huh?” Marlow said. He wasn’t sure if he could remember how to speak real words.

  The figure gestured again—come on—then moved swiftly along the riverbed. Marlow hesitated, looking to where Pan’s body lay still, an ocean of dark blood growing from the delta of her neck. His sense of loss was vast, overwhelming. He’d had to watch her die twice, and both times something inside him had died as well.

  “Hey!” the girl yelled. “Chu waiting for?”

  He stumbled after her, running until his body decided it had had enough. Then he just lay there, staring up at the ice-white sky, at that sun that couldn’t decide whether it was coming or going. He lay there and thought of Pan, and waited for the dust to drift down and bury him.

  Something moved in front of him, throwing him into shade, and he looked to see the woman there. Her face was still concealed by rags but there was something familiar about the way she held herself, the way she bounced on the balls of her feet. He didn’t trust it and he stood, waiting for the girl’s head to split open, for her to try to eat him. But there was something nagging at him, something about what she’d said. His thoughts were heavy with ash. He couldn’t work out what they were trying to show him.

  “Marlow?” the girl said, and he realized it wasn’t what she’d said but how she’d said it—the accent.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  “I … I don’t know,” she replied. “I don’t remember my name.”

  She grabbed the rags that hid her face and began to unwind them, revealing her chin, her lips, her nose, and only then did those dark eyes make sense.

  “Holy sh— Night?”

  Nightingale pulled the hood free and stood there, frowning at Marlow.