WAR: WIIGF 20 (Patreon)

Chapter 20: The Price of a Miracle

Cold left his hands in a single stream, the cone of freezing air doing a great job when it came to putting out the last of the fires in the main hallway. 

Weird. One minute he was a walking flamethrower that could turn bloodsuckers to kitty litter, the next he was a goddamn fire extinguisher spraying ice mist with those same hands.

Kenny King decided to let those thoughts go as he just held his hands out, chakra flowing smooth (if a little bit slower than usual though). Walls hissed when the cold hit the still-glowing embers, a charred doorframe spitting back at him same as the warped, half-melted metal of an overturned gurney.

The rest of the team had split off, the ones who could still walk straight anyway. Marcus's crew had bailed with Sarah's body, cops all gone, which left just Marcus himself standing around like a brick wall with a pulse, the nuns doing their whole silent death-squad thing, and his people. Tyke, Mei Mei, Lucky.

Everybody still breathing had headed back to the basement, clearing out whatever bloodsuckers were still remaining after the bonfire and hauling up the victims used as living bloodbags. The ones who were still alive, at least. How the hell they gonna explain this? 

How the hell did they explain their usual shit, really? Considering dead bodies and property damage had to be a given in this line of work, it was a miracle they hadn’t made it onto the local news at least once. Maybe Lucky's onto something with that MIB shit.

Ken leaned against the soot-streaked wall near the clinic entrance, chest pulling tight every time he breathed in. Claws had opened him up pretty good, not deep enough to be a real problem but deep enough that it stung like a bitch. 

At the very least, though, the fire was finally out, smoke still hanging in the air but no more flames trying to eat through the building. Minutes, that's all it took him. 

A few minutes and a couple icy-cold streams of air and the whole hallway wasn't at risk of going up like the Fourth of July anymore.

He almost patted himself on the back when the team came up from the basement, Tyke and Marcus carrying something that made his eyes go wide. What the…

A vampire, the one that'd taken his fireball to the face and kept twitching, stumps where its arms and legs used to be, mouth still working even though nothing came out but blood and hissing sounds that scraped against his ears. 

Ken almost jumped off the wall as they passed by him. “Hey, bruh, what you doing wi-”

“Keane’s orders.”Tyke’s words shut him down almost immediately, Ken’s mouth clamping shut as he realized he didn’t really have anything to ask about that. Okay… we’re taking vampire hostages now.

He watched the two Crosccutters, meta and cop, roughly shove the bloodsucker into the back of a van, Tyke's hands on what was left of its shoulders, Marcus outright just hard slamming the monster in the trunk. Why not just stake it?

Ken's mouth opened halfway, another question forming, then he shut it. Nah. 

Whatever reason the father had for keeping a half-dead bloodsucker around wasn't his business. He was still the new guy, magic eyes or not, still just some kid who'd lucked into a Sharingan and hadn't gotten himself killed yet. Questions for later.

The actual victims were worse to look at than the vampire.

Huddled together down the hallway where the fire hadn't spread, wrapped in those crinkly metallic blankets that made them look like baked potatoes at a really fucked-up cookout. One of the nuns had yanked them from a first-aid kit bolted to the wall, Sister Agnes maybe, or Agatha, he still couldn't tell the twins apart. 

A couple of them were crying, soft hiccuping sounds that reminded him of Cece when she had nightmares, when she'd wake up and try to be quiet about it so Ma wouldn't hear. The rest just stared at nothing, eyes wide and empty, seeing something Ken couldn't. Probably better that way.

"...the innocent suffer despite our best efforts."

Jesus f—

His heart kicked against his ribs as Ken's hand halfway went for the knife, voice right there in his ear like it'd spawned out of the smoke itself. He spun, shoulder scraping brick. "Father..."

"Kenneth."

Keane stood there with his hands behind his back, black cassock catching what little streetlight made it this far into the Narrows, silver crucifix hanging down his chest on a chain that probably cost more than Ken's last three meals combined. The priest's face was calm, almost gentle, eyes on the survivors and not on him.

Ken blinked, pulse slowing back down to something human. "I didn-"

"Expect to see me here, I know." Keane nodded once, slow, deliberate. "It is rare that I leave the church once night falls. For good reason..."

...huh?

The father didn’t follow up on that, no explanations given as he just walked past Ken and toward the survivors. 

"Good evening, all." The voice of the father cut through the street noise and the quiet crying, low and smooth; the kind of voice that made you feel like everything was going to be all right. "Rest assured that you're safe now. It has been a long night and a dark time but you'll rest soon. I'll see to that."

Ken's Sharingan was still spinning, still active just in case something decided tonight wasn't done with them yet, and that's the only reason he caught it.

Energy, golden and warm and heavy, flowed out from Keane's hands as he held them above the victims' heads. 

Not chakra, Ken knew what that felt like in his gut. Not Luigi's od either. 

This was something else, something that made all the nuns present turn toward the father, heads bowed and hands clasped together as the priest started speaking, Latin rolling off his tongue with rhythm that spoke of both practice and memory.

“In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. 

Memoria quae servit timori, solvitur in lumine.

Let their eyes see, yet not remember.

Videant oculi, sed non recordentur.

Audient aures, sed non meminerint.

Tenebrae facta sunt et transierunt. Lux sola maneat.

In silentio Dei, mens quiescat. In oblivione, pax.

Ita fiat.”

The golden energy faded to nothing as Keane's hands came together in prayer, the teenager more confused the longer he watched. 

No hand seals, no flow of anything Ken could track even with his eyes spinning red and hungry for patterns. What the hell? 

Luigi's od was visible, ash-gray and cold when it moved. His own chakra sat warm in his gut, flowing through his system in ways he could almost see if he focused. But this…

This was just... words. A chant of Latin and nothing else backing it up, at least nothing Ken could catch.

Men In Black shit, huh? The thought sat bitter in his mouth as he walked closer, boots scraping concrete. "What..." His eyes went from Keane's hands down to the dozen people wrapped in shock blankets, all of them looking half-asleep, faces slack and empty. "What was that?"

"Call it a sacrament of forgetting." The father's voice was quiet, still had that patient teacher edge to it even now, standing in front of a bunch of vampire victims on a street corner in the Narrows.

"Huh?" Second time tonight Ken had to say that word, second time he felt stupid for not understanding jack shit about what was happening around him.

Keane shook his head, slow, like he was picking through a book for the right page. "Think of it as a prayer to our father for his hand in easing the shattered souls that suffered great pain."

Ken's eyes went back to the victims, tracking faces. One guy in particular, a fat middle-aged guy with a beard that probably looked better before tonight, had been crying hard enough his whole face was wet and red. He had been so scared, his eyes had been wide enough Ken could see the whites even from here. 

But as he watched, the man's face just... relaxed. Muscles going loose, jaw dropping open a bit, eyes losing that sharp edge of panic and going hazy instead. The guy blinked, heavy and slower each time, then looked around the street with pure dumb confusion. “Huh…?”

His gaze passed right over the blood-splattered nuns, over Tyke's massive frame, over Ken himself still covered in soot and vampire dust.

Not even seeing them, like they weren't even there somehow.

"What... what happened?" The man's voice came out thick, slurred; words dragging as his head lolled from side to side. "Was there... a gas leak? I smell smoke..."

Keane smiled, a small thing that didn't touch his eyes at all, and nodded once. "Something like that. There was a gang fight nearby, you understand. You were caught in the crossfire, hit your head rather hard. But you're safe now. The police and paramedics will be here soon to get you see to your injuries."

Jesus Christ. Ken's breath caught in his throat for a second. 

It was like watching someone do brain surgery with a prayer and a lie, just reaching into this guy's head and rearranging what was in there. Mind control? Hypnosis? What else could you call something that went in people’s heads and made them forget shit they saw, and replace it with something else instead. Freaky as hell.

Ken clicked his tongue half a second later, turning away from the victims and their new fake memories. The fuck does that matter?

There were bigger problems to deal with, considering how much tonight had cost them. 

Sarah was dead, body already gone with Marcus's cop buddies. Tyke had a nasty bite on his arm, teeth marks deep enough they'd probably scar something awful even with his meta healing. 

And the vampires' lord, whoever the fuck he was, definitely knew by now that they'd hit him hard. Burned out a whole nest, killed dozens of his people, ruined whatever ritual they were cooking up.

Yeah. He knows.

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

"Filthy p-p-preeyyyy, you think this... ngggh... damn you, it burns—"

Kenny twisted the new ring on his index finger, a thick silver piece that had landed on his finger out of nowhere during the fight. Heavy on his hand, the cold metal was doing something to his chakra control but he wasn’t sure exactly what. Still, he wore it anyway, spinning it around his finger as he watched the captive hiss and spit from inside its cage.

The vampire whose arms and legs had been burned clean off by his fireball, stumps still smoking when they'd loaded it up. Unfortunately for the bloodsucker, it was unliving intel now, and it wouldn’t get to go visit its friends in the nine circles of vampire hell till they learned what they needed to from it.

It had been well over an hour since they'd brought it back, the thing bundled up in the back of a van wrapped up in a blanket and rope like the world's shittiest burrito. 

That was then.

Now it was down in the deepest corner of the church catacombs, a place that made the main basement look like a five-star hotel. Stone walls wet with condensation, air so thick and cold Ken could see his breath. The vampire sat in a thick-barred cage, iron that looked old enough to be from the Dark Ages, groaning constantly as it’s body squirmed on the floor, just a torso and head now, stumps where its limbs used to be.

"It burns... even when I don't move... nggggghhh..."

The wounds had sealed up, vampire healing doing its job enough that there wasn't any blood leaking out. But all the four stumps weren’t going anyway, at least not anytime soon.

Ken just stared at them, never having seen anything that looked like a human this burnt and still alive. Just blackened nubs, charred meat that'd closed over but hadn't grown back at all.

Why's it still hurting? Ken frowned, eyes spinning as he stared at the thing. Vampires healed fast, he knew that much. He’d seen them shake off cuts and bruises with anything that wasn’t fatal or caused by their three main weaknesses (silver, wood, fire), injuries that'd put a human on a t-shirt. 

This one should've stopped feeling it by now, he knew that much? Maybe fire does something different? He’d never had a vamp survive his fire, so he never had the chance to test it anyway, so who knew?

The neonate spat out a mouthful of blood, twitching and trembling on the cage floor as it’s voice scraped against Ken’s ears "You... you all... nggghhaaahh... will suffer."

Back in the van it'd been all curses and spit and screaming, loud enough Marcus had threatened to gag the thing. Now it was whimpering, high-pitched broken sounds that made Ken want to give it another toasting till it was fully cooked. Tears rolled down its dirt-smeared face, thick and black, wrong-looking even for vampire blood.

"The walls do their part," Father Keane said next to him, voice quiet in the gloom. 

The priest had cleaned himself up somewhere between the clinic and here, face washed, black cassock somehow perfect again. Not a speck of ash or blood or soot anywhere on him. How the hell does he do that? Ken's own hoodie was still covered in vampire dust, his jeans had tears in them, and he could feel dried blood cracking on his jaw where those claws had tagged him.

Ken looked away from Keane's too-clean self and scanned the catacombs stretching out from the main basement, stone tunnels leading off into darkness that probably went on forever under the church. "The walls?" His eyes went back to the cage, eyes narrowed as he tried to understand exactly what he was missing. "He allergic to old construction or something?"

"Have you not noticed the smell in the catacombs, Kenneth?" That patient teacher tone came out of the father again, one that Ken was just as patient with even though he didn’t like being lectured to. "Distinct from the upper levels?"

Ken breathed in through his nose for the first time in weeks and felt the hairs on the inside of his nostrils immediately shrivel up and say ‘mercy’. "Yeah, stinks like an Italian restaurant’s shoe closet down here." He shrugged, fighting to keep the tears from leaving his already-watering eyes. "I've gotten used to it, mostly."

"That," Keane gestured with one long pale hand toward the walls, where they looked like they were sweating in the dim light, moisture beading on stone, "is a substance called Sepulchral Brine. A recipe I brought with me from my s-ser… my time in service of the Holy See." He paused, and Ken could hear him picking through words. "It is composed of blessed saltwater, bone ash, frankincense, black salt, iron filings, silver dust, and garlic oil; all of the above then properly thickened with rendered animal fat."

Ken just stared at him. His brain was trying to process that whole list, each ingredient stacking on top of the last until it felt like trying to memorize a spell from one of Luigi's books. Blessed saltwater, fat, bone ash, black salt... "...Deadass?"

He could have sworn the father’s mouth twitched upwards, the redheaded man turning his head aside as a hand rose to his mouth. "A-an added layer of protection, something more than the defensive sacraments I personally laid upon this Sanctuary. A physical deterrent, if you will." His eyes drifted over to the cage and the thing crying inside it, and all the warmth bled out of his face in half a second. "I have the acolytes rub it on the walls, a fresh coat reapplied weekly. Any Dead Apostle surrounded by it, breathing it in, feels only a fraction of the suffering they and their kind have inflicted upon God's innocent children throughout the centuries." Keane's voice dropped lower, each word deliberate. "It is a holy and a righteous pain."

Dead Apostle. Ken's brain latched onto the words, holding them tight. "...Dead Apostle?"

Keane waved his hand, already turning back to the cage, dismissing the question before Ken could even finish asking. "Another time, Kenneth. A lesson for another day." His attention locked fully on the vampire now, and Ken felt his own mouth shut without meaning to. Right. Interrogation time. "For now, the monster must be questioned."

The father's eyes went hard behind his glasses as Ken stayed quiet, watching as Keane focused completely on the limbless thing sobbing blood in its iron cage.

"You are a long way from your master's usual hunting grounds," the priest started, voice calm and level like usual. Still though, there was more edge to it, the words harder as they echoed off the wet stone, bouncing back at them. "This ritual... this blasphemy you attempted... it is not the work of a simple coven acting on instinct." 

The father stepped closer to the bars, hands clasped behind his back. "Who is he? The one you call the Butcher? What is his true name?"

The vampire spat blood, a thick black glob that should have been red.

It hit the animal-fat slicked floor near Keane's worn leather shoes, the substance sizzling on the ground as the brine did its job. 

Eww… Ken shot the monster a closer look, red eyes spinning again as he pushed chakra to them. The bloodsucker couldn't have been all that older than him; nineteen maybe, twenty at most, but his face twisted up into something that belonged in a haunted house. Pain and something worse, something that looked almost like joy, pulled his features into shapes that didn't fit right even past the bleeding eyes and charred-up body. 

"He is the prophet of the coming age of blood and shadow! A guide to a new realm of night." The words came out wet and bubbling as more black blood sputtered out with every syllable, painting the vampire’s mouth to match its eyes. "You, priest, are an antiquity! A relic of a dying faith! Your weak God cannot save you now!"

Father Keane didn't flinch at the spit or the screaming or any of it as he just watched the thing with those eyes that looked neither impressed or scared. If anything, they just seemed cold.

Cold and tired. "A prophet? Is that what he tells his followers?” The priest let out a breath that could almost have been called a scoff. “That this blood magic, this defilement of the innocent, this perversion is a holy act?"

"It is the holiest of acts!" The vampire's limbless body writhed on the floor, stumps scraping stone, little puffs of acrid smoke still rising off burned skin. 

Jesus… Ken forced his dinner down as he could actually smell it, charred meat mixing with the brine-salt stink of the walls and floor not doing him any favors. 

"To consecrate the very soil of this city in blood!” More blood ran down its mouth, black and thick with clumps in it. “Lux sanguinis... lux sanguinis... the light of blood... our Lord will open the veins of the world... and drown your prayers in it..."

"You know not what you speak of," Keane said, voice dropping lower as his fists clenched tight at his sides, knuckles going snow white. "Speak his true name. Tell me where he lairs. His plans, vile creature. Do so, and I will grant you a swift and merciful end. A clean death. Absit invidia."

The monster laughed, the sound somehow more manic than all its ranting. "Kill me, then, hollow man! Kill me! Your death is already written." Those bleeding eyes flickered over, locked right on Kenneth and smiled wider. "But yours, boy… if our lord has his way, your pages are never ending."

Ken blinked. 

The teenager blinked again as he caught himself taking a step back, the sound of a boot scraping concrete drawing him out of his head. The fuck... His heart was kicking harder than it should've been, survival instinct firing off warning signals he couldn't name. …yeah, that’s enough for one night.

"I'm gonna... I'm gonna head out before my mom gets worried, 'kay, father?"

Ken turned, already moving toward the tunnel leading back up to the main basement, but a hand landed on his shoulder. Grip firm, not rough but not gentle either. The kind of touch that said stay.

The teenager turned around slow, until he found himself once again staring at a pair of tired eyes behind glasses. 

"Kenneth."

"Yes, father..."

"Now is not the time, but I ask you to come to the Sanctuary tomorrow." Keane's hand dropped away, already turning back toward the cage. "We must speak."

Ken watched the father walk away, cassock disappearing into shadow, leaving him standing there in the garlic-salt stink with a vampire's prophecy still echoing in his head.

What now?