Page 85 of Resurrection
“Are you wearingDuckTalespajamas?” Sam asked incredulous. “To a battle between zombies and vampires?”
“That cartoon is a legend, you know. Do you know how much history it teaches?” Sei said searching the room for survivors and those still in need of help. Maybe Max would know how to get the vampires to stand down? Or Mike? “Who you gonna call?” he said more to himself than anyone else.
“Zombie busters?” Sam asked.
“I could cut them up,” Bryar offered. He was splattered in clay and zombie goop, but looked as excited as a child digging into their first birthday cake.
Seiran sighed. He was tied to a bunch of psychos. Though he could not have been more grateful for having any of them at his back.
Chapter 28
Max arrived with a heap of vampires, EMTs, and apparently a couple witches. The witches being male, which surprised Sei a little. But Sam seemed to recognize them. Two of them stepped in to help Sam put the zombies down. Necromancers? Sei thought more regular witches, as they used spells to direct the magic, pointing out lines of the spell to Sam.
Sei tried to pay attention to the spell, feeling like he should learn how to use Gabe’s power, but he was insanely tired. The exhaustion actually added to his grief and depression over having Gabe go back to ground, and anxiety about protecting his kids.
Would nothing he did ever be enough? He ended up sinking down in a corner, wishing for sleep. Tanaka appeared briefly. “The kids okay?” She asked.
“Yes, safe at home,” Sei agreed. “The fire spell hit Gabe.” Sei swallowed hard, trying not to picture the damage that had been done. “He had to go back to ground.” He wasn’t going to cry, and he’d tried to hold onto the rage. But it wasn’t really in him anymore to hold onto it. “I reflected the spell back. There are going to be a lot of burned witches.”
His mother seemed to take that easily enough, turning to the group of investigators and issuing commands. Including a call to all hospitals and police about severely burned witches arriving for care. If they survived. Sei wondered if he’d killed them. It did bother him a little, even though they’d tried to kill him.
Emmaline appeared with a bottle of water and some wet wipes. “Maybe wipe your hands and face before drinking?”
“Sage advice, my friend,” Sei said as he cleaned up and then popped the cap. He guzzled the entire thing before finally feeling like he wasn’t toasted inside. “How many hurt?”
“Four vampires. They’ve already been transported to their grave sites. Hart is hoping they have a full recovery.”
“There were no humans or witches close enough to be injured?”
“Not by the fire. A few got hurt when the golems attacked, but the golems seemed to fixate on the vampires, and destroying the evidence.” Emmaline looked out over the mess. Bones scattered everywhere, some burned, and the vampires laying down on their body bags looking like broken dolls.
“How much evidence was destroyed?”
“Most of it was saved, at least the records we took. We may have lost some of the remains, and a lot of them are scattered, which means a longer process getting them back to their families, but I documented everything digitally. Saved in four places, not uploaded to the Dominion servers yet.”
“Don’t upload it,” Max said, appearing a few feet away. He had probably heard the conversation from across the room. “It’s likely why they attacked. They thought the evidence wasn’t saved.”
“You think the Dominion did this?” Emmaline asked.
“I don’t doubt it,” Max said. His gaze found Sei. “How bad was Gabe hurt?”
“He went to ground,” Sei said, his voice tight.
Max nodded. “He’ll be back.”
“In less than a decade?” Seiran couldn’t help but feel bitter.
“Likely, yes.” He turned toward the door like he heard something Sei couldn’t. Tanaka was there as people in uniform with guns shoved their way inside. Not police, as they were already there trying to make sense of the mess. This was an elite squad of witches sent out for enforcement, usually to drag witches to the stake. Their uniform actually mirrored some of the old military uniforms of almost a century ago. He’d always hated the brown and green colors, like somehow, they represented the earth, when they were all political power. This squad had been nicknamed the Death Squad. Sort of a boogeyman of the witch world, though they were all women.
“Fuck,” Sei said as they crossed the room, splitting into two groups, heading toward Sam and Sei, looking ready to kill.
Emmaline’s eyes widened. “This isn’t…”
The group reached Sam first, and tried to use some sort of magic binding on him, which he instantly dispelled with the nullification ability he’d leeched from Matthew long ago. They were already fighting before the group could get halfway across the room to Seiran.
“Enough!” Max shouted, and the entire room went still. “What is the meaning of this?”
“We don’t answer to you, vampire,” one of the kill squad said.