The XIII

The multicolored, yet very grey behemoth, once the last and greatest settlement humanity had ever seen, stretched in front of the two men forever; north, south, west, and up into the sky far beyond the sinister, lightning ripped, black swirls of clouds. Still, away from the city on the ledge of a small jagged hill, two men were lying down looking over the city. Both men were smoking hand rolled cigarettes, and were loaded down with such an array of gear and weapons that they looked more like a pile of junk and guns than two persons lying down on their bellies.

The city was Zion, and only god himself knew how long it had been in this condition.

“So, boss, any clues?” The younger man asked.

Jerrick, the older man, turned his attention from the city to his partner and smiled at the young writer.

“Boss? That sure is funny coming from you.” Jerrick told him.

Ethan, the man that once was a writer, smiled back, but inside he was already seeping fumes. His and Jerrick’s  relationship was a strange one, and even if they were intrinsically linked together by destiny to be on this last, holiest of quests, Ethan had almost killed Jerrick twice, and the older man had beaten Ethan black and blue more than once. But that was the past. That was when they first met, when Ethan was a freedom fighter, running a hundred man guerilla unit of survivors, fighting an unbeatable war against monsters from hell itself. Now the writer that had become a warrior, then killer, then butcher and savior at the same time -not to mention hero and legend- was, like Jerrick, a Knight of the Fury, a keeper of eternity, and Jerrick was boss. Still, Ethan had a way of losing his shit fast with Jerrick. The man rarely talked straight, and Ethan knew that every move the bastard made had been calculated, thought out twenty times, and then seamlessly executed all in less than a heartbeat. Conversation was no exception. And instead of answering Ethan’s question, or at least staying on subject, Jerrick went straight for the bait Ethan had set up.
“Don’t be an idiot, kid,” Jerrick suddenly said, snapping Ethan out of his train of thought. “I have no clue, and you need to stop with all of this rebellion, and I will not be told what to do. You know where we are, what we are doing, you know the parts that we are to play out, you made your choice, now bite the bullet and ride the bitch,” Jerrick snapped.

This time it was Ethan that laughed. Jerrick was a strange man, and his way of talking was very measured and genteel, yet for the last month or year, it seemed he started to speak like Ethan every time he got angry, and the writer found it hilarious.

“I am sorry, I guess provoking you is too sweet.” Ethan admitted, shooting a glance back at the city. “What do we do?” he said calmly ; and all of his concentration went back to the moment at hand.

“Well, I guess we go down into the abomination and pray we find the next portal before something else finds us,” Jerrick answered.

“You think we still have tails?” Ethan asked, suddenly cold, remembering the last ambush of wild men that had followed them for days before they finally attacked. Four handed, two headed freaks with stone axes, and jagged teeth jutting out  from everywhere, and Ethan swore then that they were dead men. Still, with the first second of panic passed Ethan’s guns came up, and Jerrick was already dealing death with the power of God Himself. For some reason that last gun fight had been so loud and so violent that Ethan was not sure what to make out of it. Why had it been so different? So ear-splitting? He was a veteran of a war, and not just any war, but the last war that humanity was ever to wage, a war against the Evolved. While civilization as Ethan knew it fell and was ripped to pieces by man-like sparrows, crows, and pigeons, -fucking pigeons that were seven feet tall- all armed with swords and clubs Ethan lived on. He fought; he found survivors; he began taking it back. And with a sharp mind, endless imagination, and the determination that comes from knowing one is totally fucked any which way you look at it, Ethan became a warrior. Then he ripened in to the butcher of the Evolved, discovering a way to fight back, becoming a hero; a legend. Then came Jerrick, and everything changed again. He became a Fury Knight, a holy killer, and with Jerrick he had seen some shit, crazy shit that could compel a man of any constitution to insanity, but Ethan had been fine, all along their bloody road, Ethan had kept his cool.
Yet that last ambush, those beast-man things, running at him as he blew their heads away one by one with deadly precision, emptying one gun, holstering it, and pulling out the next in less than four seconds, not missing even a shot, not coming even close to missing a shot. His next weapon came out, and in a second all six bullets had done exactly what he had wanted them to do, and he continued doing this up until he had run out of loaded pistols and had pulled out his hard caliber. This was his holy weapon, a pistol that Jerrick had exposed to the strength 13 and had made into a weapon that was connected to the wielders mind. It could curve around corners, explode, pierce through or stay inside the victim. The bullet was guided by the knight’s mind, as was its striking effect. That was a hard caliber. And when Ethan had fired his at a mutant,  point blank , his anger had exploded the mutation to a billion bloody chunks, spraying the world red. The explosion had been exquisitely deafening, and the muzzle flair blinding, setting the flying chunks of meat aflame.

The rest of the mutations had run at that point, and Jerrick laughed at the blood covered Ethan. Ethan, on the other hand, did not find it funny. It was not the first time he had shot someone at close range, and even if this thing was a mindless blood curdling monster, something bothered Ethan about what he did to it.

“You still thinking of the muty you blew back to god in atom sized portions?” Jerrick asked, still smiling.

“Yes damn it, it really got to me. Care to give some wisdom, because I am in a bad way here,” Ethan cursed, looking back at Jerrick.

“Well,” Jerrick began, turning his cigarette out and pocketing the bud, “you blew a muty to hell because you are far superior. You feel like a baby who snaps its hamster’s neck after it bites him, confused and guilty for blowing away life so easily.”

“Wow, deep shit Jerrick, a baby snapping a hamster’s neck. Where the fuck do you pull these stories and shitty metaphors out of any way? I don’t feel like an innocent killer, I feel that I have been given too much power, too much killing ability, and instinct to kill. I think that I am becoming too dangerous to be around people, Jerrick. And when and if we finish this, god knows what I will be. You know my path as well as I do…,” Ethan was about to say more but Jerrick raised his hand.

“You are a Fury!” he snapped at the young man. “A mutant came at you and you gave him the fury of god, you gave him the fury of the XIII!” the older knight yelled at him. “Your path, mine, and everyone else’s who is to be a part of this quest has been assigned for a reason. Your destiny will lead you down your path, Ethan, as you will lead us all down ours, and when the last moment comes, when we are all to be gone, or all is to be saved, we will know who is death, and who is life, and just what the XIII is.” Then the knight broke into one of his extremely rare smiles. “Then, once that is done, well, then we will deal with the rest of the things that destiny, and that whore called lady luck have prepared for us. Until then you will learn to live with the fact that you are an instrument of death. I know what bothers you because I have been there, many, many years ago. I was you Ethan, and I felt just like you did.” Jerrick stopped and took a long look at Ethan. “You don’t know if you even held the gun, do you? That is what bothers you. Did you still have it in your hand when that last muty crept up on you? Or did you holster it already? Logic says you holstered it, but maybe you kept it out. Maybe it was holstered and you pulled it out as the mutant jumped you, but you don’t remember, all you remember is pointing with your arm and death, the arm of God like death struck the muty.”

“How did you know?” Ethan asked, amazed, never having mentioned this to Jerrick.

“Like I said, I was you a long time ago; a baby with a hamster, which does sound wrong, how about a chic? A small chicken, you know?” Jerrick asked, looking at the city once again.

“Yes I know what a chic is, for fuck sake,” Ethan snapped.

“Well, a baby, with a chic. It plucks you, and you did something and death followed. I know it’s shit, but it’s all I got right now. You have no luck Ethan. I had great teachers; wise men, and good companions with silver tongues that could explain all much better than I. I was never that good at explaining or teaching,” Jerrick admitted, with just a bit of nostalgia in his voice.

“So what were you good at?” Ethan asked, already knowing the answer.

“I am and always was good, really fucking good -as you say, friend- at surviving, at killing, and doing those things that can’t be done. I do, that’s what I am great at, whatever you put in front of me, I find a way to do whatever it takes, and it seems that I am immortal.” He smiled at Ethan, comfortable since, for the first time, he knew he could not outlive Ethan. Before, that statement meant that everyone who came close to him was dead, and it had been that way for years. Then he had completed the first major step in the quest, and he had found the path-finder who would soon discover his abilities, and would soon be telling which way they would head.


“Glad to see you feel good, you old bastard,” Ethan commented, putting away the rest of his smoke. “Do we go down and do a little exploring?”

“Lets.” Jerrick smiled back and he got up, followed by Ethan. Quickly the heavily loaded, armed, and armored men began making their way down towards the outskirts of the ruined city.

Jerrick pulled out his long repeater and Ethan followed suit by pulling out the heavy assault rifle he had gotten from a dead shock trooper in what seemed another lifetime ago, when he and Jerrick had just met, and the world they were in still contained people, wars, governments, something. Now, staring at the grey bone yard of death that ate away the land and sky, Ethan only wished he was back in the chaos of some other place. But there was no going back. They were here now, and Ethan knew Jerrick would never give up. The XIII was all that mattered, and Ethan knew that now it was the same way for him as well.

They slowly descended into the city moving slower and slower with every step they took, and the wasteland’s scorched ground turned to trash, strange looking goo, and pavement. The city and the huge building were still far away but they had entered the outskirts fast. Even out here there were several generations of buildings, some futuristic, some rustic ones made of trash or wood. But mostly it was all debris and huge piles of dirt, broken buildings and trash with a few walls still up here and there. The city was on the west coast of a great, grey ocean, and Ethan and Jerrick were coming from the east, having descended those great mountains that had taken them almost a month to cross, and had nearly killed them every chance they got.

They had almost reached the beginning of the city where buildings and huge toppled roads on columns lay scattered, some crashed, some tilted, others still standing. The sheer size of the roads was breathtaking. Ethan guessed some were at least30 lanes wide, if not more, and even the small buildings here were not small, they just looked small compared to the monolithic dark giants behind them. What they were approaching were normal 20, 30, 40 story -maybe even more- buildings, and behind them began a section of much bigger buildings, maybe a hundred and fifty floors, maybe more. And then a few miles away began the giants, stretching so high into the sky that Ethan could not even guess how tall they were.

“Let’s keep moving,” Jerrick said, with a note of nervousness in his voice, “It’s getting dark, and we need to find a relatively safe place to spend the night,” he finished, and Ethan nodded.

They picked up their pace, and they were about to enter the first city block of broken buildings when the strangest thing happened. A man dressed in a white toga robe, with long brown hair and a beard, came running out in to the open. If Ethan had to guess, which he did, he would swear Jesus was running towards him. The man seemed haggard and tortured, he was beaten, and had several burn scars.
“Help me,” he barely croaked as he ran up to them, and Jerrick motioned Ethan to hold his fire.

The man in the dirty robe and sandals ran up to them and fell on his knees in front of the two men.

“Help me, please,” he said, simply, looking up at the two Fury Knights.

Ethan felt strangely disconnected, something was wrong; something was so fucking wrong it was making him feel as if his soul was screaming at his brain to do something, something drastic, and something fast.

“How can we help?” Jerrick had asked, while Ethan had his inside out of body experience.

“There are men in the city, evil men, men that have defied the will of my Father, men who worship the fallen one, they worship Lucifer, and Molech. They seek to sacrifice me to the Lord of Darkness, and the Prince of Lies, so that the Antichrist and his father may rule for a thousand years. You must stop them and protect me.”

Ethan swallowed hard, already scanning the city, and Jerrick was doing the same thing. It did not matter that neither of them believed a word of what the man had said; bad men they believed in. And if they wanted this guy dead, that meant they were probably close by, and getting closer. Still, Ethan could not resist himself.

“Tell me, friend, who are you?” he asked the man.

“I am Jesus of Nazareth, the Lamb of God, the chosen perfect sacrifice so that all of mankind’s sins can be forgiven,” he said calmly, and very coherently.

“Right,” Ethan said slowly, “and I guess you are totally insane as well, right buddy?” he grinned, still watching the whole city.

“No, my child,” Jesus said, “Look, and believe.” Jesus pointed at a puddle of water and, as he touched it with his finger, the water turned crimson red. “Drink and you will see it is wine, the best you have ever tried.”

Ethan looked at Jerrick, but he doubted the Fury Knight ever heard of Jesus. Even so, he seemed pretty impressed. Ethan went to drink and Jerrick yelled at him to stop.

“You first, lamb of god,” he insisted.

Jesus nodded and he cupped some wine in his hands, not spilling any, as if his hands had become a chalice. He took a sip, and then offered it to Jerrick. The Fury Knight looked away. Then he offered it to Ethan, and the writer could not help himself.

“I would not drink anything that a crazy man colored red from a toxic puddle,” Jerrick snapped, but Ethan had to do it.

He took a sip and tasted it. Jesus stepped back smiling, and by god, he radiated; so much so that even Jerrick’s mouth opened a little.

“He who has faith will find the way to my Father,” Jesus said, in a voice that was almost hypnotic.

Ethan tasted and moved the liquid in his mouth, and it was, as promised, perfect. It reminded him of an Argentinean wine he drank once, only, as if it were combined with something like liquid sex.

“It is wine,” Ethan almost yelled, “and damn, it is the best thing I ever tasted, period, not just wine.” He turned to Jerrick and saw that the knight was looking far into the distance, ignoring him.

”Jerrick, it is wine, water to wine, Jesus. Jerrick, we have found the son of God, we are in Zion, and we can save the second resurrection of Jesus.” But Jerrick only held his hand up.

Ethan burned with fury inside but did not let it show, instead he went back to Jesus, and he crouched down in front of the man.

“Tell me, if you are who you say you are, how did you get here, what is going on, what do you know of the XIII? Tell me everything, the meaning of life. Why are we here, is the bible true, what is going on, and I swear that nothing, and no one will ever even lay a single finger…”

Suddenly there was a hiss, and then Jerrick appeared out of nowhere, literally flipping Ethan over and hurling him away just as the missile exploded into Jesus. There was a concussion, a huge blue, orange fulmination, and all three men were thrown far, but of Jesus only pieces remained. Gear and weapons were falling down everywhere as both Ethan and Jerrick twirled through the air, losing all of their gear in the process.

Ethan landed hard. He was aflame, at least his left arm was. His pack was thrown off, as was his shot gun, and his MM-77 heavy assault rifle. Over the years he and Jerrick had acquired a huge, if not sick collection of weapons, and a lot of them were flying through the air as they were, along with bits of Jesus as well.

Ethan rolled as he heard heavy vehicles, diesel engines and tires shredding dirt and trash. He rolled behind a large pile of rubble just as several laser shots slammed right by him. War hollers came from all directions, as dirt columns from vehicles rose in clouds around them. Ethan was shocked, and did not even see Jerrick crawl up next to him as the heavy laser fire continued.

“They killed him,” Ethan muttered, looking at the sky and the shower of red beams flying above them, “They killed Jesus…”

“I am sure he is in a better place now,” Jerrick snapped. “Get your guns and let’s go!” Jerrick ordered, but Ethan remained shocked.

“You don’t understand, that was the son of god, we could have changed all, we could have accomplished all, gotten all answers, that was-”

“It was a Robot! Jerrick yelled, as he slapped Ethan back to his senses, showing him the twitching remains of the cyborg that was Jesus. No blood, just some blue gel, metal, and wires.  “Snap out of it, they are coming,” Jerrick finished.

Ethan nodded and he pulled out his USSR K-21, a compact version of the AK 4070, the gun that the Russian-Chinese forces used to invade Europe. Only god knews when or where, but Ethan had gotten it from a crazed Chinese commander-turned-undead zombie. It was a single-handed fully automatic, and carried a fat 150 bullet clip of the medium sized 5.56mm ammo. Without another word from Jerrick, Ethan rolled out and opened full fire at the source of the laser fire. It was a bunker of some kind, a makeshift one from god knows what junk, outfitted with a store display counter so Ethan could not see the shooter. Regardless, he emptied the clip, making swiss cheese of the bunker, and the laser fire stopped long enough for Jerrick to sneak around to the next pile of rubble. Ethan rolled back as his gun clicked empty, and three seconds later the laser shower began anew.

Most of Ethan’s assault weapons were scattered around, and any of his revolvers or automatic pistols would do little damage to the bunker. So he pulled out his hard caliber and he waited for Jerrick to make his move. A second later a loud explosion went off as Jerrick appeared on the left side of the bunker, shooting the door aside and then filling the place with lightning and death.