Page 95 of Incubus
A groan responded and Jim’s arms came up like they were trying to swat Nathan away.
“This is serious! Sasha’s hurt. Where do you keep the antidote?”
Another groan.
“Jim!” Nathan grabbed his brother and flipped him over none too gently, met by a twisted, resentful face that squinted up at him. “Jim, Gabriel is coming up to our room to kill you right now! Sasha has iron poisoning his veins! We do not have time for you to sober up!”
Finally, Nathan’s bellowing seemed to knock some sense into Jim’s alcohol-riddled brain. “What?” he said, eyes wide with panic but still glazed. “Gabriel? Here? But how did he—”
“The antidote!” Nathan yelled.
Jim blinked a few times, looked over to find Sasha pale and shaking on the other bed, and immediately turned back to Nathan with clearer eyes. “Coat pocket,” he said. “I always keep some in there.”
Nathan didn’t stop to ask why Jim hadn’t thought to mention this brilliant idea to him earlier, but went straight for Jim’s coat hung over one of the room’s chairs. He found a vial in the first pocket, beautiful luminescent green. It had only been a few minutes, but already Sasha didn’t look good. Those sickly veins Nathan remembered from so long ago were already spreading out over Sasha’s arms and up his neck.
Opening the vial, Nathan poured some on his finger and ran it over the cut on Sasha’s arm, watching it fizzle and disappear. He did the same to each of Sasha’s hands and then handed the vialto Sasha for him to drink the rest. Sasha’s hands were still a little shaky, so Nathan had to help guide the vial to Sasha’s mouth.
“Twice now,” Sasha smiled as green fire shot through his body and his eyes flashed red. “My knight in shining…blue jeans.”
Nathan snorted. “Yeah, well, you saved me first. Gabriel might have gotten that shot off if you hadn’t tackled him. Now let’s go.” Nathan stood and glanced over at his brother, who was sitting up rubbing his temples like he had the worst headache. “We are so screwed.”
What Gabriel had said out in the parking lot and his true relation to them plagued Nathan's thoughts, but there was no point in mentioning it now.
“We just need to get away from the motel,” Sasha said, standing a little unsteadily. “There are a lot of warehouses in this neighborhood. If we could lure him to one—”
“And then what? We’re unprepared again and no one...” Nathan said, lifting his leg up onto the bed to show where he was bleeding from the bullet that had grazed him. “No one is at their best. I say we make a break for the doorway and get the hell out of here.”
“No,” Jim said from the bed. “He’ll just come after us again, and we’ll be right back here a third time and a fourth, and…Gabriel has to die.” His eyes flashed not unlike Sasha’s, the blue of them suddenly more intense. “I could…use my powers. Sasha’s still stronger than any normal human. And you…well…we have weapons.”
Nathan tried not to roll his eyes at his inebriated brother. “Yeah, we have weapons and Sasha’s strong. But Gabriel had a charm against your powers, Jim, remember? And Sasha's not exactly in perfect condition right now.”
“I won't use the…control stuff,” Jim said, shaking his head a little too wildly. “Maybe…maybe telekinesis.”
Nathan didn’t have time to comment before one of the water glasses Sasha had set on the nightstand for Jim shot across the room and shattered against the wall.
Jim grimaced. “Mmm…maybe not.”
“Oh for crying out loud!” Nathan said in exasperation, dropping to his knees in front of Jim and placing a hand on each of Jim’s thighs. “Jim, you are drunk, Sasha and I are both hurt enough that it could slow us down, and we have no time. We need to get out of the motel.”
“If we can lure him to an alley,” Sasha broke in, “somewhere we can hide, wait until he gets close, and then ambush him—”
“No,” Nathan said firmly.
“But…but he’s right, Nathan,” Jim said, his hands sliding into place over Nathan’s. “We leave our stuff. Just take what we need for weapons. We can end this.”
Nathan couldn't get over that being a bad idea, but when he looked up into Jim’s eyes, despite them being hazy from drinking, he saw the same determination he could see in the sober eyes of Sasha.
It wasn’t a good idea, but maybe it was better than running.
“Walter!” Nathan called, pushing back up onto his feet.
Walter appeared with a clear expression of concern.
“Try and see if you can find where Gabriel is right now. When it’s clear, we’ll move, but we have to go soon. And pray we’re not absolutely out of our minds.”
Gettingbackdowntothe first floor wasn’t the hard part. Walter couldn’t be sure where Gabriel was, unable to sense him as anything different than any of the other normal humans tucked away in their rooms, but he could be surewhere Gabrielwasn’tand lead Nathan and the others out to the parking lot. Despite Nathan’s slight limp now that his adrenaline was cooling, Sasha’s fatigue from recent poisoning, and Jim’s drunken stumbling, they made it outside without incident.
Nathan had a gun hidden in his coat with an extra clip in his pocket, and Sasha had a gun tucked away safely as well. Jim would have to do with what powers he could use, if any. The rest of their belongings they had left in their room.
