CHAPTER 3
I’d spent the last ten minutes dangling from a rope, in a pitch-black elevator shaft, descending far beneath the Earth’s surface. The only light was from the little LED flashlight strapped to my forehead. I’d been trained, and Milo had rigged up the ropes, and there was nobody better at that sort of thing in the company than him, but that didn’t mean I had to like the trip. By the time my boots hit solid ground, my heart was racing and my limbs were trembling. I hated stuff like this. There was a reason you didn’t see very many big dudes climbing mountains.
Milo on the other hand seemed to be having a blast. “Looking good, Z!” He nearly blinded me with his head lamp when he came over to unhook me from the ropes. He’d gone down the shaft first, and had made it look like a piece of cake, kicking off the walls and dropping twenty feet at a time. Milo climbed like he was part spider monkey. Since I figured the power to the elevator would be cut, that was why I’d asked him to come along on this one. Trip I’d invited because he was the biggest geek I knew, and if I went to talk to a dragon without him, he’d probably never speak to me again.
“Wasn’t that fun?” Milo asked.
“Yeah.” I took a deep breath. “Fun.”
“Just wait until we get to climb back up!” Milo slapped me on the shoulder. The rope swung free and the D-ring made a clang noise as it hit the side of the shaft. “Don’t worry. It’ll be a piece of cake.”
Only if the cake was made out of acrophobia and nausea. Go toe to toe with a monster? No problem. But that whole random chance of snapping a rope and tumbling to my death part, I had a problem with. It had only been a few days since Gretchen had cut the cast off my forearm. This probably wasn’t what our healer had in mind when she’d told me not to strain myself too much. Oh well. That’s what fistfuls of Ibuprofen were for.
I got on my radio. “This is Pitt. I’ve safely reached the bottom.”
“Bottom of what? Oh, that’s right. You can’t tell me that. Still all clear up here,” Eddings radioed back. Our Las Vegas team lead and one of his men were ready to hoist our butts out in a hurry if security showed up. “Jones is on his way down now.”
That was good news, because we really weren’t supposed to be in here. The five of us had dressed as construction workers and snuck into the ruins of the Last Dragon at three in the morning. The section of the Strip in front was a massive around the clock construction project. There was a fence around the Last Dragon, but the MCB had finished their operation, and all they’d left behind was a small security team of rent a cops.
It had been a weird feeling going back inside this place. The casino had been completely trashed. Big swaths of it had been blown to pieces and there was a giant sinkhole right in the middle where the Nachtmar’s nightmare dragon had crawled out.
The MCB had done a masterful job successfully covering up one of the biggest public monster events in US history. It had been the crowning achievement of Myers’ career as a professional bullshit artist. And life in Las Vegas was returning to normal.
Since this was some of the most valuable commercial real estate in the world, demolition crews were scheduled to tear the place down soon. I assumed it was scrubbed, but just in case the MCB still had a presence here we didn’t know about, two more of Eddings’ Hunters were out front on look out. None of the Las Vegas team knew what Milo and I were doing here, but Earl had told them we were on a special assignment for him, and that had to be good enough.
“It bugs me we can’t tell these guys what we’re up to,” Milo said. “Eddings is solid. He wouldn’t tell anybody.”
“I’m sure he’s great, but I made a promise to try and keep Management secret. He’s probably going to be ticked off as it is that I told our team.”
“I know. It still sucks though.”
“True that.” At least I’d never had the chance to sign that NDA, because I’m pretty sure Management hadn’t been bluffing about the lawsuits. I could see the light bouncing above as Trip descended. He was faster at it than me, but not nearly as graceful as Milo. “Almost there, man!”
“I can’t believe Milo does stuff like this for a hobby.” Trip hit the floor a moment later, grinning. Of course, rappelling down a hole was rather exhilarating for him. “I must really want to meet a dragon.”
The walls were rock, like we’d stepped into a mine shaft. We were armed, but only with concealable handguns we wouldn’t mind ditching if we got rolled up by security. While Milo got Trip unhooked, I pointed my flash light down the tunnel. “He was down that way.”
Management’s fate was a mystery. We didn’t know if the Nachtmar had gotten him or not. And if the last dragon was dead, had the MCB found his secret lair? It wasn’t like this cave was on any of the building plans. I only knew about it because the dragon had hijacked my elevator. The tunnel hadn’t changed at all, so maybe we’d get lucky.
“If the treasure is still down here, I’ve got dibs on a moon rock,” Milo said. “Whoa…I just had a thought. What would happen if I gave a moon rock to Earl?”
“I have no idea. But no looting. We’re just here for information on our bad guy.” I said that mostly because dragon hearing was way better than human’s, and if he was still around I didn’t want to offend him. In reality if he was gone but his hoard was still here, that Terracotta Warrior would look badass in my freshly remodeled living room.
The dragon had been unfailingly polite, so if he was still alive I probably shouldn’t barge in unannounced. It wasn’t smart to startle things that could squish you like a bug. Super hearing or not, I raised my voice to be safe. “Hello! Management! Are you home?”
It echoed several times. We waited. There was no answer.
“Here goes.”
A short walk later, we reached the cave. It was so big our powerful flashlights were barely sufficient to illuminate one corner, but even then I could tell we were too late. I shined the light back and forth, bouncing it off of crystal formations. I muttered something profane.
“Bummer,” said Milo the master of understatement.
The cave wasn’t just empty, it had been stripped. The last time I’d been here the vast space had been packed with stuff. Everything from rare paintings to Greek statues, now there wasn’t so much as a coin on the ground. There was no sign of the dragon or any of his collection. The air tasted moist and stale. There were still electrical cables strung up, but everything they’d been powering was long gone.
“I’d really been hoping to meet the dragon. You made him sound awesome.”
“I guess if you’re into that sort of thing.”
“Man, who isn’t into giant thunder lizards?” Milo asked as he shined his light toward the ceiling. It didn’t reach.
I kept walking along the walls, searching for some clue as to what had happened. The dragon had been my best hope, because in addition to collecting physical treasures, Management had collected information. He had been telling me about the real enemy when the Nachtmar had interrupted our conversation by dragging the whole casino into another dimension.
There were big cracks in the otherwise smooth walls. I didn’t remember those from before, but I’d been on a bit of sensory overload at the time. Then I noticed the blackened scorch marks, and deep gashes that must have been caused by claws.
Trip whistled. “It looks like they had one heck of a fight.”
The back of the cave was partially collapsed. There had been a freight elevator there, which was how Management had gotten fed, but now the whole area was covered in fallen rocks and dirt. I really didn’t want to mess around back there for fear of causing any further collapse.
Milo joined me. “So what do you think happened to your big friend?”
“No idea.” He could have gotten out the freight shaft, but he’d sounded pretty beat up by the Nachtmar when I’d last heard from him over the radio. “Maybe he died here and the MCB removed his body?”
“It’s possible. The floors have been swept and hit with a dust vac. They’ve definitely had a cleanup crew down here. If he left anything for you the MCB took it already.”
“Are you getting anything else, Z?” Trip asked cautiously.
“You know…” Milo made a pair of finger guns and stuck them against his temples. Between the head lamp and the big red Viking beard, he looked really crazy doing that. “In your brain?”
I had never asked to be psychic. Frankly, it was a pain in the ass. “Not in the slightest.”
But maybe they had a point. As a creature of magic, Management had recognized that I was one of the Chosen. It was possible that once he had realized how dire our circumstances were he’d left something that only someone like me would be able to find. Sadly, it wasn’t like this champion of a cosmic faction business came with instructions. I hadn’t even known I’d been applying for the job.
“Look at Z’s face. He’s gonna go for it,” Milo said.
Sometimes, I could watch other people’s memories from their perspective. With humans, it required physical contact, and me really wanting to know about a specific memory. Though I’d pulled it off with a gnome and even a shoggoth—let me tell you, that was one weird ass experience—but with something as ancient and powerful as Management? It beat the hell out of me. I’d have to go by instinct.
There was a blasted scorch mark on a nearby rock pillar. It had been so hot that it had melted half of it into slag. I don’t know why I fixated on that. It felt…energetic. “Hang on.” I laid my open hand on the rock.
It must have looked kind of dramatic, because Milo began to chant. “Chosen One. Chosen One,” like this was a sporting event.
“Dude, please,” Trip told him. “You’re embarrassing him.”
“Just trying to help motivate our psychic.”
“If you bust out pom-poms I’m going back up that rope.”
“Oh, I bet if it was Holly dressed up like a cheerleader nobody would mind.”
Trip started to give Milo a sarcastic response, but thought about it for a second. “Okay. That’s true.”
“Guys. Come on.”
“Sorry, Z,” they said simultaneously.
Despite my fellow Hunters being themselves, I could tell there was something lingering here. It’s hard to explain, but it felt like a memory. As I focused, I could almost but not quite hear Management’s voice talking to me. Only this wasn’t like taking something from a human mind. Now that I had gotten quite a bit of practice, I could grab those in an instant, like reflexively snatching a ball tossed to me out of the air. This felt heavy. This wasn’t a ball. This was a pallet of bricks precariously balanced on top of a stick.
“Here goes.”
I gave the stick a mental shove. The bricks fell on us.
“What the heck?” Trip muttered as blue flames appeared around my hand.
I jerked my arm away, but the flaming handprint remained. It began to spread across the rock, picking up speed at it went. Within seconds the pillar was engulfed, and the fire was rolling outward across the floor. Luckily, there was no heat accompanying it. It washed over my feet. Milo yelped and jumped as it flew past him.
“You seeing this too?” I asked. They didn’t answer, but by the looks on their faces, staring at the imaginary glowing fire that was up to their knees, the answer was yes. Items grew from the fire, shelves, cases, caskets, thrones, even cars, all of the dragon’s treasures. The glow climbed up the wall until it lit the distant ceiling. We were standing in a neon blue world. “I’ve never had anyth—”
There was a deafening roar followed by a sound like lightning. I put my hands over my ears. All of us instinctively ducked as something gigantic whooshed overhead. It was a dragon wing, stretching across half the cavern. The other wing materialized, beating, but there was no wind. The roar grew until I thought it was going to swallow us all.
The body formed, big as a train car stood on end. Powerful limbs formed out of thin air. It all became clear, and I gasped in awe as Management towered above me. His mighty, horned, head turned on his long serpentine neck, as he opened jaws sufficient to chew a whole cow, and a cone of blue fire burst forth, snaking from side to side. It washed over us.
I couldn’t help but flinch. If that had been real, we would have all been instantly consumed, but we weren’t in the presence of this mighty force of nature. This was just an imprint left behind. The glowing version of Management was translucent. I could see rock of the opposite side of the cave through his shimmering scales and membranous wings. The collected treasures were blurry. There was a table full of jewels partially through Trip’s leg. There was a flaming blue suit of armor next to me. I swiped my hand through it, and it rippled like water.
“What is this?” Milo shouted to be heard over the rushing wind. He was on his knees, covering his head, pistol in hand. “Is it like a hologram?”
Another shape was rising up through the floor, even bigger than Management. This one was pitch-black. It originated from an entirely different form of magic. The glowing blue dragon got ready to fight.
“It’s a memory.”
The nightmare dragon rose, dwarfing Management, absolutely filling the cavern. It had been the Nachtmar’s ultimate form. It snarled something incomprehensible, probably in the ancient dragon tongue. But our pudgy old dragon wasn’t going to back down from any challenge, no matter how unwinnable. Management flung himself across the space, claws spread, tail whipping.
Imaginary or not, it was still scary as hell.
Priceless treasures went flying. A super car was tossed, flipping end over end through the air, only to be struck by the Nachtmar’s tail and launched back across the cave. The flame world shook as the real world stood still, a memory of an earthquake. The noise was inconceivable. Glowing boulders fell from the ceiling. One flashed right through Milo and exploded into gravel when it struck. He looked around, bewildered, but unharmed.
The dragons were crashing back and forth, claws sunk into each other. Glowing blood spilled. Their necks were intertwined, teeth snapping. But it was like watching a child fight a grown man. The Nachtmar got a mouthful of wing, and there was a horrific crunch as he bit through Management. My host screamed. The Nachtmar struck with unbelievable fury, hurling Management down, right through where we were standing, and for an instant I could see bones and internal organs. But Management slid right through us. He hit the wall and bright blue fire rolled up one of the cracks in the wall, demonstrating how it had been created.
Only Management was one tough old bugger, and he rolled over, and went right back to it. This was his house and he was going to defend it. But ten seconds later his head made another dent in the cave as the Nachtmar effortlessly threw him down.
Management was dragging himself away, crashing through his hoard. The nightmare followed, looming over him and speaking again in the dragon tongue. I didn’t understand Dragon, but I knew the Nachtmar enough to know he was gloating. Then he turned in a flash and vanished through the real world’s fallen rocks.
I knew exactly what happened next.
Sides heaving, it took a minute for the old dragon to catch his breath. Management’s gigantic head, lacerated and torn, had stopped only a few feet away from where I was standing. One horn was splintered and broken. “Activate radio. MHI channel three.” The dragon coughed. “I’m sorry, Mr. Pitt. It would appear that I have underestimated our foe.”
I heard my own voice as if it was coming from speakers on the wall. “Management? Is that you?”
“Yes. I did my best, but I could not stop him. He ripped it from my mind. He combed through my treasures…He went back to the beginning when I was a hatchling and the great dragonfathers ruled the sky. Beware…He means to devour you.”
That was when we had lost contact, and the terrifying creation had come after us.
“Mr. Pitt. You are our only hope to defeat the nightmare. Can you hear me, Mr. Pitt? Come in.” Management’s breathing was labored. “Drat.”
I stared into those shining dinner plate sized eyes. It was like he was looking right through me. It was hard to read a dragon’s expression, but I saw sadness. It quickly turned to realization. Management lifted one shaking claw, jabbed the tip into the stone, and made a mark. Those in particular hadn’t been battle damage. The sign had to be some form of dragon magic and how he’d left me this message.
“I make a desperate gamble…You have been chosen. If you survive today, I know what you will do. If you can hear me now it is because you have defeated the Nachtmar, and returned because we were denied the opportunity to finish our conversation.” He wheezed. “The cause…The being who released this nightmare upon us, I have prepared a dossier about him. I dared not transmit it for risk of interception. However, I was not so foolhardy to fail to prepare a backup. Go to the law offices of Rondeau, Katz, and Smith. Ask for Benjamin Rondeau.”
The dragon’s eye flicked over to the side, where the suit of armor had been caught in a burst of dragon fire during the battle. The steel had gone all soft and bendy in the heat. “Oh, that belonged to Henry the Eighth. What a shame. Curse this dreadful Nachtmar. I hope you make the fiend suffer, Mr. Pitt.”
“We killed the hell out of him,” I answered. Not that he could actually hear me.
“The Nachtmar is just a symptom. There will be others until you tear this evil out by the roots.” Management’s voice had died off to a whisper. “My people called him…Asag.”
When he said that name the blue fire flared violently. By the time I could see again, the fires were shrinking and the glow fading. The treasures began to disintegrate around us. Bits of blue fire broke away, drifting upwards, until they blinked out of existence. It was like standing in a field made of static.
“Mr. Pitt, or whichever Chosen hears these words, may your God of light guide your way…” Management closed his eyes. “Now, I must rest…”
The dragon disappeared.
I blinked a few times. The cave had returned to normal.
My friends were staring at me, dumbfounded.
“You guys heard that too, right?”
Trip gave a vigorous nod. “Man, you’re just full of surprises.”
“The light show was the dragon’s doing. The rest, I’m still getting the hang of.”
“But did he survive?” Milo asked.
“No idea. I hope so.” He had really been in bad shape. More than likely they’d butchered him into easily managed pieces, and those were being studied in some MCB facility. “I really like the old guy.”
“I bet he made it.” Trip was an optimist. Plus he had always been a sucker for anything magical and not super evil. “Let’s get out of here before Eddings gets arrested, they cut the ropes, and we’re stuck.”
“Let’s go find this Rondeau…Ah hell, that was so distracting I almost forgot now we’ve got to climb up an elevator shaft.”
“Worth it!” At least Milo was pumped. “Holographic dragon fight was way cooler than Laser Floyd. This trip has been great!”