Doom of DOOM
“Over the centuries, mankind has tried many ways of combating the forces of evil... prayer, fasting, good works and so on. Up until DOOM, no one seemed to have thought about the double-barrel shotgun. Eat leaden death, demon...”
— Terry Pratchett
You’re pretty much fucked.
That’s your considered opinion.
Fucked.
Up to your knees in the dead with demons scrambling over each other to claw at your junk, the hot blast of sulphuric wind washes over your Praetor Suit as you snap your shotgun barrels shut with an upward flick of your wrist.
An imp catches your opposite wrist, drawing your attention. You pull it into the air with ease and let it taste two barrels of buckshot at point-blank-range.
You had chosen this; voluntary damnation for eternity. You bled for the sins of humanity while they were living it up on some far off planet, safe and sound. But at least she was going to be safe. You had made sure of that.
When the Gates of Hell opened up on Earth you fought your best for the remnant of humanity. You held the line and stemmed the tides of demons salivating for human flesh. The last evacuation ships managed to take off, but you hadn’t joined them, despite her begging and pleading. Even when she broke that life-changing news that made your heart flutter where the most horrific demon failed to get even a rise out of you.
You couldn’t go with them. You wanted to, but you still had work to do. Still had demons to kill. And it was watching those orbital thrusters fade off in the night sky that you backed into the Hellmouth and returned to the hot place where the nuns always said you’d end up.
The Gates of Hell could only be closed from the inside. So that’s what you did. You ripped and tore your way into the depths and closed them. Saved the world; saved the universe!
And damned yourself in the process.
But it’s not so bad after the first couple of years. After all, you’re not trapped in Hell with the demons. The demons are trapped in Hell with you!
Skilfully sliding two more shells into your super shotgun, you snap the weapon shut again and turn the next imp’s face into mincemeat, all the while scrambling backwards up a mountain of corpses. The blood and gore is slick under your boots and gauntlets, and the mad scramble is a slow go – made slower by the constant pause to reload. But it’s worth it. Every roar of old faithful turns another one or two demons into essence. Essentially they are being re-incarnated somewhere else in Hell and you know you’re just feeding an endless cycle of death and rebirth. But at least those imps are coming back with a clear message.
Don’t fuck with the Doom Slayer.
So why are you fucked? You ask yourself that for a brief moment as you nail a pair of grabby imps with one shot. You can’t possibly be fucked, your kill count is through the roof today. Then you look up the mountain of death you’re climbing and you remember.
About ten metres above you on a rock shaped like a demonic cow’s skull sits a wavering portal of energy and fire. A Gate of Hell.
You had closed them all ages ago. Everyone had learned the damn lesson of the day: Stop fucking with things you don’t understand. Then you remember the self-destructive human condition. Wherever there was profit to be made, people would always make the same damn mistakes again and again.
Someone had opened a Gate of Hell again, and now you’re fighting desperately to keep the demons from getting at it and the world that lay just beyond. If they get through it’ll be the same massacre as before. The one you damned yourself to put a stop to in the first place.
Your plan doesn’t go beyond getting up there and killing the shit out of anything that tries to get past you, but unfortunately there’s nothing else you can do. The last time all the Gates of Hell were controlled by a single demon. This time there’s no switch, lever or big-boss demon anywhere to be found. Just a horde of imps trying to crawl over you to get to wherever that Gate of Hell leads.
You kick one imp’s face in, then cave another skull under an elbow before you roll over and scramble up on all fours. You make it to the curled horn of skull-rock and pull yourself up onto the flattish base at the top.
The view is pretty kickass. You can see for miles around, the shores of Hell being built quite vertically. It’s valley after valley of blood and death with mountain peaks like jagged daggers. Looking closer you can see some rocks are actually squirming, revealing they are made out of the still living bodies of the damned.
There’s even a floating fortress of some kind made of skulls and spikes just over the uneven horizon.
Oh, and the horde of imps is getting pretty close too.
You slip the super shotgun into its holster on your right shoulder blade – easy to grab should you need it in a hurry again – then you reach down whip a chaingun out of whatever flat-space ass-pocket it has been residing in this entire time. Hell, demons, Gods and Devils; there’s no point trying to rationalise any of this while you’re getting a magical supply of ammo, armour and health from every creature that falls before your raging might.
You waste no time in spooling up the trio of quad-barrelled guns and hurl an almighty shit-storm into the imps below. The chaingun spits fire as fast as it pisses empty shell-casings and metal links from the ammo belt out the side.
Most of the imps explode into clouds of blood and bone as you rake left and right through their advancing ranks. Others are turned to lumpy paint; the cheap stuff your dad once tried to make you paint the garden fence with despite your complaints. The rest just sort of fall apart. Many of the imps keep climbing as if not noticing the sudden absence of an arm or a leg. But follow-up shots soon put those monsters out of your misery. More meat for the mountain slope.
But soon your progress begins working against you as the bodies begin piling up and forming a wall. Soon you can’t see the imps’ approach anymore and you’re just raking the dog-shit out of them with short controlled bursts as their heads pop over the ridge. While at first this seems deceptively easy soon you realise your reflexes and attention can only stretch to a certain angle.
Suddenly demons start spilling over your left flank. Switching out weapons you have your combat shotgun up next and you put a three-shell burst into the crowd. The imps in back topple over a whirlwind of gore the front line disappears into, giving you some time to polish the rest off with some accurate shots.
But as you do so the right flank fails and some imps scramble into pouncing positions on your twelve-o’clock. The shotgun is stowed with a click and you whip out your heavy assault rifle. The belt starts chugging out of the box magazine as your firing one handed into the crowd on your right. Meanwhile your left hand finds your pistol and you start putting bolts of energy into the demons at your front like a gangster.
The range is reduced to the kind of distance best reserved for fisticuffs so accuracy isn’t really on your list of priorities. You’re just spraying and spamming at this stage, trying to keep your footing as the top of the skull-rock grows slick with blood and bits of flesh exploding from imp bodies.
It’s only a matter of time before it all goes tits up.
And it does when one of the sneaky buggers leaps over its buddies and collides with you like a bowling ball. You’ve been tossed about by bigger, badder demons before, so you’re not exactly winded. But the impact is enough to take you off balance, and the two of you crash into the Gate of Hell.
A billion flashbulbs ignite in your face and suddenly time has no more meaning. You have no body but retain a consciousness somehow, somewhere. A sense of motion, but that might only be another memory.
Remembering a hand suddenly creates a hand full of clicky joints – the result of punching things too often and too hard. Remembering a foot results in the sensation of a foot, a painful sensation where the ankle is bruised. Memory of a backache condenses into a patch of flesh and blood that is your back. Memory of breath turns emptiness into a pair of lungs followed by an instinctive gasping for air.
Your eyes open and you groan with dismay at another memory. An older memory. Remembering exactly how it felt every time you stepped between their world and the next. The transition between the land of the living and Hell is a disorienting and uncomfortable affair, and you’ve experienced it too often.
Scrambling to your feet you realise you’ve still got your pistol in one hand and you waste no time in jumping on top of the imp you passed through the portal with. You have one hand wrapped around its throat, squeezing hard enough to pop bones and spines while you shove the barrel into its mouth and pull the trigger until there’s nothing but a chunky puddle of soup where the brain used to be.
The imminent threat dealt with you take a moment to breathe and tuck away your pistol, scraping up the heavy assault rifle and hefting it into position again.
The Gate of Hell is still open, pulsing and flaming like a pillar of fire in the centre of the room. But you’re not in a high-tech research facility like you had been expecting. There are no pipes and cables trailing all over the place, no control panels and flashing lights. Not even a single UAC marking to be had.
You’re surrounded by smoothly cut stone walls. It’s a cavernous chamber with a high ceiling and narrow windows fitted with simple glass panes to one side. The floor is fairly slick and there is some kind of stage at the very front of the room cordoned off with heavy red curtains.
The floor is littered with tables featuring an assortment of unusual models and contraptions. But the one that takes your immediate fancy is the flat grey pedestal glowing with white light above which the Gate of Hell stands triumphant and wavering.
Whoever had opened the portal knew their stuff. But they were clearly neither very technologically advanced or well-funded.
Which begs the question, if you’re not in a modern human facility, then where the hell are you?
A question that will have to wait for later. You snap up your weapon and stand ready as a few fireballs fly out of the Gate of Hell, followed closely by the imps who blindly threw them. Rolling aside, you open fire and start picking them off as they come through. It’s only a few at first. And soon it begins to feel like all the residents of Hell are trying to come out through this one portal.
They’re short. They’re spiny. They’re all over the fucking shop and they’re not dying as quickly as you could hope for. Ammunition streams into their bodies and blood comes spurting out. Bits and pieces of unrecognisable stuff that would look more at home in a butcher shop or a biology lab piles up.
Chunks of whatever is left falls wetly to the floor leaving a crimson mess everywhere.
It becomes a pointless exercise though as soon there’s too many for you to engage all at once. They start getting by you and begin leaping about the room. Many run up the walls and make a dash for the doors. A few hang about to get their bearings or lob a fireball at you.
One sizzling too close to your visor for comfort forces you to disengage the Gate of Hell. Turning you throw your weapon into its holster and sprint across the space. Tables flip and ruined science fair experiments are flung aside as you tear across the space and rip into the imps attempting their escape.
The monsters scatter as you put yourself between them and the exit, your shotgun making short work of a few of them. You catch one by the scruff of the neck as it scrambles away, and the thing seems to squeal like a puppy being told off as you heft it in front of you. The squeals turn quickly into spits and hisses, killing the moment of adorableness and quenching your guilt about what you had planned for the demon.
With a smirk you prime a grenade and shove the explosive into the imp’s mouth. Its teeth gnash over the slick surface of the device before you punt the creature away, the timer rapidly beeping on the grenade.
The imp lands a few yards away and slides to a halt at the base of the Gate of Hell. It explodes into a sunburst of fire and gore a moment later. The concussive blast guts the teleportation pad giving the Gate of Hell life and a moment later the gateway into the abyss collapses on itself.
The noise coming from the portal device is no longer there, replaced instead by the scuttling of claws and the thumps of bodies landing in the puddles of mess before you. Spreading their arms to their sides, the imps crouch low, hissing a challenge. You crack your knuckles and bring up your combat shotgun.
A familiar red haze mists your visor as you get stuck in. Claws rake over armour, fists cave in jaws and buckshot turns insides into outsides. You use your shotgun like a weapon in every sense of the word. The stock becomes a skull-cracking club. The front grip becomes a bone-shattering staff. The muzzle spits hellfire without pause. It’s a whirlwind of death and you’re in the eye of the storm.
At least while there’s still meat for the grinder. The imps fall like dominoes. Every one that throws itself onto you dies in a brilliant, glittering fountain of viscera.
One, the last imp, takes a hint and leaps past you.
The creature digs deep for traction and scuttles past, putting you into an awkward spin as your barrel attempts to track. Dropping to your knee you find a stable position and let the creature have it just as it’s charging a ball of fire in one claw.
It’s time for the imp to lose balance now, and it drops the projectile before staggering in place drunkenly as some buckshot tears through its torso.
Without hesitation you rush in for the kill. Slinging your shotgun, you grab the creature by its face and fling it into the doors you’ve been defending. It connects with a smack that has the doors burst open and you both carry on into the corridor beyond.
You cross and the imp is crushed under your weight against what looks like a set of flimsy metal lockers. As you step back, the creature peels loose and collapses to the ground before you lift your knee to your chest and put your boot through its skull.
The rush of noise in your ears – and you slowly realise this must have been the sound of the adrenaline coursing through your veins – fades and the rage of battle calms to the gentle brush of your calm breaths breaking on your helmet’s face-plate. What was noise and shrieking and death moments ago has turned to a heavenly sort of quietness. And it’s these moments of bliss you live for. That transition from absolute fury into complete calm; there’s something strangely satisfying to it.
Enjoying the quiet doesn’t last long though as you realise you’re gathering an audience. You hadn’t noticed them in the blur of combat, but now that the gratuitous violence had passed they’re making themselves more known.
The young people in their skinny jeans seem to crawl out of the woodwork, slinking around smashed furniture, picking between the dead demons and crawling out of the other nooks they had been hiding in.
Boys and girls in their teens gather all around. Several adults stand among them, and everyone stares at either you or the gore soaked gym you’d come from with bewilderment.
Something about the setting and these people suddenly clicks in your brain. Your palms get clammy. You sense you’re developing a sudden spot of acne. And for some reason you feel the urge to listen to angry music sung by some dude furious at his dad.
The realisation crashes down on you quite suddenly: this is a high school.
You lift your hand, though not in violence. Armoured fingers spread and you give a bewildered wave. A girl with thick framed glasses and purple hair sheepishly returns the gesture.
Having traded one Hell for another you realise you’re back to square one.
Being fucked.
So you vent; and let one of the locker doors feel the rage of your fist.
EQUESTRIA GIRLS
Hell to Pay
In the calm you got a real sense of how messed up the gym was. There had been an aging janitor trying to mop up the gory mess you left on the floor, but he didn’t get anywhere. If anything the guy ended up just spreading the blood around.
The banner hanging overhead mostly read:
Canterlot High School Science Fair
It barely hung up there anymore, covered in scorch marks and smouldering in places. Pretty much every student project was in bits and pieces, and that’s without even mentioning the tables they’d been sitting on.
The students had mostly been told to go to class while much of the faculty freaked out over the slowly dissolving mess. That was the great thing about demons. Destroy their corporeal form and they just tend to dissolve, leaving less chunks to deal with. Just the smears of blood.
You remind yourself none of this is your fault, even as you pry off the remnants of the locker door still wrapped around your wrist. Punching it in was a little harsh of you, in hindsight. But better to crater an inanimate object out of frustration than a human skull, right?
“Um… s-s-sir?” a small voice asks.
You look down and notice a skinny girl with long pink hair and a yellow dress standing uncomfortably in your shadow. She’s like a matchstick when compared to your armoured bulk. Hell, you figure she probably wouldn’t even stand up to your abs if you weren’t wearing armour.
You give a noncommittal grunt, staring at her through your visor, and she balks a little under the rumble of your voice – despite how vague the sound you made.
“Um…” she points at the locker door in your hand. “That’s… that’s my locker door,” she squeaks out, ending in a little yelp.
You consider the bent and ruined plate of metal and shrug before handing it back to her. Admittedly you’re probably a little rough because she catches the door in her chest and stumbles with a little “oof.”
Still, she manages a little smile out of politeness. “Thank you.”
She wastes no time in scurrying away and you watch her go. You’re standing outside the principal’s office like a delinquent about to get a good talking to. Pacing back and forth and no locker door to fidget with you pat the stock of the pistol on your hip taking reassurance in its presence. You have no idea why you’re nervous, but it has something to do with this Principal Celestia chick you’re about to see.
Getting in trouble was something you’d done often as a kid, and when you left school you swore you’d never stand before another angry principal again.
About five minutes ago she’d gone into her office with a student named Twilight Sparkle, that purple haired girl who had waved before your locker-disembowelling tantrum. From the snippets of conversation you caught while following them here you get a distinct impression this sort of shit happens around Canterlot High often – that is to say, portals into other worlds and general magic related crap. Clearly however, this is the first time things have escalated into bloodshed.
The faculty counted their blessings no students had been hurt. You’re just glad none of them had turned into zombies.
Another snippet of conversation led you to discern Twilight Sparkle was some kind of wonder-child too. Her experiment was a fusion of magic and science, and she had been hoping to open a window to take a glimpse at something called ‘Equestria.’ Clearly things had gone tits up and you can’t help be frustrated.
What’s wrong with kids now and days? you think. Isn’t a paper mache volcano exciting enough anymore? Gotta open up Gates of friggin’ Hell.
You wonder if they know how lucky they are that you came out of the portal rather than a cyberdemon.
Sick of pacing, you turn and sit in one of the plastic chairs outside Principal Celestia’s office. The plastic cracks and the metal legs groan, warping slightly under the weight of your Praetor Suit.
As if sensing the chair’s anguish, the office door swings open and you angle your visor upward to see Twilight Sparkle step out of the office with Principal Celestia at her shoulder. The girl must be about seventeen years old, with glasses and freakishly large eyes. She’s even got a strange purple-ish tinge to her skin, enforcing the idea this is clearly not the same version of Earth you came from back when.
As if the fact her parents had called her ‘Twilight Sparkle’ hadn’t made that obvious enough already.
You hazard a guess Celestia is about your age. Just less grizzled and with a lot more colour in her hair. She looks displeased, but then a principal whose student opened a gate to Hell and unleashed demons on the world and then looks pleased clearly has psychological issues.
Twilight Sparkle looks rightfully sheepish, clutching a thick notebook to her chest. Obviously they are the calculations and schematics of her science fair project and you sense she’s going to be up all night figuring out what went wrong.
Considering she gets to survive that long.
You’re considering having some strong words with the girl, then again Celestia seems to want to have some words with you as well. Her mouth opens to say something, but she’s cut off before she can make a sound.
A shockwave rips through the walls, cracking plaster and shifting pictures. It’s invisible at first, but has enough force to throw all three of you sideways. Then, shattering the visible light spectrum, the wave manifests itself in the form of a fiery orange aurora borealis wafting like a plague through every space in Canterlot High.
Your heads-up-display cycles between clarity and static a few times before resolving on a quick diagnostic screen and you stomach the familiar feeling. A Hellwave! Which can mean only one thing…
Your pistol clears the holster in one deft tug and you turn on Celestia and Twilight Sparkle with the weapon levelled. Finger on the trigger, you aim for headshots, but you stop before firing the first shot.
Normally speaking a Hellwave is accompanied shortly after by shambling zombies with an unquenchable hunger for brains… or death. Whichever. Eating someone’s brain generally results in death anyway, so either way it works.
Fortunately however, Twilight Sparkle and Principal Celestia are not the groaning minions of Hell you fully expected them to turn into. Instead they’re standing, stabilising themselves on a wall and shaking off the disorienting effects of the Hellwave.
The Hellwave doesn’t affect one-hundred-percent of people, you know that quite well. But this is the first time you’ve seen mass immunity to the zombification. Turning you see a few classroom doors open and students and teachers stumble out clutching their heads and wondering what the hell just happened. But otherwise, the school seems to be remaining zombie-free.
You lower the gun and walk to the nearest window. Being on the second floor of the building and on an external wall, you find yourself looking out over the various outdoor facilities that make up Canterlot High’s gardens.
Out on the football field, around the mid-field line hovers a perfect orb of energy and fire, much like the Gates of Hell but much more stable. It hangs suspended above the field offering a glimpse into the skull mountains, writhing damned and sulphuric deserts on the other side. And sustaining it, positioned directly underneath and feeding the hole in space and time is a Gore Nest.
The pile of viscera and globby pieces seems to be made entirely out of bits of spiny bone and unrecognisable masses of flesh. You catch sight of a few demonic faces in the mass of viscera and realise the gore nest is comprised of demon bits.
Knelt before it is an imp. It’s missing a chunk of its mid-riff, damage likely caused by your shotgun in the earlier fray, but it’s alive enough to throw a few more pieces of its dead kin onto the pile, feeding the Gore Nest with more energy.
You missed one of the little fuckers and now the bastard has opened up the worst variety of a gateway between Hell and here possible. A Gore Nest isn’t just a single doorway to Hell. It’s like a teleportation beacon that can spawn demons anywhere around it. You have no idea what the possible range is. But going by the pillars of fire springing up in the corridor next to you the range is just enough to spawn critters in the school.
The pillars burst like shattering beer bottles and the fire resolves into the squat, spiny, bipedal shapes of imps. The demons waste no time in flailing their claws and gathering wicked balls of fire ready to be thrown.
Students and teachers scream, diving back into the classrooms for cover and clearing the hallway. You’re glad they do it with enough speed for you to quick-draw your plasma rifle and fire from the hip.
The weapon lets out an almighty howl as you walk streams of burning blue death into the imps. They fall in quick succession, some of them catching on fire, others practically evaporating into a pink mist as they’re overwhelmed.
A ball of fire catches your pauldron and you’re forced to turn into the imp that threw it. The stream of plasma chops the imp in half, then splashes over something charging up behind it.
Every heavy footfall shakes the ground beneath your boots until the mass of pink flesh and thorny spikes ploughs through the bisected imp, scattering the burning remnants to either side in a cloud of howling gore.
Your plasma fire hits the charging beast square in the over-sized face, but it either doesn’t care or relishes the pain of skin being seared away.
The hulking pinky demon is more mouth than anything else really. The beast is like a mutant cross between a bipedal bovine and a wild boar. There’s no neck, just a musclebound torso glued to a potato head. There are tusks and spikes sticking out along the spine and around the sides of the skull, and the enormous mouth that opens wide enough for the bottom jaw to scrape the ground is filled with massive teeth seemingly better suited to impaling rather than chewing.
You swipe from side to side, spraying desperately from the hip and shear off a few of the pinky’s spines. It howls, spitting gouts of blood as the plasma stream lobs off one and the opposite arm just below the elbow. But the demon charges into you all the same, knocking your plasma rifle to one side.
As the weapon slides out of reach you’re knocked onto your back with the demon’s impressive maw attempting to chew you to bits. Digging your fingers into the large teeth along the top of the mouth you wedge one knee against the inside of the lower mandible and keep it from biting down. in its frustration though it keeps pushing, shoving you along the ground and headlong through Celestia’s office door.
Twilight Sparkle and Principal Celestia, having run for cover inside, throw themselves out from behind the woman’s heavy desk and a second later you and the pinky demon plough right through it.
Pinned to a wall, you shove with all of your might, the servos in your armour whining as you stretch out the pinky’s jaws until finally, with a sickening crack and a howl from the demon, the mandible breaks off entirely.
As if wrestling a bull to the ground you twist the oversized head and pin the demon down on its side with a knee on the side of the head and both hands gripping one of the larger tusks jutting from what remained of the mouth. With an expert pull you perform some impromptu dentistry and tear the tusk free before flipping it like a dagger and driving it deep through the demon’s eye.
The pinky demon slumps as you stand over it and dead check it by unloading two barrels of super shotgun into the head.
Catching your breath you crack open the sawn-off, dumping the empty shells as you look over at Twilight Sparkle and Principal Celestia. The girl is hyperventilating, babbling on about something neither you nor the principal can decipher. But Celestia, much respect to the ol’ gal, seems to be holding her composure. She stands up, brushes the dust from her dressy skirt and helps Twilight Sparkle to her feet before looking at you.
You can’t help give her a firm nod as you feed shells into your shotgun and snap the weapon shut.
“Hopefully now I can speak without being interrupted,” Celestia sighs as she walks to the door and checks the corridor outside.
It’s clear. Bloody and strewn with slowly dissolving body parts, but it’s clear of demons. A few of the classroom doors crack open and students peek out, indicating that miraculously, no one is hurt. The demons seem to be focusing on coming after you, and to be honest you don’t mind drawing their attention.
“Can you stop these things like you did before?” Celestia asks over her shoulder and you nod. “Good. I don’t know who you are or where you came from exactly, but I sense you’re here to help. And for the time being that’s all that matters. You do your thing. I have to make sure my students are safe.”
Giving the woman a thumbs up you catch your super shotgun by the barrel and present the handle to her. Celestia seems to hesitate at first, but then gingerly takes the weapon as if it’s made of something revolting.
“Thanks… I guess,” she mutters, weighing the weapon that makes her look like a child holding an oversized nerf-gun, before leading Twilight Sparkle away. You don’t waste anyone’s time by watching the principal at work. She’s doing her job well, gathering students and directing them away from the Gore Nest to the other side of the school.
You turn and look out the windows. Only instead of being treated to the sight of a dying imp trying to build a larger portal, two heads float into view.
The cacodemons are impossible to mistake. They are certainly among the ugliest of Hell’s demons. A round-ish bell of floating hide with what looks like deformed, diseased little arms partially formed on the underside, the cacodemons only have two eyes between them. Each of the creatures has a single green eye dead centre under a Mohawk ridge lined with spikes and bony thorns, and under the eye sits a wide mouth filled with altogether too many teeth.
One of the cacodemons opens its mouth wide to reveal a gathering ball of lightning within its simple bowels, then spits the ball out with enough force to shatter the window separating you from the creatures. Shards of glass rattles across your armour as a burst of static electricity fuzzes your HUD again and has every hair on your body standing to attention.
Time for you to get back to work again.
Digging in your heels you charge headlong at the two floating demons and leap off the windowsill at them. The thrusters on your boots ignite and push you up and forward for more distance. You clear at least five metres of free air between the creatures and the building’s second story, arcing through the air at them with parkour-like precision. It’s an act of ludicrous daring, but being pretty huge means your guts are pretty huge too.
You land neatly on the cacodemon that shot at you before it can close its mouth. Your gauntlets find purchase on a cluster of the balloon’s spines while you plant a boot firmly in its bottom jaw. The cacodemon sags and spins off-balance. The world is a whirling blur as you cock back an arm, flex your fingers into a claw, and then shove your hand right into the cacodemon’s eye.
There’s some wet digging and flexing, and after a moment your hand comes out of the socket clutching a wad of watery flesh and a long, ragged ribbon of optical nerves.
Dropping the extracted eyeball, you kick off and leap through the air at the other cacodemon. You grab hold just as the first sprays a waterfall of blue goo that smells like rotting grass and bursts apart with the sound of an overripe squash dropped ten stories.
The second cacodemon puts up much more of a fight than the first and you struggle to hang on with just one hand as it spins and convulses through the air. Your other hand finds your pistol and you put several shots through the creature.
The creature wails as you put another three shots through it for good measure, then jump off. The drop to the ground is no more than a dozen metres, and you crouch deeply, falling to one knee on impact leaving fractures in the pavement where you land. Rising o your feet again, your pistol twirls a few revolutions around your index finger before you slot it back into the drop-leg holster on your thigh.
Punctuating your feat of badassery, the riddled cacodemon smacks into the ground behind you and explodes into a cloud of gore.
Ahead, the imp that had been building the Gore Nest lay in a collapsed heap. But the portal above glows brighter as if the death of its builder is giving it more energy.
Shouldering your heavy assault rifle you stride in for a closer look, putting a dozen rounds through the fallen imp in passing. Better safe than sorry.
The closer you get to the Gore Nest the more frequent your HUD readout descends into static, until eventually the readout vanishes altogether. Your stomach is turning and your head spins. People just aren’t meant to be this close to a transition into Hell, especially while still being attached to their mortal coil.
Lowering your weapon you pace a circle around the Gore Nest. It’s got a creature-like configuration to it. Almost like a massive Pac Man head in mid-death, maw opened wide towards the portal orb above it. There’s even an eye, pulsing and beating like a heart on one side.
Experience, and just a little common sense dictates what you do. Plunging a hand into the heart you rip it out of the Gore Nest, which ironically enough explodes into cloud of gore, misting you with blood and gibs.
There’s another burst, quite like the Hellwave as the portal collapses on itself and slowly the static fades. Your HUD springs to life again and you lift your rifle into a combat ready stance, sweeping up and down the football pitch for contacts.
As mentioned before, you had experience with Gore Nests. And every time you end one the area heats up with demons porting in on the residual energy left over in a desperate attempt to get into the world of the living and replace the beacon. Any second now the place is going to be crawling with demons of every shape and size.
… you lower your rifle a little and frown when nothing happens.
The relief is short lived though when a mighty thud vibrates out of the Earth, through the soles of your boots and into your bones. There’s the heavy sigh of a mighty chest cavity, followed by a loud huff. A mist of water particles washes over the back of your head and dapples the grass in front of you.
“Doom Slayer,” a heavy voice rumbles, calling you out.
Lowering your rifle to your side you very slowly turn on the spot, then angle your visor upwards to look into the demon’s wicked grin. The beast’s right claw ignites into a ball of plasma fire and it throws down its fist to crush you.
You dodge to one side just in time, but the ground-smash resolves into a shockwave that picks you up mid-roll and flings you like a toy from the hand of a toddler across the field. You hit the deck, bounce, then hit again and slide to a halt on your ass. Picking yourself up with a grunt you shoulder your assault rifle and take aim.
The Baron of Hell is surprisingly fast considering its bulk. The massive naked demon is what you originally thought the Devil would have looked like. But now, after everything you’ve seen and experienced you have no idea what to expect anymore.
The baron’s horns curve down slightly and jut forward like massive tusks. Each large hand is home to killing claws and it walks on cloven feet, the quadruped joints in the legs giving it a swift sprint to its step.
The baron leaps forward, another ball of plasma ready to eviscerate you.
You leap forward at the same time, but not on a trajectory to collide. You dive down under the baron’s feet and fire your thrust boots. The boost fires you head first into the ground, sending you sliding under the leaping baron which craters the pitch just behind you.
Another shockwave picks you up and flips you head over heels through the air. Only this time you’re ready.
In a matter of speaking.
Time screeches to a crawl as you flip and hang upside down in the air, facing the baron’s back. Your rife is level and shouldered and you unload everything you have. The barrel heats, the muzzle shroud begins to glow and smoke and tracers smack into the baron’s bare back. Small splashes of blood erupt from the demon’s hide as the under-slung attachment on the heavy assault rifle pops open.
The two rocket racks positioned on either side of the barrel slide open before a dozen small thumb-sized rockets take off, drunkenly weaving towards the baron.
Time rushes back into its normal, painful pace before the rockets explode and you hit the deck, tumbling about and accidentally firing off a few bursts of fire into the deck. An explosion rattles your teeth as you slide to a halt on your front, and picking yourself up you wipe the grass and muck from your visor.
All of the rockets met their mark, but the damage is minimal. A few bloody craters riddle the baron’s back, but it turns to snarl at you like nothing happened.
You sigh as the baron closes the distance between you in an instant and catches you with a flaming uppercut.
The world is a mess of red haze. But when the pain clouding your vision passes you still can’t quite figure out where you are or where you’re going. All you have is that familiar falling sensation as you fly on whatever trajectory the baron has sent you.
Finally, you make a hard landing – hitting the tin roof of a supply shed that collapses under your weight and you disappear inside with a crash.
In the meantime several of the doors fly open and students and teachers move gingerly outside, only to realise they’ve exited the school in the wrong direction. Among them is Princess Celestia, and in a bout of panic she tries to bring up the super shotgun you gave her and aim at the baron.
The Baron of Hell merely lets out a mighty laugh at the sight of the mortals before it. Both its claws light up with balls of plasma as it prepares to get to work. Only before it can…
You kick open the tool shed door, blowing it clean off its hinges and step outside. Letting out a deafening whistle you catch the baron’s attention, then draw its eyes to the device you’re carrying.
Shifting your grip on your new weapon, you give the rip-chord a tug and the chainsaw revs to life. You’re going to fell this uppity motherfucker like a tree; one limb at a time.
The Baron of Hell charges at you with fury, and you meet him halfway. A fist swishes overhead, but you’ve already rolled out of the way and land on your feet behind the baron. It’s all over, the fucker just doesn’t know it yet.
The chain whirs as the two-stroke engine roars and you bring the weapon around like it’s a two handed sword. The gnashing teeth make wet contact with the flesh on the baron’s thigh and the chainsaw hungrily eats down to the bone. The chain catches, the barbed catches at the base of the blade dig in and you lever the blade deeper into bone.
The baron screams and topples backwards as gouts of blood shoot from the stump that used to be a leg. It lands hard on its back and raises a fist to launch a ball of plasma. You don’t let it, getting stuck in with the chainsaw again and lopping the limb off just under the wrist. Flesh and bone yield with ease as you cut through the beast like a hot knife through butter.
One more upward stroke from the side across the belly and you give the large demon a heavy kick, spilling all sorts of slippery bits and pieces across the bloodied grass. You wonder if it’s even possible to wash the field.
Gargling and groaning, the baron attempts to set up, but you put a foot on its throat and shove it back down to the ground, holding the blade of your chainsaw menacingly to its face.
Regardless, the baron manages a wet chuckle.
“This won’t end so quickly, Doom Slayer. The Beast has tasted the magic in this place. And He will not rest until the shores of Hell have consumed this world and the power it hides.” The demon turns its head to the gathering crowd and lets out a rumble of evil laughter. “Let the sluts make peace with their God. Soon, hellfire will consume them all!”
You’ve heard enough, and so has everyone else. You spool up the weapon again and introduce mister chainsaw to mister face.
The blade stabs right into the demon’s face as the teeth spin. A fountain of viscera erupts into the air as you dig around a bit, turning skull and brains and pretty much everything else that made up the demon’s head into the consistency of paint.
The Praetor Suit makes the menial tasks so easy you’re shocked you haven’t used it to perform chores before.
Case example, the locker door you eviscerated earlier turns out to be an easy fix. Your armoured gloves and strength enhancing servos made it a pinch to bend back into shape. A few strips of duct tape and some fresh screws through the hinges into the locker frame…
Viola! Instant locker door replacement.
You stand back with your fists resting on your hips and admire your handiwork with a nod. Looking down you see the owner of the locker is equally pleased. ‘Fluttershy’ as she introduced herself when asking if you could help fix the locker door, smiles.
“Thanks, Mister Doom Slayer.”
You give an amused grunt and gently pat the girl on the head. Everyone has started calling you ‘Doom Slayer’ since that Baron of Hell called you out by the title the demons have given you. It’s kind of funny really, the way they think that’s your actual name. At least they’re not trying to pry into your life and force answers out of you.
As Fluttershy skips off back to class you resume your previous task. Taking up the mop the janitor graciously handed you after seeing the bloody mess and subsequently quitting (in quite a lot more words than that, and certainly more profanities screamed), you get back to cleaning the blood smeared corridors of Canterlot High. You’re surrounded by a lot of buckets of water, as many as you could find in the stores. Some of them have clean water, others are black with the blood you’ve cleaned up so far. There’s a trick to cleaning up blood and guts without making more of a mess, and it’s a trick you’re proud to say you’ve mastered.
You didn’t realise until you started mopping how much you miss the old days of chores around the barracks, shooting the shit with your fellow corps buddies and avoiding staff sergeant’s judgement the morning after a massive drinking session. These simple activities make you feel like a normal marine again.
With it come the memories of dodging between civilians and facing unclear threats in a sweltering backwards country of savages. Compared to battling the foes of Hell, a good old Earth insurgency, the kind of thing you were originally trained for, seems like a cake-walk.
Though having said that, a conflict where the boundaries of good and evil, friend and enemy, kill or be killed are all very clear cut and boldly labelled is nice too. It adds a certain moral simplicity to things.
Heck, what does ‘normal’ mean anyway?
You ease into the routine again, sweeping, dipping, wringing then repeating the process. But it doesn’t take long for something else to interrupt you. Looking up to the sound of approaching footsteps you spot Principal Celestia.
She looks a little bedraggled and tired. Her eyes have lost some of their vibrant colour, she’s missing the dressy yellow jacket she had been wearing earlier and her multi-coloured hair is frizzy in places. She still manages a brave grin as she watches you lean on your mop like it’s a cane, eagerly waiting for her to speak.
“None of the students were hurt in the attack. And we’re not noticing anything else out of the ordinary,” Celestia explains while you nod with satisfaction. “It looks like you got all the monsters for now. Thank you.”
She pauses, as if hesitant; then slowly adds, “The creature that spoke. It said more would come. This horror isn’t over yet, is it?”
You want to tell her otherwise, but lying isn’t going to help. Brutal honesty is what will get these people through this. In fact, any form of brutality generally helps in your opinion. So you shake your head.
Understanding, Celestia sighs, then notices something. She’s still carrying your shotgun, and hefting it she turns the weapon over and hands it back.
“But we’re not entirely defenceless. We have you,” she adds on a brighter note and some of the colour returns to her eyes. “Will you stay? Defend us if or when the monsters return?”
It’s a dumb question really, but you don’t tell her so. You take the weapon and nod firmly.
Thanks aren’t necessary, but she thanks you anyway. “I’ll prepare a dorm on campus for you. And in the meantime, since you’re doing such a good job, and the school will need some good maintenance if these attacks do keep up, you can help out in a janitorial capacity.”
You’re enjoying the simplicity of mopping floors and fixing bullet holes so far. It’ll be nice to do something constructive for a change, rather than deconstructing demons every minute of every day.
Holstering your shotgun, you reach out and open your hand. It takes Celestia a moment, but realising the gesture she smiles and shakes your hand.
You’re not really fucked as bad as you originally thought.
The Beast let out a roar of such fury that it could be heard in every corner of Hell, and even purged one of the older, forgotten plains with a wave of hellfire.
“I’m gonna fuck that Doom Slayer so fucking hard!” the demon yelled jumping from his throne and tearing the chair of bloodied skulls from its altar.
He flung the throne across the palace of flesh and it shattered on impact with the wall. The pure will of his rage caused several mushroom clouds to plume up on Hell’s jagged horizon. Imps and other lesser demons scuttled out from under his feet as the Beast kicked and stomped. It caught one zombie in the ass and punted the creature away.
The hellknight, the bearer of bad news for its master, didn’t flinch, even as the mighty Beast brought a mountainous fist to the ground beside its head. The hellknight was kneeling so deeply its chin practically scraped the floor and had either not moved out of fear or discipline.
“Gather the summoners!” the Beast bellowed, bring his face down to the hellknight’s level. “Have them pool together every scrap of argent energy! We will assault this new world immediately! We will not rest until their magic is ours!”
The hellknight didn’t get a chance to acknowledge, or even budge when a lighter, feminine voice wafted out of the shadows.
“That won’t work,” the sound teased.
The click of her metal heels on the stone floor followed the sultry notes of her voice as a demon dwarfed by even the hellknight minion swished into the murky red light. She was human, at least seemed so on first glance. She was perfect; altogether too perfect, and her eyes like her almost too perfect body held the promise of desires both gross and subtle.
The Beast growled as the demoness swished past him and seated herself daintily on the bottom few steps that led up to his throne… or where the throne used to be.
“You have attempted to defeat his brute strength with brute strength of your own for too long,” the demoness said, absently filing down her talons on the rough breastplate of her armour. “The Doom Slayer has walked through Hell defeating everything you’ve thrown at him for half a decade. You’re making all the same mistakes again.”
“Watch your tone,” the Beast warned and the demoness looked at him innocently. It was a look that would turn a eunuch into a raging deviant.
“I am merely suggesting we combat his brute strength with cunning for a change.”
Huffing, the Beast stroked his goatee thoughtfully and dismissed the other minions in the room with a lazy wave. “Speak.”
“Don’t send an army. Just send me. I will find out how they opened the Gate of Hell that originally drew us to that place and replicate the technology. I will study their magic and master it. And when the time is right I will open a Hellmouth wider than any Gate of Hell we have ever produced. Their world would fall in seconds.”
The Beast nodded slowly. It wasn’t an uncommon tactic for his minions to adopt. Eons ago it had been a popular tactic for assimilating worlds into Hell, a successful one at that. That was before the Beast had come to relish ultra-violence so much and began opting for a more straightforward approach when it came to attacking the living.
“And the Doom Slayer?” he asked.
The demoness gave a type of giggle reserved for young women sharing a naughty secret over coffee rather than a demoness planning world domination. But as she made the sound that didn’t suit her she changed. Her claws shrank away into a set of perfectly manicured nails. Armour turned to modest cloth. Her skin took on a less violent shade of red and turned pale before her tail shrank away. The shape of her eyes barely changed, but somehow turned arguably more seductive.
Sitting in the demoness’ place, with her long slender legs crossed was a human woman who would be a model in any capacity; with light skin, long wavy hair and dressed in a dressy skirt with a tidy jacket over her blouse.
She smiled with a wicked set of pointed teeth.
“Just leave the Doom Slayer to me.”