Disclaimer: I do not own The Dresden Files.
Father Roarke Douglas stood to the side of the stone doorway, sidearm held before him in a practiced position. His was a classic shooter's position, arms firm and straight. The pistol itself was immaculately maintained and clean, the whole contraption painted a non-reflective matte black.
He was protecting his parishioners, his flock, against the genocide exploding outside. His charges, normally numbering around two dozen, had now grown to more than forty crowding together inside the small stone chapel seeking mutual defense.
Douglas saw shadows dancing around the corner he was guarding and braced himself, eyes staring crisply into the space he knew was about to be occupied. His hands were steady, form solid.
A tall man, visage smothered with evil, burst from around the corner with a machete held above his head. His mouth was open in a howl of obscene joy at the slaughter he was expecting to find.
Douglas pulled the trigger on his sidearm once, and then once again. The first round caught the homicidal native in the throat, abruptly cutting off his scream. The second shot exploded out of the side of his head, catching him on the way down.
The body crashed to the floor, and other men like him shouted in surprise from outside. The encounter had taken all of one second to begin and end.
Roarke didn't bother with checking the clip in his firearm – it had a dozen shots in it, ten now that he'd used two of them. He had two other clips in the pockets of his pants and a knife in his boot.
Someone outside lit up the doorway with an assault rifle – likely a Kalashnikov. The high-powered rounds splintered into the old stone walls, rebounding in all directions.
Douglas retreated back down the hall and around another corner to come into the sanctuary. Almost fifty people were crowded into the relatively small room, mostly weeping women with a stoic father or brother here and there.
Clearing his throat, the priest said to them, "People of the Lord – do not give up hope. We have something which those outside do not – our faith in Him. Our Father. The Lord will deliver us through this trying time, if we but have faith and do not lose hope in the Almighty." His voice was calm and reassuring, rising above the cacophony of frantic voices without him having to shout.
His flock heeded his call, and turned silently to prayer. Still, many of them cried and whispered quietly.
It was over this silence that Roarke was able to hear a terrible howling from outside. It was utterly unlike anything he had heard in the natural animal world – but he had heard it, yes. The shouts outside turned to screams as the strange, somehow unholy barks and yelps grew in number and volume.
Roarke furrowed his brow and turned back the way he'd come, towards the open door. The corpse was accompanied by another – a different man, shirtless, with a look of stark fear and terror on his face. His hand was white-knuckled on a dirty machete, the other arm missing from the elbow down. One of his other legs was gone, a trail of blood leading his way outside.
Roarke made to peek around the corner to see what was behind the man when it came at him. The beast was the size of a German shepherd, hairless all over its pale form. Tusks and teeth protruded wildly from its gaping maw, bloody saliva slinging around the small corridor.
Somehow maintaining his composure, Douglas sprang back from this new monstrosity, training his pistol on the spot above its left eye – its eyes were on the sides of its head, like a boar – and fired rapidly into his target. Blood darker than a human's spattered from the exit wounds and onto the walls, floor, and corpses. The beast fell away from Douglas and convulsed, then lay still.
Roarke carefully stepped over the growing pile of bodies, changing the clip in his weapon along the way.
The scene outside was one worthy of Dante. More of the creatures – more than ten – were fighting over the bodies of a few of the native warriors, whose bodies were shredded and torn almost beyond recognition. A few men in dark fatigues carrying rifles sprinted across the yard, racing from one copse of trees to the opposite side in pursuit of a few fleeing survivors.
Father Douglas waited in the shadows of his church, pistol aimed at the nearest monster. His chiseled features were stark as granite, eyes colder than ice. After a few minutes the dark-clad men called off most of their beasts and continued their rampage into the town, killing rebel and unlucky innocent alike.
Two of the beasts were left, and Roarke made to make his move in destroying them. But someone beat him to it.
A figure ran into the clearing with a drawn sword, the slender blade marking it as a katana. It was a wizened old man, wearing a set of Kevlar armour and a white cloak embroidered with a scarlet cross on the left breast.
He fell upon the feasting beasts silently, slicing one down the flank from haunch to shoulder. The other spun on him, hissing, but the seemingly-frail man leapt back from its mouth with ease. He shifted his weight backwards, as the monster lunged forward, then forward before it could recover. His slim sword pierced the beast's neck and stabbed inward to where the vital organs were cradled, killing it instantly.
Slicing the crippled thing's neck in mercy, the old warrior turned to Roarke and softly said, "Hello, Father Douglas."
Roarke nodded and answered, "Good morning, Shiro."