Jagged claws dug into the floor, the muscles in the arm expanding and contracted. It was as if it were trying to pull itself out of the portal, and that was probably the case. A conical spike jutted out of the elbow as it bent, pulling more and more of the arm out into this world.
As a shoulder appeared, a number of similar spikes growing out of various points of the rounded joint, a head then appeared. The face was monstrous, the very definition of a demon. From its forehead came two more spikes that first went out perpendicular to the head before bending upwards, forming fork-like horns. Small spikes ran down the sides of its face, almost like a horny sideburn.
Then the rest of the demon came out, towering over everyone in the room. Hell, it was almost as tall as the room when it stood to its full height.
This…this just couldn't end well.
"Welcome, Nebiros!" Brother Night greeted the creature, which drew its burning eyes to him. "The Mortal Realm receives you warmly."
"You have upheld your end of the bargain, Brother Night," Nebiros acknowledged him. "Now finish it. Ensure my existence on this plain."
Zatanna wasn't entirely certain what that meant, but she liked to interpret it as this Nebiros guy wasn't completely here, if that made sense. Like, he was right there in front of her, but he wasn't completely secure. He could be pushed back to where he came from. That was good news.
The bad news was that she suddenly felt this overwhelming force crush her down onto the floor.
Now, she had been laying on the floor to begin with, but now she felt as if she were a thousand pounds and unable to push herself up. Some unseen force was sitting on her and it was really uncomfortable. She tried to open her mouth to say a spell, but found she couldn't even gasp, much less say anything intelligible.
Her head did turn to one side and she saw Brother Night walking towards her. He moved an arm, a bejeweled dagger in hand. Oh, she had an idea as to what the creep was going to do to make certain his new demon overlord stayed in this world.
"Nothing personal," he told her as he came to stand before her, "but your sacrifice is necessary."
Zatanna wanted to say something snarky; she really wanted to. But she couldn't…freaking…speak!
Fortunately, she didn't have to.
An orange seal suddenly rushed in between them, separating the two Homo magi. Relief filled the dark-haired woman as she recognized just whose seal that was.
"Now let's hold our horses," Constantine said, holding that black sword at his side, his other hand extended up in their direction. "I'm sure we can come to some ending where we all walk away from this alive. If you push it, Peck, then I'll show you just what your little demon found out when I ran this bloody sword through its guts."
Brother Night just gazed at the Brit impassively. "If you would be so kind, Nebiros?"
That caused both Zatanna and Constantine to jerk their heads towards the towering demon. Well, Constantine did more jerking, Zatanna had to slowly urge her head to turn so that she could look at the monster.
Nebiros stared down at the blond man. Immediately, Constantine held up the sword, the tip pointed right at it. This caused the demon's eyes to narrow. "I sense old magick," it growled.
"Old would be accurate," Constantine agreed. "It also doesn't care for other magical beings, so I highly suggest you don't tempt fate here."
"I AM fate."
"I know a doctor that would beg to differ."
Nebiros then roared, revealing a gaping maw of sharp teeth. A powerful wind slammed down on Constantine, who flinched from it. His eyes squeezed shut as his face twisted from what must have been a nasty odor. At least, he looked as if he were smelling something unpleasant.
And then he sunk down maybe an inch. It was almost as if the floor were giving out, which turned out to be the case. Suddenly, the floor beneath Constantine's feet, plus several more in every direction just collapsed, forming a large hole. The blond man fell into the hole, letting out a startled cry.
"J-john!" Zatanna managed to sputter out, fearing the man had been hurt or thrown into some other dimension.
"So much for the Black Sword of Mordred," Brother Night observed. "I had thought that would be cause for concern. Moving on then." He then turned back to Zatanna, the seal between them no longer there. "Where were we? Oh yes, your noble sacrifice."
The fall wasn't a long one. Constantine had been through longer ones before. 'Course, he thought he would have fallen into some hellscape.
Instead, he landed on his feet, then promptly fell onto his ass.
Yeah, not the most graceful of landings.
The blond man just laid there on the floor, irritated by how sore he felt. His back and ass were letting him know he wasn't as young as he used to be. Yeah, he was considered a young man in the prime of his youth, but he had a lot of miles on his wheels. The tread wasn't what it used to be.
Groaning, Constantine climbed back onto his feet. He made certain to keep his hand on the Black Sword of Mordred because he was pretty certain he would lose sight of it if he let go of it. See, he was in this pitch-black room, save for the column of light that fell over him from the room above. The darkness was practically trying to swallow him up. Perhaps it was a little early to rule out hellscape, but he certainly hadn't left his normal dimension.
That's when he saw it. A pair of eyes opened in the darkness. They looked like a cat's, with the slitted pupils. They were also large eyes, meaning whatever those eyes were attached to, it was certainly big.
Then another set opened, followed by another and another.
Oh great, there were more of these bastards.
Constantine just looked over his shoulder, not bothering to grimace as he found himself surrounded by a room full of eyes, no doubt belonging to some kind of twisted minion or fiend that Brother Night had locked up down here. Whatever, he knew how to deal with situations like this.
Keeping the black sword at his side, its tip scraping on the ground, the Brit reached into his pocket and pulled out his lighter. He held it in front of him, using his wrist to flick the top up. "Sorry to cut this short, but I've got places to be," he grunted at the darkness-covered fiends.
With a muttered spell, he struck the flint and a blazing inferno erupted from the lighter.
Zatanna squeezed her eyes tightly as she tried to fight the force pinning her down. It wasn't budging, even as she flooded her body with magic to strengthen herself. She was just as stuck as she had been for the last minute or so, which was infuriating.
She then opened her eyes and glared at Brother Night. The asshole, he had no problem letting people die for his gains. One could say that about all practitioners of blood rituals; funny how they were never the "willing" sacrifice.
If only she could make him feel what she was feeling.
Her anger was bubbling over by now and she pulled in every piece of magic she could get her hands on. This caused her eyes to glow a bright white, which caused Brother Night to pause, a frown on his face. "Hctiws secalp!" she shouted.
And then the force was gone. In fact, Zatanna was no longer lying down, but standing up. She was even holding the bejeweled dagger Brother Night had been holding, which caused her to blink owlishly for a moment.
This caused her to look down and find Brother Night sprawled on the floor where she had been, he too looking surprised at their sudden change in situations. "Well, well, I hadn't expected that to work," she admitted.
"Role reversal," the creepy man remarked. "Not bad, Ms. Zatara. Though I hope you don't sit on your laurels for long. I can't be held down by my own spell after all."
"Ypoc eht lleps," the dark-haired woman muttered to herself before she held a hand out towards the man. Suddenly, Brother Night's body appeared to flatten, an invisible force crushing down on him. "How about now?" she couldn't help but ask.
"I…stand…corrected," he wheezed.
"Now, I found myself in an intriguing position," she continued nonchalantly.
Before she could continue, a column of fire blasted out of the hole in the floor she had last seen Constantine fall through. Both her and Brother Night looked at the hole, the fire receding just as suddenly as it had appeared.
Well, John was clearly having some fun, the magician hoped. Unfortunately, that had made her lose her train of thought for a second. What was she doing again? She had done this apparently sweet role reversal spell and had even been complimented for it. Oh, now she remembered what she was up to.
"You were going to kill me for whatever deal you got with tall, dark, and ugly over there." At this, Zatanna nodded towards Nebiros. "I wonder, if I kill you instead, does that put me in control of this ritual?"
Brother Night didn't answer her, just stared at her from the corner of his eye as that was the only way he could look at her. The side of his head was plastered to the floor, so he could only look up with one eye. That eye looked impassive, making it clear the creep wasn't going to answer her question.
"Well, does it?" she asked louder, looking up to Nebiros.
"I will feast on your flesh and devour your entrails," the demon declared.
Oh, well, poo…
Nebiros then raised a hand up and swung it down to crush her. "Tropelet," Zatanna spoke and she vanished, reappearing up in the air and behind the demon. To be exact, she was damn near at the ceiling as she was above the monster, looking down at him.
"Mia eb eurt dna tih eht nomed," she chanted before she threw the dagger at the creature. As her spell demanded, the dagger flew like an arrow and struck Nebiros on his shoulder, digging into green flesh.
Nebiros roared before he twisted around, swinging an arm up to try and swat at the magician. Not bothering to speak her teleportation spell, she simply did it, evading the gigantic arm entirely. She reappeared on ground level, readying her next spell when she noticed a very crucial detail.
She didn't see Nebiros.
That…was not a good thing, especially how he was this big, towering monster.
Suddenly, a hand wrapped around her, a crushing grip squeezing down tightly on her. Zatanna gasped as she was hauled up into the air before she found herself being thrown through the air. She didn't even have time to use a spell as she crashed hard into a wall, somehow not bursting through it. Considering how hard she had hit it, she would have sworn she would have forcibly exited whatever room this was and enter an entirely different one.
The large hand then slammed down on her, keeping her pinned to the wall. This also made certain she couldn't speak as she was rendered breathless. Her blue eyes were wide from the beating she had taken, admittingly a two, possibly three hit combo if you counted being grabbed, being thrown into a wall, and then slapped down against it like a fly.
This didn't stop her from seeing Nebiros hovering in front of her, his disgusting face filling her entire vision. "Your resistance is futile," he growled.
Well, it certainly seemed that way at the moment; didn't mean she wasn't going to keep resisting. It was the principle of the matter.
Of course, she just needed to say the right damn spell.
So naturally, that was when a completely different spell decided to interrupt things.
A hand reached up and grabbed onto the edge of the hole. Pulling himself up, Constantine put one arm on the floor, followed by the other. He held onto the edge by his arms, the rest of his body dangling beneath him.
It had been a pain in the ass to get up here, but here he was. He needed a breather for the moment since physical activity and smoker's lungs didn't exactly play nice with each other. This gave him the chance to look around and—
Oh…well…bullocks.
Nebiros was still hanging around. In fact, he was hanging Zatanna in the air by crushing her against a wall. Brother Night was climbing back onto his feet, just watching on in mild amusement. This wasn't exactly the scene the blond man wanted to walk back into.
Though things could be worse. It could be him being crushed against a wall.
Naturally, that was when he sensed something entirely different, which caused him to snap his head towards the doors, doors that were suddenly swung open.
Constantine had seen a lot in his time, and he knew the first thing he needed to do was get out of the hole.
The doors were flung open. Corrigan staggered into the room.
There was a rift in the very fabric of reality. Out of that rift was a towering demon, which held the Zatara woman pinned against a wall. Its very presence tainted this realm.
And from within the redhead, he felt as if his very being was about to rip apart.
He held on, but was barely able to do that. It wouldn't be long before he fell apart. It was miraculous he had held on this long. If he hadn't, who knew what would have happened? Tired eyes glanced around, which he found Eldon Peck staring back at him impassively.
"I don't suppose we can end this peacefully?" he asked, knowing full well what the answer would be.
"What wretched soul is this?" the demon snarled. "I can smell the distasteful purity."
Hmm, so it could sense that, huh? If it knew any better, it would take the damn hint.
The large demon turned its body to face Corrigan, keeping one arm extended out to keep Zatanna pinned where she was. Raising its other arm, it was pretty clear what it was about to do.
The moment its large arm came falling down towards him, Corrigan just raised his own arm up, green light erupting from it. The moment the demon's hand made contact with the light, it let out a shriek, snatching its arm back. Even from where he stood, the redhead could see the chard, bubbling skin from where the light had seared the demon's flesh.
"Vulgar creature!" it roared, pulling its other arm away from Zatanna, which caused her to begin falling. Corrigan wasn't able to see what happened to the Zatara woman, namely because he had his focus on the demon. Hopefully she would take steps to cushion her own landing. "I will smite you for that!"
"Wrong," a deeper voice came out of Corrigan's mouth. It was as if he had spoken in a lower octave than he couldn't normally do. It seemed time was up.
Clearing his throat, the private eye called out, "To anyone belonging to this dimension, it's highly advisable you leave. I highly doubt you'll be able to protect yourselves from what comes next."
The demon snarled and once again reached out towards Corrigan. He didn't try to protect himself; there was little point in trying.
Namely because a hand burst out of his chest. It stretched out towards the demon's approaching hand, growing larger itself until it was able to wrap around the demon's wrist, stopping it cold. In comparison to the demon's green leathery skin, this hand extending out of Corrigan's chest was covered in a green glove, giving way to the whitest of white arms.
The redhead's eyes began to roll into the back of his head then, and he lost all consciousness.
Gravity always had a way of humbling people; namely it pulled everyone down until they could fall no further.
Now, like any other time, Zatanna was remembering just what gravity did as she fell to the floor.
Nebiros had his attention on Corrigan, which caused the monster to let go of her. Considering he had been leaving a Zatanna-sized imprint in the wall, she had little strength to call upon before she fell. The air around her rushed by as the distance between her and the floor shrank quickly. She really wasn't looking forward to the sudden stop at the end.
Where was a knight in shining armor when she—
The wind buffeting her body began to slow down; so did her rapid descent. Zatanna felt too dazed to realize what was going on until she softly touched down on the floor. She felt the faint traces of magic as a spell faded away.
Had that been her? Had she subconsciously cast a spell? It didn't feel like her doing, but maybe she had.
"There, there, no worse for wear," a familiar voice with an even more familiar British accent spoke.
Turning her head, she found Constantine at her side. When had he shown up? It was so nice of him too. Maybe he had used a spell to stop her from going SPLAT. How very, very nice of him.
"Now, I don't know about you, but I think we need to make ourselves scarce," Constantine said, which the dark-haired woman found herself whole-heartedly agreeing. She didn't really care to keep fighting with a giant demon anymore. Once was enough for her.
"Wrong." a voice rang out, causing both mages to look. They were just in time to see a hand suddenly explode out of Corrigan's chest and stop Nebiros from crushing him.
"Now that's not something you see every day," Zatanna mused.
"Is your bell rung?" Constantine questioned her, giving her a serious glance. "You don't sound like you're in your right mind."
"Well, I did get smashed into a wall, so you tell me."
The blond man stared at her. "Fair enough."
That's when the arm growing out of Corrigan's body grew longer. Soon there was an elbow and then a shoulder. A brilliant light was shining out of Corrigan's chest to the point you couldn't even see the guy anymore. Perhaps that was a good thing too because the body that pale arm belonged to came rushing out, revealing a towering man, person, thing…
Zatanna found herself tilting her head back, even as the man/person/thing's shadow fell over…well, the entire room.
"Bloody hell," Constantine swore. "This isn't gonna end well."
The figure was tall, just as tall as Nebiros in fact. A broad, muscular chest, arms and leg, all were chalky white. Only green gloves, green boots, green underwear, and a green hood and cape covered him. The hood actually shrouded the face, though it didn't hide the hooked nose and the green glowing eyes. His mouth was pulled tight in an expression that didn't look too happy.
"Nebiros," his voice thundered. "Your presence here is an affront to nature. The world withers and dies before your feet. This cannot be allowed."
"I will not be denied!" Nebiros roared as it drew its other hand back before throwing a punch at the mysteriously tall man. Its punch slammed into the man's face, a powerful wind launching out in all directions from the impact. Zatanna felt herself be forced back by the wind. Thankfully there was a wall behind her that stopped her from toppling over. Whatever daze she had been feeling was no longer present now.
"Zee, listen to me and listen well," Constantine hissed to her, practically gluing himself to her side. "I get the feeling things are about to get rowdy here. Our only shot is to put up as many damn shields as possible."
"Why can't we just teleport out of here?" she asked. "I think teleporting would be best."
"Use your damn senses. There's something drawing everything in and I highly doubt it'll just let us go."
Zatanna let the bluntness go as she reached out with her senses. Much to her surprise, she sensed a barrier that seemed to be closing in on this one location. It was forcing anything and everything to just stay here. How the hell had she missed that?
"Since…but…why…" she sputtered.
"Something this strong," the blond man said, cutting her off, "I rather doubt is for us. If anything, I think it's to keep Nebiros locked right here. Whatever that…thing is, it means business."
Yeah, no kidding.
Meanwhile, the muscular man didn't seem the least bit phased by the fist in its face. In fact, it just stared back at Nebiros with growing fury. Suddenly, green flames erupted around his body, a magical aura that seared the demon's fist.
"GYYYYYAAAAAHHHHH!" Nebiros shrieked as he yanked his fist back, the flesh charred and black. Suddenly, the tall man raised his other hand and seized the demon by the throat, cutting off the scream. The aura was still present, so now the skin around the monster's throat, head, and chest began to blacken.
"Does it hurt?" the man questioned. "Does divine retribution burn you, demon? Remember this pain. I want it seared into your flesh for all of time." He then leaned closer, looking into the hideous face of Nebiros. "Though perhaps that punishment is too light for something as evil as you are.
'There was a brief pause, as if this guy had come to a decision very quickly. "So be it then; allow the Spectre to strip you of that flesh."
Gloved fingers dug into Nebiros' throat before the Spectre pulled his hand back. There was a ripping sound, like cloth tearing, but instead it was Nebiros' skin. Zatanna knew this because she watched in horror as this Spectre guy pulled the demon's skin right off of his body. It tore down Nebiros' back before it was pulled away, revealing muscle and sinew. Nebiros stood there, naked of skin, its eyes wide.
And then it let out an ungodly shriek, one so terrible that it threatened to destroy eardrums from a hundred miles away.
Constantine's hand grabbed onto Zatanna's shoulder, his fingers digging in. Somehow, the magician was able to tear her eyes away from a very naked demon and to the blond man. His mouth was moving, but she couldn't hear what he was saying. She certainly sensed him gathering his magic though, and she knew what he was trying to shout out.
"Shield! Shield! Shield! Shield!"
Immediately, Zatanna began pulling in her magic before she started casting magic shield after magic shield. The very air around the two of them began to glow a pale white, the occasional rainbow reflecting off of it. Layer after layer of shield spells formed over the two of them, each of them errecting one after the other and piling them on top of them.
"Now, begone!" the Spectre declared.
The green, fiery aura around him flared and then blasted the naked Nebiros. The demon damn near vanished from sight, its silhouette just noticeable as it was thrown backwards. It flew towards the rift, vanishing beyond its opening.
However, those flames didn't just stop there. They flowed out in all directions, washing up against the shield Zatanna and Constantine had forged. Instantly, the dark-haired woman could feel each layer of magic as it eaten and consumed, thinning out with every passing second. She actually felt fear as she wondered what would actually happen should those flames actually reach them.
Without being told, she began throwing up more and more shield spells, this time lining them on the underside of the shield. She didn't see any point in trying to lay it on top, just for the spell to be consumed in an instant. Better to reinforce and hope that each new spell wouldn't be reached.
Yet, the Spectre wasn't finished.
"This rift shall exist no more," he said. Holding a hand towards it, the hand open and palm facing upwards. He then closed his hand, forming a fist. In response, the portal began to close, slow at first, but then rapidly. Eventually, it was only a crack in reality before it winked out of existence.
Slowly, the green glow of the Spectre's aura began to recede, pulling in the flames it had caused. "That is one punishment delivered." His eyes, such as they were, began to look around the room. "Who else wishes to receive divine retribution?"
Zatanna could safely say that, no, she did not want to receive any such retribution. She could certainly live without it.
With that said, the moment the Spectre's attention fell upon her and Constantine, she had the feeling she wouldn't be getting a choice in the matter.