Available Darkness Season 2

John around, just in time to see Hope rising from the ground, blinking as she stood, rubbing a bloody gash on her forehead.
    She looked up, her eyes haunted. She stared as if she were looking at a ghost, ignoring the floating man behind him, and said, “John?”
    She remembers!
    The crystal in her chest began glowing with a red so bright it could be seen through her skin. Jacob’s cackle preceded the horrible.
    Hope looked down, staring at the glowing in her skin, eyes wide in horror. She clutched at her chest, screaming in pain as the crystal moved beneath her flesh, pressing up and trying to rip right out of her body.
    “Stop it!” John screamed, unable to move, unable to turn to face Jacob — unable to do anything but watch. He could feel Jacob sucking his life from him, weakening him the longer that he held him in his grasp. The more John tried to break free, the more energy Jacob withdrew from him.
    The crystal ripped through her like a gunshot, the gem flying through the air leaving a bloody arc behind it as it went into Jacob’s orb. Hope stood momentarily, stunned, or in shock, before her eyes closed and she collapsed to the ground.
    John screamed.
    Jacob released his hold of John and allowed him to fall to the ground as the orb grew bright red, pulsating as wind swirled in a building tempest around them. John tried to stand, to go to Hope, but was immediately sent to the ground by a gust of wind that knocked his feet out from under him. Rolling thunder exploded, each boom louder than the last, as if the world itself was exploding around them.
    John looked up to see a swirling darkness gathering above them, blotting out the stars. The darkness was then sliced by bolts of bright purple lightning crackling in an ever growing circle, starting small but quickly spreading, splitting the world behind Jacob into an ever wider aperture until another portal opened.
    John managed to get up, scrambling to Hope’s side as she lay in a pool of blood spreading into a lake. “John?” she said, confused, and lips trembling.
    Tears streamed down John’s face as he looked at Hope’s wound. She was losing too much blood. Too fast. She would die if he didn’t do something.
    He thought of the healing spell he once taught Larry, but shook his head knowing Hope’s wound was too deep for a spell. He would need it, plus everything he had inside his own soul. If he had to drain himself to death to save her, he would.
    And if he failed, he didn’t want to live, anyway.
    John, ignoring Jacob, started reciting the spell, holding his hands high above Hope’s chest. Behind him, he heard Jacob say, “Goodbye, brother. Until we meet again.”
    The portal closed and Jacob disappeared, taking the insane weather with him.
    John continued reciting the spell, holding his hand over Hope’s chest, trying to summon the energy, but nothing came. He was too weak, drained by Jacob and the drugs before that.
    “Please, God!” he screamed into the heavens above.
    John tried healing Hope again, repeating his incantations which hit the charred and still slightly purple air as only words.
    Suddenly, Skinner was standing beside him, staring down at Hope, his black ringed eyes filled with sorrow.
    “Here,” he said, holding his hand out to John. “Take my soul.”
    “What?”
    “Take my soul. You are the only one who can save the world. I have family here. If Jacob returns, they’ll become either slaves or cattle. Please. You can’t allow that to happen. Take my soul, save her, then go slay the monster.”
    John’s eyes met the man’s. “Thank you,” he said as he reached out to take Skinner’s hand. Skinner’s soul immediately followed.

    * * * *

CHAPTER 7 — Larry

    Larry paced the house, waiting for Abi.
    He’d driven all over town looking for her. He’d even put out word to Tiny’s crew, after telling them that their boss was dead, a fact they were none too happy to hear about.
    Larry didn’t know what to do. John and Abi were both gone, and he couldn’t take a chance that one or both might show up at the house in need of his help.
    Still, he felt helpless.
    Larry looked at his watch for the hundred-thousandth time, wanting to punch something hard, or kick something harder.
    “FUCK!” he screamed to no one.
    The sun would be up soon, and Abi might be dead when it was. She had no way of protecting herself out there, wherever she was. For that matter, John might be a dead man, too.
    Larry shuddered.
    “FUCK!!”
    He