The Book of Death (Bourbon Kid 4)

laser bolts from both hands, aiming
blindly in all directions. But where was the Bourbon Kid? There were numerous
statues and displays within which he could conceal himself, and it seemed that
Gaius was unable to locate him.
    As if the laser bolts and
gunshots weren’t enough to contend with, one of Gaius’s mistimed attacks had
created another problem. A set of red curtains had caught fire and burst into
flames. So as well as being stuck in a room with an angry mummy, a serial
killer, an unconscious boyfriend and not knowing for sure where her pants were,
she now had to contend with the fact that the place was on fire too!
    She hauled herself forward onto
her knees and stared around the hall. Her jeans and sneakers had been tossed
across the floor and had landed not too far from an antique piano with a
mannequin of Ludwig Beethoven sitting at it. She took in another deep breath
and groggily began crawling on her hands and knees towards it.
    Behind her she could hear
Rameses Gaius cursing and firing laser bolts off in all directions.
Occasionally a gunshot would ring out in response. Gaius and the Kid were
taking shots at each other but, where the Lord of the Undead was out in the
open, the Kid was hiding within the shadows of the museum’s displays.
    Kacy reached out and grabbed her
jeans with her fingertips. As she did, a blue laser bolt hit the floor nearby
and ricocheted up, flying a few inches past her nose. Clearly, time was in
short supply. Her jeans were almost completely inside out where the vampires
had yanked them off so hurriedly. As she picked them up off the floor,
something fell out of the one of the front pockets. It was the small object
Vanity had handed her. She cast her mind back to the moment when he had slipped
it into her hand. “ Use it… ’ he had said.

Fifty-Seven

 
    Sanchez made his way tentatively
down the stairs to the main hall. Below him he could hear gunfire and all kinds
of stuff breaking. That was a sure sign that the Bourbon Kid was already taking
on Rameses Gaius, and doing it without The Book With No Name. Sanchez hoped he
wasn’t too late.
    At the bottom of the stairs he
saw the actions that went with the noise. A pair of curtains had been set on
fire too, and the flames were spreading. There were dead bodies lying around on
the floor, which was nothing unusual in all honesty. Over by a shattered glass
display he saw the unconscious figure of Dante, wrapped up in bandages from his
feet to his shoulders. There was also the strange sight of a rather attractive
brunette in her early twenties crawling across the floor on her hands and
knees, wearing just a black sweatshirt and a pair of pink panties with the
words FREE ENTRY across the back. In any normal situation Sanchez would be
checking the spelling quite rigorously, but this wasn’t the time. The large
shaven headed figure of Rameses Gaius was standing in the centre of the hall
with his back to Sanchez. He was firing off blasts of blue lightning from his
hands, aiming them at just about anything. They were ricocheting off the floor
and walls, blasting into statues and displays. Everything he hit either snapped
in half or burst into flames. This was one destructive bastard.
    Out of the corner of his eye,
Sanchez caught sight of the Bourbon Kid. He was hiding in the shadows behind a
black curtain that covered a statue of a fat naked guy. He had a large gun in
his hand. He saw Sanchez and nodded at him. Then he vanished into the shadows.
His disappearance was followed by a loud gunshot that drew Gaius’s fire. The
giant mummy launched a laser bolt at the curtains where the Kid had been hiding.
    Sanchez had no fucking idea what
the Kid had nodded at him for, but he suspected it was some kind of signal. It
probably meant he was supposed to do something important. Something brave. The
Kid had drawn Gaius’s attention away from the stairs so Sanchez could sneak in
undetected. This was obviously his big moment. Gaius was only twenty metres in
front of him. Time to be a hero, like Flake had suggested.
    He tiptoed as quickly as he
could up behind Gaius, only taking his eyes off the back of the mummy’s head
briefly to check out the ass on the girl with the pink underwear one last time,
just in case he never got another chance.
    When he was less than a yard
behind Gaius he raised The Book With No Name up above his head and smashed it
down towards the back of the mummy’s skull. Unfortunately, as he plunged it
down, the Lord