Clark suddenly raised his foot and drove his heel down into the arch of Diamond’s foot. The big man grunted, but did not relinquish his hold. Clark’s eyes went wide as Tony pointed the rifle at him and sighted.
“Sorry about this, dude.”
“Tony…please.”
Tony squinted. “Jesus, my head is fucking killing me. Ia verm…”
“Verminus,” Amethyst prompted.
“Right. Ia verminus Leviathan. Ia destrato Leviathan. LEVIATHAN. That okay?”
Amethyst nodded.
Tony, Clark and Jennifer all moaned at the same time as the pain in their heads increased tenfold.
“Dagon is close,” Amethyst yelled. “He’ll breach any minute now. Hurry, Tony.”
Clark seemed to relax. Nodding, he said, “Go ahead then, you son of a bitch. Let’s get this over with.”
Tony motioned at Diamond with the barrel of his rifle. “Get the fuck out of the way, Marion.”
Releasing Clark, Diamond stepped aside—
—and Tony shot him in the face. The round punched a neat hole between the big man’s nose and mouth, and blew out the back of his head, splattering Clark with gore. Blood and skull fragments soared through the portal and splashed into the water on the other side. Before Clark could even blink, Tony pumped another round into Diamond’s stomach. The agent staggered backward, making a peculiar mewling sound, and then toppled over face first.
“GENOVA!”
Tony spun. Amethyst raced toward him, hands raised and fingers splayed. Blue light flickered between his fingertips. Tony wasn’t sure what he was doing, but whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. Tony lowered the weapon and squeezed off a short burst, effectively amputating both of Amethyst’s legs at the knees. Screeching, Amethyst lay on the ground, thrashing and clawing as blood sprayed from his ruined stumps. Behind him, Jennifer shrieked. Clark seemed momentarily stunned.
“Like I said,” Tony said, standing overtop Amethyst. “I don’t have a lot of friends. I’d like to keep the ones I do have.”
“You bastard,” Amethyst muttered through blood-stained teeth. “You fucking bastard.”
“Don’t blame me. I tried telling you guys when you first busted into my apartment—I’m retired now. My name’s not Tony Genova. It’s Larry fucking DiMazzio. And Larry DiMazzio doesn’t kill on command.”
He shoved the smoking gun barrel against Amethyst’s left eye and pulled the trigger. Then he glanced up at Jennifer. What Tony saw on her face nearly broke his heart. Her mouth hung open and she stared at him with a mixture of fear and revulsion.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, “but this is who I used to be. I don’t know. Maybe it’s all I’ll ever be.”
She started to speak, but then, clutching her stomach, she turned away and vomited onto the floor.
Tony turned around to face Clark, who was still standing next to the portal.
“I’m sorry, man.”
“I really thought you were going to shoot me.”
“I thought about it,” Tony admitted. “Figured I could plant one in your leg, just to throw them off guard, you know? But even a round this size could cripple you for life, so I did the next best thing.”
“You were certainly convincing.”
“With Ruby dead, they couldn’t read our thoughts, but just in case, I had to play along. Make sure they didn’t know what I was up to.”
“What if you’d missed?”
“I told you before, when we first left the landing strip— I never miss. But seriously, I’m sorry for putting you through that.”
“It’s all right.” Clark took a deep, shuddering breath. “Let’s just get out of here, okay?”
“Hang on. Got to finish with the magic words.”
“Well, do it th—”
The other-dimensional ocean churned as two enormous tentacles shot through the doorway. They were immense, with girths larger than the mid-section of a human being. They reminded Tony more of snakes than they did tendrils. One of the appendages grabbed Diamond’s body and lifted him off his feet. Blood immediately splashed on the floor, and Tony and Clark both saw with mounting horror that the tentacles were lined with suckers that bore razor sharp teeth.
Mouths, Tony thought. The fucking thing has mouths on its tentacles!
The other appendage whipped toward Clark, but he ducked low and rolled forward, away from the portal. The tendril cut the air where he’d been standing, while the other one yanked Diamond’s corpse through the doorway. For a moment, they saw him floating in the water on the other side. Then the tentacle pulled him toward the light. As Tony and Clark stared, dozens of other tentacles erupted from the light and surged toward them.