Graves came across Miss Hannah first. The lady was just then sitting up (possibly having been roused by the swift seismic kick the earth had delivered moments ago), fighting for consciousness and wincing at the obvious pain in her side that rewarded her efforts. She was banged up badly but far from finished off, he was glad to see.
Hannah looked over at a man-shaped bundle of twigs and leaves and rotted crap that was lying in the dirt beside her and she cocked her head, as if it meant something to her but she couldn’t quite remember what. The pile looked like nothing so much as the husk of a mummy, desiccated beyond all recognition-although there was a gun lying next to it. And a pair of shoes at one end. Graves didn’t know what in the hell that thing might’ve been before something sucked it dry, nor did he much care to speculate, not at the moment.
There were significant sights Hannah had yet to see.
Graves, standing a few yards away, watched as she slowly looked up further, only to find the imperious, helmeted figure of Lady Madness looming over her, with her head cocked at a curious angle.
The figure’s visor exploded, showing the static behind it. Hannah flinched, and shards of tinted plastic rained down all around her.
Lady Staticface turned to see the bones of Dexter Graves pointing two silenced handguns at her, from behind. They spat quiet fire as he squeezed off every round in the magazines.
Hannah threw her hands over her head as multiple bullets perforated the Archon’s black suit, traveling on an upward trajectory. Graves had been sure to shoot from the hip, to keep her safe. The spots of bright gray static that showed through Lyssa’s leathers made her look like she was dressed up in costume as her absent sister-mom.
“Gin plus tonic, super plus sonic, you plus moronic, if you think that’s gonna help you, Dexter Graves,” she said.
Graves shrugged. “Never know until you try,” he replied. Then he threw the empty guns aside and charged at her, bellowing at the top of lungs he no longer possessed.
The thing called Lady Madness hauled off and backhanded his skull right off the top of his spine, almost without effort. The skull landed in the dirt many yards away. Graves saw the rest of his frantic skeleton caroming off the trees from his new, low-angle perspective, while Miss Madness turned back to Hannah.
“LiaMiaZoeClioTia,” she said. “Where is they?”
“Right behind you,” answered the woman in question.
The Queen of Crazy spun around in time for Lia to ram the jagged, torn end of her cherry branch right through Lyssa’s broken visor. Lia ran her backwards with it, shouting, until the leatherclad demon tripped over Graves’ skull and went sprawling.
As Lia savagely ground the splintered branch into Lady Madness’s open helmet, grunting with the effort of it, roots broke out through the back of the hard plastic braincase and slithered down into the earth. The demon drummed her heels and fists on the ground while the branch blossomed into a new sapling under Lia’s influence, pinning her helplessly to the dirt like some monstrous approximation of a scientific specimen.
Both Graves’ skull and Hannah watched this happen with quiet shock. Neither of them would ever have guessed that such a thing could occur, much less that Lia might be the one to cause it.
Her moment finally broke. Lia stumbled back from the fresh sapling and the madwoman whose head it was staked through, falling on her ass next to Graves’ disconnected headbone.
She looked both stunned and depleted. Such intense acts of will took an immediate and visible toll on her.
“That thing dead enough for you yet?” Graves’ skull asked. It happened to be facing the new tree, and had enjoyed an excellent view of the whole improbable event.
“You can’t kill the moon,” Lia said, distracted. “But that might hold it till sunset. Maybe.”
She picked up his skull when she got to her feet and shoved it against Graves’ ribs when the rest of him went running by. The skeleton grabbed its proffered top gratefully and crammed it back down onto its spine once again.
Lia fell to her knees beside Hannah. Her black cat came running up to them, switching its fat tail back and forth. Graves hurried over and knelt down too, quickly assessing the lady’s injuries.
“Awww, hey there, that’s not so bad, is it?” he said, squeezing Miss Hannah’s hand. “Not deep. Just grazed your side, is all. More of a mess than anything.”
“Are you sure? Dexter?” Lia sounded wobbly. He hated hearing that terrible, sick fear in her voice. “There’s so much blood, I don’t know what to do, oh, Hannah, I’m so sorry…”
“Pressure right now,” Graves said, ripping the lining out of his coat. “Stop that bleeding. Here. Hold this, nice and firm.” He balled up the fabric and put it into Lia’s hands, then guided them to Hannah’s wound and demonstrated an effective amount of force to apply.
“Yes, okay, thank you Dexter,” Lia babbled, holding that wad of cloth against Hannah’s hip like all the world depended on it. “Are you sure she’s okay? She’ll be okay? You’ve done this sort of thing before?”
“Back in the war, field surgeon woulda called you a sissy for wantin’ a band-aid on a scratch like that,” Graves said.
“Some scratch,” Hannah gasped. “Feels like I’ve been chopped in two.”
Graves looked to Lia. His manner was serious. “Maybe it’s time we got the hell outta here, whaddaya think?” he whispered. “There could be a whole stack of those guys out there in the trees.”
Lia thought about it, frowning. “You’re right,” she agreed, after exchanging a quick glance with her black cat. “But we’ve gotta do it carefully.”