The gunmen were already rattled, but staring at the flaming skeleton before them, their bullets doing nothing, they teetered on the edge of panic.
Within seconds they had emptied entire magazines, brass shells raining across the dirt, their muzzles blazing under the night sky. But as the smoke thinned, they watched in horror as Ghost Rider's body simply stitched itself back together.
The bullet holes glowed red, then sealed shut as if his charred leather and flaming bones had never been touched.
For ordinary people, their firepower would have been death itself. For him, it was barely an inconvenience.
But the constant barrage did something unintended… it made him hunger.
Ghost Rider tilted his head slowly, sensing the thick, rancid aura clinging to the men before him. Their souls reeked of violence and sin, exactly the kind of nourishment the Rider craved.
The flames around his bones brightened with anticipation.
"Hungry…"
One of Carrigan's men, a burly guy with a tangled beard, fliched as the Rider suddenly blurred forward. The man barely had time to inhale before the flaming skull was inches from his face, empty sockets burning straight through him.
"Repent," Ghost Rider whispered, his tone carrying the weight of every tortured soul he'd ever avenged. "In the fire of Hell."
The Penance Stare hit him instantly.
The bearded man screamed, eyes bulging as he relived every life he'd taken, every cry, every drop of blood, every last gasp magnified a hundredfold and seared directly into his soul.
The agony was beyond physical; it was annihilation.
His scream warped into a choked howl as his essence ignited. A moment later, his body now an empty husk, crumbled to ash.
The Rider inhaled, absorbing the burning soul, flames roaring higher along his spine.
The remaining gunmen recoiled in terror. Even Carrigan felt a chill crawl along his back. They all knew now, bullets weren't going to save them.
But fear drove them to keep firing, squeezing their triggers like the noise alone might hold death at bay.
Ghost Rider had no patience left.
He reached over his shoulder, and the iron chain coiled around him slithered free like a living serpent. Hellfire surged across the links, heating them until they glowed white-hot.
With a sharp flick of his arm~
SWISH~CRACK!
The chain arced through the air like a flaming comet, splitting one man cleanly in half. But he didn't fall, he burned, flaring into ash before the pieces even hit the ground.
Again the chain snapped outward.
SWISH!
A scream tore through the air. Another man vanished into cinders.
SWISH!
A second scream. Another body ignited like cheap paper in a bonfire.
The remaining killers backed away, faces pale, guns shaking uselessly in their hands. Their bravado evaporated. This wasn't a man. It wasn't even a demon they could negotiate with.
Carrigan felt his breath catch. Mephisto had warned him he might encounter resistance, but he had never pictured anything like this…
And now those burning sockets had turned toward him.
Carrigan hurled aside the empty rifle with a snarl.
"Hold him off!" he barked at the nearest man before diving into the backseat of a nearby Jeep.
His hands shook with rage. Pure, stubborn rage. He tore open a metal case, revealing a heavy, custom-modded grenade launcher. If bullets couldn't drop that flaming demon, maybe this would.
Metal clicked and clattered as he slammed in the oversized grenades one after another. His breath came in short bursts.
If this doesn't work… we're all dead. Every last one of us.
Out in the dirt, Ghost Rider was already dragging another screaming thug into his grasp. The man's soul peeled away from his eyes like smoke being ripped upward, and the Rider inhaled it like a starving beast.
Carrigan's lip curled. Not on my watch.
He rose from behind the Jeep door, sighted the burning skeleton right as it turned toward him, and pulled the trigger.
"Go to hell, monster!"
The grenade streaked through the night in a hot arc and slammed into Ghost Rider's chest.
BOOM.
The explosion ripped the desert open. Fire surged skyward. Dirt blasted in a wave. The man Ghost Rider had been devouring vanished in the inferno, body and soul alike.
For a moment, the entire camp fell silent. Then…
"…Did we get him?" someone muttered.
Relief washed through the desperadoes in a sick, casual wave. Their companion's death didn't matter; fewer people meant a bigger cut. A couple even exhaled tiny laughs, half-hysterical.
But Carrigan didn't laugh. That was too easy.
"Move!" he snapped. "We're leaving! Now!"
He hauled Danny's limp body into the Jeep without a second glance at Nadya, who lunged after them, begging, pleading. The engines roared, tires spat gravel, and the convoy tore away into the desert.
Behind them, the fire continued to burn… then twitched.
A low, unnatural rustle rippled through the flames. The inferno tightened in on itself, sucked inward like breath being drawn by something hungry.
The fiery blast vanished piece by piece, swallowed whole.
When the smoke settled, Ghost Rider stood in the center of a blackened crater. His body was cracked with molten lines, but already knitting together. He swayed once… starving, furious and dropped to one knee.
Dawn's first light crept over the horizon, brushing his scorched leather with pale gold.
He looked up, flames dimming, and whispered through his skeletal grin.
"Not done yet…"
Then he collapsed, too drained to chase the fleeing Jeep…