Fallen: The Demontouched Saga (Book 2) (3 page)

“You are taking me on a cruise? I’ve wanted to do this since I was a kid.”

“I know. I had one of my friends ask yours at the bar the night we met.”

She grabbed my hand and we walked onto the ship. I didn’t reserve a cabin, like some men would have on a night like tonight because I want to see her under the moonlight.

“I wish I brought my camera. It is so beautiful out here.” She looks over smiling.

“We’ll just have to do this again, some day.” I turn towards her and we lock our hands together. We spend a few moments staring into each others eyes before I finally grow the nerve to bend down and give her a kiss.

I stay with it as long as I can. If I could go back, I would make sure it never ended.

-4-

I wake up just as the smell of smoke enters my nose. Looking around, I notice a dozen corpses around me. I reach down, pick up my knife, and try to get my bearings. The last thing I remember is charging into the woods to take care of three demons that attacked Uriel’s complex. I know I managed to kill one but none of the corpses here looks like the other two.

I walk towards the walls of the compound. Thankfully Eunie didn’t destroy those. That is the one thing I fear the most is losing control around other people. He doesn’t really care who he happens to kill. To be fair, he only gets to play when I’m within steps of eating it. But, it doesn’t make me feel any better knowing that.

I work my way towards the gate. I get close when one of the soldiers manning the gates raises his weapon.

“Hands where I can see them, tough guy.”

“I’m on your team, numbnuts.” I raise my hands slowly in the air.

“Thats not how I saw it. You managed to kill ten good men before you finally collapsed. We should have killed you last night. I won’t make that same mistake today.”

“Stand down, sergeant.” Uriel walks in from behind him. “He told your men to stand down and get me. You sent your men to their deaths, not Mitch.”

“How was I suppose to know that he was as twisted as the fucks he charged after?

“You weren’t. Your job was to have your men man the walls and protect the encampment. If you send men every time someone tests our defenses, we will not have any left.” She places her hand on the barrel of his gun and presses it downward.

I lower my hands, walk through the gates, and stop in front of the sergeant. “I’m sorry about your men, Sergeant. I have some problems of my own that I can’t control.”

The sergeant sets his rifle back on his back and storms away.

“Any idea what they were after?” I ask.

“The attack on the gate was a diversion. Not long after you ran off three of them jumped over the walls and ran directly at my house. Ezekiel managed to kill two of them, but one managed to get into the room with the orb fragments.”

“Shit, they took them?”

“No, but they no longer hold the shadows.”

I can’t say for sure, but it sounds like the demon souls are no longer inside. I have never been a fan of cameras for security, but I find myself wishing Uriel had some installed in her house. “So we are going to be dealing with Duncan again.”

She nods. “With any luck they have some trouble finding a suitable host.”

“But a demon can possess anyone. Why would that matter?”

“If a demon forces his spirit into a body, it will not have as much power as a willing host. He could return to a physical body once he gets released, but something tells me that they are going to wait.”

“Does that mean that you could possess any body you wanted to?” I’ve always been curious about the angels. Demons, as a rule, are a lot less secretive about the shit they can do. That’s not to say they tend to overstate their abilities at times. Angels, however, come off as a bit protective. That probably has a lot to do with them being tasked with protecting us, but surely someone has been on the bad side of one at some point.

“Yes, but as a rule we only go into those who ask.”

“That kind of limits your options now days, doesn’t it?”

“It does, but we are much better at healing our hosts than them.”

“How much good does that do when our enemies already outnumber us?”

“If we have to drop to their level to win, then this is a war I don’t want to fight.”

It is a war she was created to fight whether she wanted to or not. This is why I laugh when people prayed for an end to any war. God created all of us to fight. The angels split into two factions and fight each other. Humanity just took that to the extreme and split into hundreds of factions. The only thing that worries me is knowing that some of these factions still have access to nuclear weapons. I realize we are all going to die, but that is not the way I want to go out.

“Talking about wars we don’t want to fight, I better be getting out of here. I don’t want to see Michael’s bad side.” I start heading towards the door. “If you need anything you know where I’ll be.”

Zeke meets me at the door. “I’m sorry that you have to be in this mess, Mitch. I wish we found you before all of this, but I’m glad to have you on our side now.”

I reach out and shake his hand. “All things considered, I’m glad you didn’t smite me for my mistake.” I can’t say I wouldn’t have done it to him if the situation was reversed. What kind of idiot makes a pact with a demon and hangs out with angels.

“If we did that to every human who made a bad choice, we wouldn’t be able to fight this war.” He walks me out to my ride and opens my door. “We will find a way to get you out of your deal. You deserve it.”

“I appreciate it.” I put my seatbelt on and pull down to the gate. Besides some dirty looks from the soldiers at the gates, I don’t have any issue getting out of the place, though I do have to swerve around the cars the demons left behind when they hit the place.

The drive back home is rather pleasant. The one advantage to the apocalypse is the complete lack of traffic on most of the highways. Yeah, you will see other cars from time to time, but you don’t have to deal with traffic jams. Probably the best thing is the lack of road raged idiots on the roads. I find it hard to believe that they all stopped existing after things went south, but considering your odds of dealing with someone willing to kill you over something relatively minor have gone up, I can see why they may have learned to leave the finger on the steering wheel where it belongs.

I’m about ten miles from the pad when I come across a group of cars blocking the road. I notice that they have the occupants of the front car standing outside of the vehicle while two other people are searching the vehicle. In the past I would have been trying to hide the booze I have in the back seat while sucking on as many Tic Tacs as I could before I got to the checkpoint, but something tells me this isn’t a sobriety checkpoint. Of course it may be the two assholes with assault rifles that are heading my way.

I roll down the window as the men approach. “What’s the problem here? I’m running late for an important business meeting. The boss will have my ass if I don’t get there on time.”

The one on the driver’s side of the car raises the gun towards my face. “Nice ride you have here. Why don’t you get out of it and take a nice walk down the highway.”

“And if I pass?”

The asshole on the passenger side busts out the passenger window. “Then my friend there is going to take it from you.”

“OK. OK.” I step out of the car. “You win man. The ride isn’t worth my life.” I take a few steps backwards. “Tell me, is it worth yours?”

I focus my push on the barrel of his gun, sending him tumbling towards the ground. I focus on a pull on the other gun, which brings it to my hands. I then rush forward and put everything I have into a punch to the first guy’s jaw. I wasn’t the type of guy who you feared taking a punch from in the past, but survival today meant having to learn how to disable people without killing them when possible. I’m not against killing these guys, but I need to keep things quiet unless I want to decrease my survival rate.

I square up to the other asshole on the other side of my car. I pull my knife to my hand and hover it in the air. “Time to play.”

The look in his eyes is somewhere between holy shit and I have to run, but he stands his ground. I admire a man who is willing to stand up and fight, even when he knows he is royally screwed. I start to twist the knife around mid-air while he makes his play. His play is to take off running down the highway away from the roadblock. I also admire intelligence in a man. I bring my knife to my hand and start to walk towards the roadblock.

If these other two assholes hadn’t tried to take my car, I would have probably let them pick this couple dry. Supplies are scarce, true, but they aren’t worth dieing for. Besides I would have picked them up a few miles up the road and given them a few things. Now I have to make an example out of them. I always thought the seven deadly sins were more figurative than anything. Ironic that these guys are going to die today because of greed. I allow a smile to come to my lips as I close in.

“Back away from the car and let them go and nobody else gets hurt. One bad move or smart comment and you all die.” I start to levitate the knife again. “Your move.”

The four of them look at each other. The one closest to the man starts to laugh so I send my knife directly into his chest. The others take a step back and raise their hands in the air.

“Take a hike.” I pull the knife back to my hand.

They walk about twenty yards backwards but then turn around and start to jog down the highway.

“Thanks for that, mister. I thought they would have killed us for sure.”

“You would have been safe. They only kill people that don’t give in.” I hand them the rifle. “Keep this with you, and learn how to use it. A day may come where that will save your life.”

They thank me, get in their car, and speed off. I turn around and start to walk back to my car when I notice the guy I punched slowly getting to his feet. A smile comes to my lips and I start to play with my knife. I wish I had taken his gun away, but my odds are much better now than they were before.

“I’ll give you one last chance. Drop the gun and run off. I don’t have anything that you need to die for today.”

He doesn’t drop the gun, but he does begin to back up slowly away, keeping his gun trained on me. I hold my hand forward in case he decides to do the ole spray and pray maneuver, but he doesn’t seem to want to play anymore. He reaches the back of my Expedition and turns his back towards me to walk away, but he stops. Within moments the sounds of fully automatic gunfire fills the air as he unloads a clip towards the back of my ride. I want to run up to see what they hell he is firing at, but common sense prevails and I stay put.

It doesn’t take long for him to empty his clip. I watch him try to reach a spare he has attached to his vest when I notice the guy in the brown hoodie walk up and place his hand on the shooter’s head. He releases a white flash of light into the shooter’s head which sends him to the ground in a heap.

He looks at me and starts walking to me. “Where are the other four?”

“Three are running for their lives down the highway and the fourth is in a bloody heap on the ground behind the cars.” I start to levitate my knife, more out of reflex than anything. If he makes a move for me I want to be able to move quickly.

“I’ve seen that blade before.” He stops a few feet away. “The Raksa blade only works on a demon.”

“Then what the hell are you?” I relax the blade back into my palm.

“I’m like you.”

Hoodie walks by me, stopping at the bloody corpse I left momentarily before continuing down the highway. I have so many questions that I want to ask, but I stand still more in amazement than anything. It is hard enough to believe one person like me exists, now I know two.

I run back to my Expedition and kick it into drive. I want to catch this guy before he gets too far away. It doesn’t take too long to catch him, thankfully. The guy seems very driven for some reason, just not in a hurry to get anywhere.

I slow down next to him and roll down the window. “What do you mean, you are like me?” I keep up with him waiting for an answer that doesn’t come. Desperate times call for desperate measures, so I stop the car and run out after him.

“What the hell man. Don’t have time to answer a question?” I wait for a minute hoping for some sort of response, but this asshole just keeps ignoring me. I step out in front of him and try to hold him back. It takes about two seconds to realize that holding him back wasn’t my best idea. He raises his hand up slightly and pushes me about ten feet back with his power and continues walking.

He was too blessed with the ability to throw anything to be like me. Yeah, I have managed to draw enough in to throw someone around, but it was hard to pull off. I’m not so sure that it wasn’t just Eunie stepping in to make sure I didn’t manage to kill myself when I did it.

“Stand in my way again and I will kill you. Those men must pay for their crimes.”

“You the new sheriff? Didn’t see anyone new on the last ballot.” I hate it when my snappy comeback lines get ignored. I guess that’s what I get for trying to reason with this clown.

I dust myself off and head back to my ride. As much as I want to push the issue, there are some things worth dieing for. A couple of questions is not one of them.

-5-

The outside of my house looks nice and calm. While we live close enough to Nal that we do have electricity, it isn’t odd that there aren’t any lights on when I arrive at the house. It’s probably better that way. I know Sara will want some quality time with me since I’ve been away for a few days.

Sara must have noticed the lights because she greets me at the door with one of the biggest kisses of my life. Moments like this is why I keep doing what I do.

I owe this girl a lot more than she could ever know. When we first met, I was going through a very rough patch in my life. It was a year or so after the world went sour, so I had plenty of time to wallow in misery at the loss of my family. It was a dark time then. If Eunie would have let me, I gladly would have taken my life a dozen times over. My reasons to live were both ripped from my life that one night.