Chapter 10

He stood in the wreckage of what had been a car, bellowing his call of challenge, never once taking his eyes off the girl. If this pathetic beast, this byproduct, no matter how useful in the past, so much as harmed a hair on her head, he would dash it into a bloody smear on the pavement. It took up the call, changing its pitch to offer its own challenge, as even the dumbest of The Master's children knew the Way of Rights, and he, The Master's most trusted, had just challenged it for the girl's life, and he was determined to win, he knew he would win, all cowered before The Master's right hand, His eyes, His ears, His might, His hate, His weapon, His general, He who would lead the armies of darkness to the Gates of Heaven, the pearly spires that reached up into infinity, and burn them down. This petty beast, in its single-minded quest for sustenance, knew not what fate awaited him.

***

Elisa was aware of only motion as she fell through the air, forgotten, cast aside, left alone in the clinging fog to die. She knew not the war that raged just beyond the darkened haze of her vision, she knew not the benefactor that had come as champion for her life. She knew nothing, only that she was free of the grasp of the horrible winged thing, and that after she regained the ability to, she was going to run as fast as she could, as far as she could, as hard as she could, until her legs gave out, until her lungs bled from exertion, until she was no longer able to run, and then, if she had to, she would use the Glock to end her torment, better than being eaten by that thing, She thought as her lungs began to work again. Suddenly a deafening howl roused her from her suffocating reverie, and she opened her eyes to find the winged beast, and worse, The Crucifix Demon, posturing as if to fight. What a strange twist of Fate, She thought wryly, it's tried its damnedest to kill me now for who knows how long, and now it comes to rescue me in just the nick of time, will wonders never cease? The thought was drowned out by the sudden, intensely loud answering howl that flowed forth from the winged thing's mouth. The Demon, now incensed to the point of attack, leapt from the twisted remains of the SUV and swung a massive, clawed hand at the winged thing's black, bird-like eyes. The combined howls of the combatants ended and they threw themselves at each other, a mess of clawed limbs and teeth, fighting to the death.

She struggled to crawl backward, tried desperately to put some distance between herself and the tornado of death that was the demons. She raised the gun, miraculously still in her grasp through the fall, and fired a shot into the fray, and cursed loudly as the shot sparked off the wreckage of the SUV, doing nothing more than adding a loud PING to the sounds of the fray. When she was satisfied that she could do nothing to harm either combatant, and that neither of them seemed to be paying her any heed, she quickly got to her feet and ran as fast and far as she could, until she could no longer run, and she fell to the ground again, nauseous from the exertion, no longer caring if she died, almost welcoming the release, she would open her arms to death, she would let its icy hands flow over her, through her, and, as the blackness once again encroached on her blurred vision, she thought she could make out a figure standing not too far in front of her, a man, with long, flowing blonde hair, she could barely make out his facial features, strong chin, perfectly sculpted nose and cheek bones, overall, a very beautiful face, but when she saw the eyes, her breath caught in her throat, and her entire being shivered.

The figure's eyes were completely devoid of color, in fact, they were almost devoid of anything more than a pinprick of black in their centers. She was transfixed on them, unable to even breathe as long as they held her gaze and he began to walk to her, and she began to feel chilled as some unseen aura that followed the figure suddenly washed over her. It seemed to surge with power, authority, and something else, something…darker, something that frightened her, and as she succumbed to the weakness of her body, she was filled with dread at what this figure might do to her, but the sudden release of consciousness pushed the feeling away, and she was engulfed by blackness.

***

The lesser demon was no match for his refined ability, he'd been taught to fight by The Master Himself, he'd been forged in the Lake of Fire, he'd tasted combat before he was more than ten minutes old, had been born to it, had loved it, and he loved it no less as he landed his first blow against one of his Master's weaker minions, one who didn't share the plan, one who knew nothing of his true place in the War, one that was more concerned with its struggle for sustenance than The Master's dream, The Master's plan, The Master's life. He relished the smell of newly spilled blood as it flowed freely from the chest wounds he'd inflicted on the bastard demon that had sought, however unknowingly, to compromise the hard work of his Master, of his Father. He danced with glee at the sight of its pain filled eyes, he nearly stopped in place to drink in the sound of its agonized screams as it ripped a black, feathery wing clear from the thing's shoulder. He lunged once more, pulling the other wing loose and brandishing it like a club, thrashing the beast with its own body part. Finally, he grew tired of toying with the pathetic animal, and he flung his clawed hand in an ascending arc, piercing the thing's abdomen and driving his hand through it's hot entrails to grasp it's spinal column, with he then brutally jerked from his body, shattering it's spine and reducing it to no more than a quivering mass of cooling meat, a growing pool of blood growing around it like a red halo. There he stood, for nearly ten minutes, reveling in the carnage, he raised the section of spinal column high above his head as if it were some trophy, and bellowed, the howl rising loudly above the dead city and shaking the very earth beneath it, until it was cut short by a new sensation, one that blotted out his unbound joy that had accompanied the killing of the winged demon, and filled him with a new joy, one that a child feels after seeing their beloved parents after a long separation.

The Master had come.

He knew it better than he knew himself, he could sense His power coming from the direction the girl had been headed, so he took off, bounding in the same direction like a puppy coming to the call of his master.

The Master had come. The time was nearly upon them.