Befriending the wicked

Troy lay huddled in the darkest corner of the darkest alley. He cried long and hard. While he had been able to put up with the monsters for the whole of his life, this was the first time something drastic had happened and people had died. For so long he had held in the tears but now the just poured out down his cheeks and truth be told, it just made him feel worse.

While he sobbed quietly to himself the alley suddenly got a lot colder and darker, the creatures that had assaulted him for so long were back, 'oh Troy...' a voice whispered,' why do you cry?' the voice was strangely haunting and beautiful. Troy stopped and opened his eyes. A shining light blinded him with a soothing warmth, 'who...who are you?'

'Why I am an Angel, can't you tell?' the light sung,

'An Angel... are you real?'

It was strange, Troy had never thought of there being Angels or even a God, he supposed now there must be, if those things that he had endured all his life were Demons...

'What do you want?' Troy whimpered,

'I don't want anything... except to help you. If you want those beings to disappear step into the light'

'Really you'll get rid of them?' Troy asked scrambling up,

'Of course'

'...okay...'

Michael walked through Helsing that night with watchful eyes. Something was not quite right, the city seemed darker, more foreboding than usual. The city was silent, as if everyone was hiding from someone, or something.

Guns in hands he walked and walked and walked. A wind blew across the buildings making everything a lot creepier. He was, of course searching for the boy who God had called Troy. He had started around the ruins of the orphanage but found nothing, and now he was searching the side streets and alleys.

Suddenly he heard a quiet chatter from down one of the alleys. Turning down it he gasped, the boy, he was talking to a demon in disguise!

'I don't want anything... except to help you. If you want those beings to disappear step into the light'

'Really you'll get rid of them?'

'Of course'

'...okay...'

Michael ran quickly towards the boy and dived at the demon, 'NOOOO!'

He tackled the beast and they tumbled to the ground. Troy screamed and began to crawl back up into the corner and shake back and forth repeatedly, 'why, why, why?'

Michael rolled on top of it and held his Uzi to its head, 'If you are truly from the Lord, dodge this!' the gun exploded and the Demon's head was blasted into oblivion. Blood and brain fluids splattered across the ground with a sickening thud.

He stood up and turned to Troy who wept with fear, 'Please, no!

'Troy moaned and shut his eyes, awaiting death. But death did not come. Cautiously Troy opened his eyes and found a hand held out for him. He reached up and grabbed it. Michael pulled him up, 'Who are you?' he asked,

'The name's Michael- I'm the angel!'

Detective Thompson stood in front of the latest victim. A woman, Leann Shelly lay in a crumpled mess on the floor of her uptown house. A puddle of blood dribbled smoothly across the lino and painted savagely across the walls was the number 661. James- another cop walked up to Thompson, 'What do you think detective?' he asked. Thompson considered the scene in front of him for a moment, 'Put the station on full alert- we have a copy cat'

'Sir?' James asked,

'You heard me- a copycat- someone is short on ideas so they're piggy backing on our monster'

'How can you tell?'

'See the numbers? 661 splattered across the wall. What seems odd about that compared to the other victims?'

'Um… it just looks like your regular run-of-the-mill bloodied letters sir'

'It's sloppy'

'Sloppy, sir?'

'Yes- sloppy! All the other numbers were perfectly painted on the wall- no dribbles or anything. This guy is obviously not our killer'

'Well that's just great- now we have two killers to find'

'Yes it seems so'

Later that night Thompson arrived home. His apartment- a small dirty shack of a place welcomed him as he entered with a well tuned creak. Throwing the keys down in their tray, Thompson grabbed a cold burger and sat down at his desk. Opening his suitcase he pulled out the files on the serial killings and began to study them feverishly.

There had to be a connection between the killings in there somewhere. He took a bite of the burger and flicked through the photos of the victims, everything seemed the same, The numbers were painted exactly the same, the body- what was left of it was arranged in the same position, in fact the only thing out of the ordinary was…

'What the hell?' he hissed looking closer at the photos.

There was a blur on each one of the pictures, hardly noticeable but there was definitely a foggy patch sitting above the victim's chest. Thompson's mind began to go into over drive, and he began to notice other things strange about the victims:
They were all women, although there was no sign of sexual activity on them.

They all seemed to be fairly young, and most importantly- their throats were slit in a very peculiar way.

Thompson ran a scan on the photo and then cut the part of the photo that contained a slit throat and enlarged it. Yup, there was definitely something new to the way they had been cut- A long thin curve of a slash suggested a thin sharp blade and if he zoomed in close enough he could see small spots of flaked gold,

'Now what kind of knife has gold plaiting?' he asked himself, and then the answer- it hit him. A ceremonial dagger- these murders weren't your average run of the mill killings- these were occult sacrifices!

Thompson immediately connected to the net and began to search for a list of all recorded cults in Helsing. He was given over five hundred results to sift through. He searched within results for Ceremonial daggers and was returned with four hundred and fifty, he had a long night ahead of him…