Devil At My Door — Valor Valor
"RORY!"
He wastes no time and springs to action by flying right after them.
The beat of his wings are mighty as he flaps his way across the city, trough the streets, passed the buildings, trying to catch up to the winged beast that has Rory.
"Let go of me, you chickenshit!"
No doubt his sister's voice as angry as ever, trying to get out of its claws. But the thing having hold if Rory doesn't tetter from its mission. Whatever that is.
Aiden flies faster, catching up and right on its tail.
Seeing his sister struggle to get free, Aiden suddenly summons his hellfire and lights up each of his feathers.
The beast that has Rory, looks more like a large, demented version of bird now up close.
The boy quickly stretches his now flamed wings back and without another moment to lose, smashes them together. Creating a heat blast of fire that is sent directly to the bird.
It screams.
And just like Aiden had hoped, the thing loses its grip on the girl and lets her fall.
"AIDEN!!"
Almost there.
Shooting down as fast as he can, Aiden manages to snatch her up before she hits the streets below.
"Gotcha!" He buffs out a smile and keeps flying. "You know we should really stop this me-saving-you-every-time-you-fall thing and actually come up with a way to get your wings to work."
"Ya think?!"
Landing on top of a rooftop, Aiden places Rory down to stand right before the creature catches up.
"Fucking Hell!" Rory says just when Aiden turns around to hear the scream. "Looks like its back for round two."
The older Nephilim pushes Rory behind him, but the large black feathered thing moves quickly, and Aiden immediately protects his sister by leaping his body away from her to get the things eyes on him instead.
The Nephilim doesn't have to try very hard because the beast's attention seems to be solely on him after all. And it surprises him by launches itself suddenly forward.
The creature manages to get Aiden down and start snapping his peak at the boy's face.
Aiden grits his teeth and tries to push it away from him, but it has a strength of its own.
"Get off him!" A loud smack and something smashes into the side of the aggressive creature.
Aiden, finally freed, looks up to see Rory with a bent pipe in her grip.
"Nice one." He lets the comment slip, just before the beast directs its attention to Rory. She moves but she is pummeled down instead.
Something snaps in Aiden at the sight of seeing his sister tackled to the ground and about to get killed.
His movements are suddenly precise and swift as the Nephilim manages to grab onto the creatures back to get a good grip on his neck.
Rory lets out a yelp before Aiden finally gets a good hold on it. Using all is strength, he twists his arms and snaps the bird's neck with a loud crack.
Next thing they see, is the birds body falls to the ground. Lifeless and motionless.
Rory gets herself up and breathes. "That was insane!" She says her eyes bright with relief and excitement that she hasn't had in years right before her gaze lands on Aiden eyes.
Red eyes.
Rory doesn't move, but her jaw does.
Aiden's chest rises and falls, but he catches the sight of her sister and blinks. Eyes back to a normal blue in an instant.
"You killed that thing." She states while looking at the dead beast and trying to control her breathing.
Aiden eyes travel back to it. "It wouldn't be the first."
The...?
Who was his first?
It's like nothing lets them have a break because more sounds of wings flapping approach the two.
"Get behind me." Aiden orders, and Rory does as she's told. The boy ready to end the next thing that comes their way.
A pair of majestic grey wings come to view and land right in front of them. Causing Aiden to let out a relieved breath.
"Charlie." He sighs, this close to thanking the uncle upstairs.
"You found it!" Charlie's gaze lands on the dead bird.
Aiden squints his eyes. "You were looking for it?"
Just then, the creature starts moving.
Aiden holds Rory back.
"How is that thing still alive?" Rory's hoarse voice comes out.
The creature moves, but only to turn into black mist and seep into the midnight darkness.
Aiden eyes lift to the sky's horizon, noticing the trace of light slowly starting to emerge. Daylight.
"That thing's been popping up everywhere in the city." When the thing disappears, Charlie continues. "I've been searching for it for days, trying to catch the fucking thing."
"Days?" Rory asks.
"It started showing up since last week. And now that I think about, that's right around the time when you showed up." He looks at Aiden.
"It's after me."
"But why?" Charlie arms cross in front of his chest as he examines the thought.
"Aiden?"
Aiden looks at Charlie as he remembers. "There was something carved inside my locker this morning."
"A message? What did it say?"
"It said I don't belong here, and I that I needed to leave or else pay the consequences." Someone pulls at the sleeve of his jacket.
"Aiden... I don't feel so hot."
Her brother turns and his eyes grow wide when they catch onto Rory holding her palm against the right side of her neck. Her bloody neck.
"You're bleeding."
The creature must have scratched her while they were fighting it.
"I didn't feel it." She admits. Two sets of claw marks now lay on her neck.
"Must have been the adrenalin. That's why you didn't notice." Charlie suggests.
"We got to get you home." He says so fast. "Charlie tag us, just in case it reappears and tries to follow us."
"On it."
Ignoring Rory's protests to not carry her back home like a baby again, Aiden pulls her up into his arms anyway and takes off as fast as he can.
Luckily Rory gets patched up at home. Her immortal healing capabilities kick in. Slowly, but still, healing, nonetheless.
Now she's sits on her bed in the safety of her room while Chloe cleans the wound on her neck.
"Ow."
"Sorry."
Arms crossed, Aiden leans against the door frame and watches them from afar. Contemplating all the ways he could have avoided getting Rory hurt in the process. Because she was injured because of me.
"Are you alright?"
Now there's a voice Aiden never thought to hear. Keeping his eyes on his sister and mother, he doesn't turn his gaze towards Donnie on his left.
"Fine." What do you care? Surprised by how easily he decides to answer the man. Even if he meant to say it a little colder. But in Aiden's mind, he is alright. A small cut remains below his right eye. Nothing the Nephilim can't handle.
"I know you don't like me." He begins.
"Wow." The boy says it with false conviction. "Whatever gave that away, Sherlock?"
"We should try to get along, you know?"
"And why would I bother to do just that?" He says lower, so the others won't hear. "You're nothing to me. If I didn't care what Chloe would think, I'd have you thrown off the side of cliff by now."
A small chuckle escapes him. "Ah, but you do care, kid. At least for the girls." He lifts his chin towards the two. Chloe trying to make Rory laugh, while giving her first aid. He quietly continues. "You don't have to like me for us to get along, although, I don't see any harm in trying. But we should be able to at least try for their sakes."
Aiden hates to admit it, but Donnie is right about one thing. And that is that Aiden would do just about anything for his family. Even if it meant tolerating a stranger he barely knows.
He scratches his greying stubble. "Oh, and by the way. Your arm tells a different story." Donnie adds before walking inside the room and holding up a cup of chocolate ice cream. He smiles at the injured girl. "I know what will help take the pain away." Rory's brown eyes widen and a hint of glee shines at the sight of Donnie bringing the girl her favorite ice cream.
Aiden's gaze falls to where Donnie mentioned. He pulls up the left sleeve of his jacket. Only to discover more blood and a much bigger cut in the center of his wrist. For a moment, his eyes lift to find Rory before shooting back down. He didn't even feel this one. Must have been the adrenalin that's still buzzing in his system.
"You're hurt." While Aiden assess his hand, he didn't notice Chloe leaving the room and walking up to him. "Let me look at that."
"It'll be fine once I get out of here."
Chloe has none of it and guides him back to sit on the couch, while she disinfects his wound, luckily no stitches are needed, so she wraps it up in a bandage.
But while assessing the damage, Chloe's finger brush against a bumpier texture. Her lips fall apart in shock. "What is that?"
A noticeably dark, but faint shade of skin travels upward from the outside side of his wrist. "A birthmark." He says like it's obvious, but by the look on her face, he hopes she doesn't make him take off his jacket just so she can see how big it really is and that it actually goes all the way up to his shoulder.
"That looks more like a scar than a simple birthmark."
"I didn't have a simple birth." It slips out before he even has time to stop it. He curses and pulls away and heads to the door. "Forget I said anything."
"Where are you going?" Chloe follows behind him. "There's a winged creature out there trying to kill you. You can't just go and hope for the best." Her tone softens when he turns around. "Stay. We need to figure out what that thing is and find a way to stop it before it hurts anyone else."
"That's exactly what I'm trying to do. I'll fly out and patrol the city with Charlie, we'll circle our way back here if we don't find anything."
"That's a bad idea to try and track something of that size, and you know it. It's too dangerous."
"Well, so am I!" He snaps, eyes blazing red for just a second and immediately he regrets it when he sees Chloe's reaction. His tone softens considerably. He blinks and the blue in his eyes returns. "So am I."
She covers her mouth with her hand, stunned by witnessing the Devil eyes for just a moment.
He opens the front door, and leaves.
A belly full of Ice cream, in her black sweatpants and hoodie, Rory lies in her queen-sized bed, a controller in her hands as she eyes the screen in front of her. A new rated M videogame just itching to be played.
"Is that the one I got you?" Donnie walks inside again and replaces the empty bowl of sweets.
"Yeah." She smiles, remembering how he told her yesterday that she can play it if Chloe didn't know about it. Rory's eyes drift to Donnie and she calls him back before he has the chance to leave. "Hey, wanna play together?"
"I'm pretty sure it said single player." He sits down at the edge of her bed.
"We could take turns." Rory suggests and pulls herself to sit.
"I don't know."
"Please." She puts emphasis on buffing out her lips and making her brown orbs bigger. The classic puppy dog eyes move.
"It should be illegal to be able to make that face at your age." But the agreeing smile doesn't falter.
"Yes!"
Donnie chuckles. And half an hour later and the two of them are both superglued to the screen. Both their eyes watery from the horrors of what they just witnessed.
"But I thought Sarah was the main character!" Rory sniffs.
Chloe strolls while ending a call. She stops to look at the two. "Why are you both crying?"
"It was supposed to be a cool zombie game." Rory says utterly saddened by the story.
Chloe nods, not understanding a thing about what they're watching. She makes a light sound and nudges her head at Donnie to follow her to the living room.
He wipes his face with the sleeve of his white buttoned shirt. "I'll be back. Save the game." Donnie says right before he leaves the room and closes the door.
Rory does that. But without anything else to do she gets bored and starts picking apart her bandages. To her surprise the wound is already healed. As if it was never there to begin with.
"Interesting." She mumbles. Not the part that it healed. Rory has had many cuts and bruises over the course of her life, but none of them took an hour to fully heal. Could it have something to do with the beast that attacked them earlier? Or was this just a bad day?
A few hours later, she is now lying upside down on her bed, scrolling through social media.
Elsa had sent her a message after she had heard that Rory couldn't make it to school today, courtesy of Chloe informing her teacher that she was sick.
ELSA: I heard you were sick today. I hope you get well soon :)
That's so sweet of her, Rory thinks and likes her message.
RORY: it'll take a lot more to then a little cold take me down :)
After that, she became utterly disinterested in everything else.
Utterly bored out of her mind, and ready to do anything but die of said boredom, so she places her hands together and closes her eyes.
Not ten seconds later and the door slides open. A distinctive size of shoes stand in front of her when she opens her eyes.
"Did you catch the parrot?"
"What?" Aiden tilts his head to eye his sister's flipped face. "Oh. No. Charlie and I flew around for hours, but we decided to call it quits after not finding any trace of it."
The girl pulls herself up an idea booming in her mind. "Did you consider it might have come from Hell?"
"No. Why do you ask?"
She starts playing with her fingers. "What if Lucifer was the one who sent that thing in the first place?"
He crosses his hands in front of his chest. "One: Trust me, I checked. He isn't in Hell. And two: There's no reason why Dad would send something to attack us like that."
"I mean—" She lifts her shoulders. "He is the Devil right?"
"That doesn't make him evil."
"Can't spell Devil without evil."
Aiden's eyebrows draw. "Now you're just being impossible."
"I'm being pragmatic."
"Big words, even for a Dweeb like you."
Now it's her turn to make a face. "I'm serious. If we could go to Hell and see if maybe, we can find something that would give us a clue as to where that it came from or why that bird from Aladdin wants to eat you so badly."
"Why do I get the feeling you have your own ulterior motive about this? Ohh..." He's eyes widen and he uncrosses is arms. "It's because you do have an ulterior motive."
"Her smile grows.
"I don't know if... Chloe would be alright with this."
"What my mom doesn't know won't hurt her."
Aiden palms his face. "What demon raised you?"
A smirk finds its way onto her lips. "I could name a few."
After countless attempts of begging and bargaining her way with the boy just so that she would trade him her hidden stash of her favorite chocolate chip muffins, Aiden finally agreed to Rory's plan.
Who knew all it took was a little bribe of sweets and he'd roll over like a dog?
Aiden says that contrary to the way to get to Heaven which is by following the light—getting to Hell requires pitch black darkness to do so. That's why many of the hidden entrances are for the most part underground.
Aiden just happens to know one of them that is in the subway station. One of which is an abandoned tunnel located at the coast of the city.
Signs of do-not-enter as well as many yellow tapes of warning labels cover the entrance way as Aiden flies Rory inside the tunnel.
"You have been here before, right?" She asks on the way.
Aiden slows down slightly as the tunnel gets darker and darker as they pass. He lights up his orange feathers, making his wings glow of fire, lighting up their way.
"When I first came here, I did search for him." No doubt in mind about who he meant. "And when I couldn't find him, I looked for you. I had hoped he was on Earth, but since that's not the case, I sincerely hope your presence will stir something up."
"I'm good at stirring things up. Trust me." She declares somewhat proudly. "May as well be my middle name. Rory—the Stirred Up—Morningstar, it has a ring to it, don't you think?"
He shakes his head, but a chuckle still escapes from Aiden.
"What am I like in the future?" She suddenly asks. Her face brightens up about the idea to know what her future self would be like.
"You are...you're..."
"You know what, don't tell me." Rory hesitates as her curiosity towards herself vanishes. "I don't want to know what a disappointment I am."
Aiden's bows draw together. "You're not a disappointment, Rory." His face softens when he tries to understand the reason why his sister would think of herself as any less.
Their talk is cut short when a sudden jolt of power goes through them out of nowhere. Sending the two nephillims to scatter apart along the cold ground.
"Rory!" The panic in his voice is clear.
The 15-year-old groans a great distance behind him. "I'm fine." She touches her head and assesses her torn up skin on her palms but other than that, the girl's fine. "What happened?" She says while getting up.
"An earthquake? I don't know. This didn't happen the last time I was here." Aiden patting off the dirt and debris from his clothes and hair. He pulls himself up, noticing that his wings had also snapped back inside when they fell. "Can you see me?"
"Yeah." Rory makes her wobbling feet finally move and heads towards Aiden.
"I guess we're walking the rest of the way." He turns himself towards the tunnel. "It shouldn't be far now."
"Aiden?"
The same feeling that happened just prior fallows as he turns around to see Rory behind him.
Only this time it finally makes sense.
"No." It comes out as a whisper when his gaze lands on Rory's hands trying, but failing, to push past an invisible barrier between them.
"What is this?"
"A shield."
"For what?" She asks, only to realize a moment later.
Not what, but for who.
A shield to prevent entry to Hell.
Rory places her hands against the translucent wall and starts to push. Sparks fly, but she doesn't stop.
"Rory." Aiden warns, slowly putting his hands up. "That's not a good idea."
Ignoring him, the Nephilim continues to press on with all her might. Gritting her teeth, and sweat beginning to form on her forehead, does not tetter her the least.
The longer she tries, the more the shield starts to shine with light right where it connects with the girl.
Aiden's gaze snaps upward, a rumble, first the ceiling, then the ground. Just a little, but enough to scare the boy into action.
"Rory." He tries again, only to understand that she is so focused on her mission to push through that she doesn't either acknowledge him or just hear the sound of his voice anymore. "Rory! Snap out of it!"
The 19-year-old's face turns worried when he sees the blood slowly seeping from his sister's nose now.
"Rory, you're bleeding." He rushes towards her, not caring about the sparks and beaming light coming from her palms. He tries again. "You're hurting yourself! Do you even hear me?!"
Rory grits her teeth, ignoring the blood now tripping from both sides of her nose.
He has enough.
Aiden walks around her and from behind Rory, starts pulling her away from the damn thing before he loses her.
Something in her awakens. "Stop! Let go of me! I have to get through, I'm almost through!"
Even thought, Rory doesn't give up her struggle, Aiden is far too strong compared to her and loses the fight as he pulls her away.
"Let go of me!" She shrieks cries her lungs out. But he doesn't stop.
The boy pulls her far away from the barrier and turns her around. Grabbing her face in his. "What were you thinking? You could've gotten yourself killed!"
"I was almost through!"
"Bullshit!" The anger, clear as daylight, is directed at her recklessness. "It takes all of your strength to get that thing to break. And when it shatters, you'll go down with it!"
Finally realizing what happened, Rory swipes the remaining blood off with her sleeve. "I was just... but I thought..."
Aiden visibly calms down. He grips her shoulders for emphasis. "As much as I would love to test your theory on possibly breaking the shield, I will not have it at the cost of your life." A sad smile forming on his lips. "Mom would be devastated. She would have our heads if she were here right now. And she would not for a moment think otherwise."
Rory sniffs her nose and then narrows her eyes at his words.
Before she has the time to respond, everything starts to shake again. And this time it's not Rory who's doing it.
They both eye their surroundings. Pieces of dirt and rocks start to break apart from the walls as the tunnel starts to finally collapse.
Their gazes meet, and one soundless word screams from their eyes. Run!
The pair both start sprinting towards the way they came from. All the while trying to evade the braking ceiling and the rocks that pummel their way down.
"Look out!" Just in time before it falls on her, Aiden pushes Rory out of the way.
When she is out of the way, she loses Aiden for a split second, only to find him on ground.
The girl runs to him, pulling him up. "Come on, Doofus, this is not the day I lose you, too!" She manages to grab him by the arm and hoist him up to his feet. She panics. "Aiden!"
"I'm alright."
"Then fucking move!"
They both manages to make it out of the restricted part of the tunnel before it all finally collapses on itself.
Just when they get out, the entrance is sealed off with a pile of rocks and ruin. A small pebble falls and stops right in front of their feet.
She coughs, and he wheezes to clear some room for air in their lungs. Both of them and their clothes, faces and hair covered in dirt and dust after coming out.
"Please tell me..." He coughs. " That... that was an earthquake?"
Rory exhales and inhales while looking at the destruction. It didn't take a genius to figure out what just happened. Not to her.
"No. Not even one bit." She turns to him.
"We should get out of here."
The realizations quickly cements itself into Rory when Aiden's earlier words echo.
"All this time I thought you were my half-brother..." She mumbles.
Aiden's brushes some debris from his dirty hair when she speaks, and he freezes in place. He said Mom, didn't he? "Rory, whatever idea you're concocting inside that head of yours right now—"
"I don't know why I didn't make the connection sooner. And for a random second I thought it might have been another woman, but no. All of it actually makes sense now." Rory starts pacing. "It wasn't a coincidence that Lucifer disappeared on the day he found out that Mom was pregnant with me."
"It could be just that. A coincidence."
She doesn't stop, her mind racing a million miles a second. "And then for whatever reason, Lucifer gets back together with Mom, and they have you." She nods as if finally uncovering the truth. "He rather have a son like you, then raise a daughter like me."
"That's not true! You can't believe that."
"What else is there to believe!?" Her voice raises. "It's stupid to believe that he died. It's stupid to believe he was killed. It's stupid to believe he disappeared. What else am I supposed to think?"
"That he cares." Aiden moves closer. "That whatever happened, it doesn't change the fact that he still loves you."
"Then where is he?"
"I... I don't know." He honestly doesn't. He doesn't seem to know anything. "Rory."
When she walks away from him, the defeat in her voice is heartbreaking to hear. "Just leave me alone."
A/N
Thank you guys for being my motivation to write everyday :)
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Love ya!