"Dave, I have to apologize. Not just for trying to kill you, but I am sorry for that. For the way I ended things with you. Leaving without an explanation why or even discussing if we were still together or not was wrong, and for that, I am truly sorry," Sarah said, with tears in her eyes. She put her hand on mine as we sat on the ground in a puddle of water.

"Thank you for the apology, but it's ok. I understand that what I said wasn't what you needed at the moment. You needed someone to hug you and tell you to take as long as you needed to heal and move forward. But my stupid pragmatic side didn't see that and only saw the bills coming up. I loved you more than anything. I'm sorry it ended the way it did too," I said, putting my hand on her hand that was on my hand.

"You know, Harvey's medallion had me thinking you were this controlling monster who only saw what I could do for you and not who I am," she said, putting her other hand on my hand that was on her hand that was on my hand.

"No offense, Sarah, but that's insane. That wasn't your fault, though. You weren't yourself and you are now. I'm just happy I could save you without one of us getting killed," I said.

"Are you still drinking?" she asked.

"As of yesterday, I was, but a lot has changed for me in the last 24 hours. I don't think I'll touch a drink for a long time, if at all," I said.

There was a long silence, then Lilith said, "Girl, if you think Dave is controlling, you should've seen Adam. He'd put Dave to shame."

"I've been meaning to ask, why is the sword talking?" Sarah said.

"You absorbed Lilith into the sword, remember?" I said.

"Oh yeah. Right," she said, looking at the sword. "You say Adam's name like I'm supposed to know who that is."

"You do. You know, Adam and Eve? I'm his first wife, Lilith. He couldn't control me, so he banished me from Paradise to live in the wastes," she said.

"Oh, I'm sorry. That must have been hard," Sarah said.

"It's fine. It was the best thing that ever happened to me. I've never felt more free in my life!" Lilith said.

"That's ironic, considering you're trapped in a sword," I said.

"I can feel free and be trapped at the same time. I'm allowed!" Lilith said.

"Ok. I'll let you do that. For now, though, I need you to melt the mind control device," I said. "And don't scream."

"Ok, fine. Mmmmm," she said.

"That's weirder, but carry on," I said.

"Mmmmmmm!" she hummed.

I took Azrael's sword and pressed the tip against the heart medallion laying on the ground. It fizzled and sparked purple at first, but eventually melted under the intense heat. I picked up the chain with one less medallion on it and said, "Would you like this back?"

"No. Keep them. They would remind me of being controlled, and I don't want to feel that ever again. Besides, you're the one who's going to save the world, so you should have them," she said.

"Ok, sounds good to me," I said, looking at the remaining medallions. One was a sword, another was a goat's head, a third one was an hourglass, and the last one was an icicle. "Sword skills, charm resistance, and long range ice powers? Hell yeah. Now the hourglass, I suppose is just teleportation since Harvey said you're not from the future?"

"I don't know. He said it allowed me to travel back and forth between the past and future, but I don't know what it actually does," she said.

"Maybe best not to mess with it," I said.

I put the necklace around my neck and tucked it inside my shirt. I received a call on my phone and picked it up right away. "Yeah?"

"The inside of that building was blocking my GPS. I'll send you my coordinates through text," Lucifer said. "Get here quick. Something's going down."

"Will do," I said, hanging up. I immediately received his coordinates. "Alright, we need to go."

"Ok," Sarah said.

"Ok," Lilith said.

Looking at my phone, I said, "It's only three blocks away."

I began walking, and Sarah followed. I had already put Azrael's sword back in the sheath. After a 10 to 15-minute walk, we arrived at our destination. It was a random office building a few blocks off the strip. Lucifer was standing outside.

"Ok, good. You're here. Let's go inside. You need to see this," he said.

When we walked inside, it was a normal office lobby, aside from the dozens of flying imps that were watching over 7 pregnant satyrs. They all looked 11-months pregnant. The gestation period for antichrists must be really fast. They all seemed to be in labor simultaneously.

"Seriously? 7 satyrs? Was that really necessary? Are we really going to have 7 antichrists on our hands?" I said.

"Sorry. Satyrs are my weakness. It's the horns. They make me—" Lucifer said, shrugging.

"Don't say it," I said, interrupting him.

"Fine. It does look like we're going to have 7 antichrists very soon," he said.

Lights started to shine above the 7 satyrs. They got brighter and brighter until they were blinding. When they dimmed, the satyrs were no longer pregnant, and the antichrists had been immaculately conceived. The way they looked was both hilarious and horrifying. They all looked identical. They were fully grown men resembling Lucifer with pale skin and black hair, except with small goat's horns, wearing perfectly tailored white suits with black shirts and white ties. Their eyes glowed white.

They all looked at each other for a minute, thinking, calculating. Then they spoke in unison, "Mutually assured destruction will result in failure. We must join forces. Very well. Ok. Stop. No, you stop. No, you stop!"

I interrupted. "Would you all just stop talking and do what you're going to do?" I yelled.

"Very well," they all said. They all walked together into a circle and held hands. Lights shot out of their chests and eyes and mouths and gathered into a mass of light in the middle. Then they began to fade away into nothing. When they were gone, the light in the middle dimmed and one antichrist remained. "There. Happy?" I could still hear seven voices, just speaking over each other at the same time. It was uncanny.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

"What is your name?" I said.

"Hmm. Sssteeeeve. Steve," he said.

"Ok, Steve. What do you want?" I said, a little wary of the being called the antichrist. I mean, he's supposed to be evil, so why wouldn't I be worried he'd turn out to be evil? I'd be stupid not to.

"I suppose I want to fulfill my purpose," he said with a blank face.

"Whoa, whoa! I am your creator and you will do as I say!" Harvey, I assumed by the voice, flapped his wings and flew over to where we were standing. He was a purple imp demon. He was about 3 feet tall and looked a little like a pterodactyl, if a pterodactyl had separate arms and wings and was 3 feet tall. "That said, yes, go fulfill your purpose. That's all I want you to do."

"You will not tell me what to do, even if it's just to tell me to do what I was already going to do," Steve said. He grabbed Harvey and slammed him into the ground so hard that the carpet cracked, which shouldn't be physically possible. Then he stepped on him. Steve looked around the room. "Does anyone else want to tell me what to do?"

"No," I said. "I don't want to tell you what to do. You can do whatever you want. But I do want to say that if it's something bad, I will have to stop you."

"You will stop nothing," he said. "I will do what I please. I will please myself whenever, wherever, and however I want."

"Ok, I know you were just born, but you should be more careful with your words," I said, laughing.

"What? That I want to pleasure myself? What is wrong with that? Isn't pleasure what everyone wants?" Steve said.

"That is true. Nevermind. Forget I said anything. Say that to whoever you want to," I said, struggling not to laugh.

"Maybe I will!" he said, levitating and bright white light emanating from his body.

"Hey, before you leave, I was hoping you could help me fill out a survey." I walked over to a desk and took a notepad and a pen off it. I held them like I was going to take notes. "So. On a scale from 1 to 10, how likely are you harm other people?"

"If it pleases me, yes," Steve said.

"You have to give a number from 1 to 10," I said.

"I have to do no such thing!" He roared.

"Sorry, I meant, if you want to properly answer the question, a number from 1 to 10 is required," I said.

"Oh. Uh, 10 I suppose," he said.

I scribbled on the notepad. "Ok. Next question. On a scale from 1 to 10, how likely are you to start the apocalypse?" I said.

"Hmm. 10 again, I guess," he said.

"Final question. If you were a washcloth, what—" I said.

"No more questions! You are wasting my time here while I could be out there pleasuring myself," he said.

"True. It's ok, I got the answers I was looking for," I said, drawing Azrael's sword. "Lilith, are you ready?"

"Almost. I'm just about done with my vocal warm-ups. La la la la la! Ok, I'm ready!" she said.

I dashed up to Steve and plunged Azrael's sword into his chest.

"I do not like that. That is not pleasurable at all!" Steve roared. He backhanded me across the face, sending me and the sword flying, still firmly in my grasp. I watched the wound in his chest heal in seconds without a drop of blood spilt.

"That's not good," I said. "Lilith, I need you to flame on when I'm fighting him."

"Ok! But I'll have to hum," she said.

"That's fine. Whatever it takes to save the world. Also, I'm kind of getting used to your voice. Your hum is rather soothing in a stabbing myself in the ears sort of way," I said.

"Thank you. I love to know that I cause you pain, Dave," she said.

I got up and back onto my feet. I rushed at Steve while Lilith hummed. "Mmmmmm!!!!"

Steve summoned a sword of light, similar to Raphael's, that he blocked my over hand strike with. I pressed hard against it with both hands, cracking the sword. Suddenly, the sword of light broke, and Azrael's sword sliced all the way through Steve's body vertically. A left and right half of his body fell to the ground, but a living Steve remained.

"How dare you kill me!" he yelled. I couldn't be sure, but it sounded like 6 voices instead of 7 this time. He covered his fist in hard light and punched me in the chest. He sent me flying back, but more importantly, he stopped my heart.

Everything was a blur after that. There were a lot of noises and yelling. I even think I heard Lucifer crying, but whether it was because I was going to die, or because he was going to lose the bet, I couldn't tell.

I woke up in my apartment on the couch. A pillow was behind my head and a snuggly warm blanket was over my body. I sat up and put the pillow and blanket off the side of the couch. My favorite TV show was playing on my least favorite streaming platform.

"About time you woke up," Lucifer said, biting into an apple. "This apple is really good! Is probably what Eve was thinking when she betrayed my father and doomed humanity to be banished from Paradise for all eternity."

"Hey, you," Sarah said, as she sat next to me and hugged me. "How are you feeling?"

"I would hug you too, but I'm currently a sword," Lilith said. "I sure hope somebody gets around to fixing that. Eventually." She laughed nervously.

"I feel fine," I said. "What happened after I died? Temporarily."

"A lot of things, really," Lucifer said, taking another bite of his apple. "You should eat these more often. I hear they're good for your heart."

"What's wrong with you?" I said.

"Me? I'm fine. Why do you ask?" he said.

"You're acting like a jerk," I said.

"Well, I'm sorry," he said sarcastically. "Maybe I have feelings too. Maybe I didn't like seeing you die. Maybe watching my son kill you was not the most fun thing I could be doing on a Tuesday. Maybe carrying your lifeless body away from the scene and performing cpr on you for hours affected me in some way. I don't know because I'm not supposed to have feelings! I'm the Devil, remember? I'm the bad guy!"

"Hey. You're allowed to have feelings, Lucifer. You just can't let those feelings make you lash out at the people around you," I said weakly. I coughed a few times.

"I don't know how to do that!" he said.

"Well, learn, asshole! Maybe grow for once in your life, and think about the pain and misery others might be feeling besides just your own!" I yelled at him. I couldn't deal with his constant self pity right now on my literal deathbed. He mentioned hours had passed. That meant I didn't have much time left.

"Would you boys please stop fighting?" Sarah yelled.

"Yeah, what she said!" Lilith commented.

"Fine," I said.

"Fine!" Lucifer said, crossing his arms and looking away.

"I'll tell you what happened, but as Lucifer said, it's a lot," Sarah said. "Steve left you alone once we confirmed you were dead. He went off and started terrorizing people in Las Vegas. Lucifer then teleported us to the devil's trap, and we dismantled the giant fan and devil's trap with Azrael's sword. Well, I did the dismantling. Lucifer did cpr."

"I finally finished dismantling the trap around the time your heart started beating and you were breathing again. Then, Lucifer teleported us to your apartment, and you woke up."

"Oh. I'm sorry I put you all through that. Truly, I am. But, Lucifer, shouldn't you be happy the bet is almost over? You're going to win. Isn't that what you wanted?" I said.

"It should be, but it isn't. We failed man. We failed to stop Steve, and now the world's going to end. All the amazing things that humans have created will be gone forever. Soap, toilet paper, margaritas. All gone. And I'm going to kill the world's only chance of survival. You could do it, man. You could stop Steve. You just need another chance. But I'm going to take that all away," he said.

"It's not the end of the world," I said, and rethought what I just said. "Ok, it is the end of the world, but it's not the end of the world yet. It still has you. You're far stronger than me. You could defeat him."

"I don't think you understand, Dave," Lucifer said. "You're special. You think other people have what it takes to stand up to the antichrist? I sure as hell don't. I don't have the heart, or the guts, or the balls. I mean, don't get me wrong, I have balls. Like big manly balls—"

"Ok, we get it. You have big balls," I said, laughing slightly.

"Right," he said. "But mine aren't made of steel like yours."

"I appreciate your confidence, but I'm nothing special. I just did what I had to do," I said.

"And that's exactly what makes you special," he said, laughing and smiling.

My alarm on my phone went off.

"Alright, it's 7 o'clock. Are you ready to meet your maker?" Lucifer said, getting his fingers into snapping position.

"Wait! He needs to take his medication!" Sarah said. She picked the bottle up off the coffee table, pulled a pill out, and handed it to me. Then she handed me a bottle of water. I noticed her hands were shaking.

"Does he really need to do that?" Lucifer said. "He's about to die."

"Can you just let him have a bit of normalcy before it all ends?" Sarah said nervously.

Something was wrong with the way Sarah was acting, but I didn't have time to figure out why. I took my medication and said, "Ok, Lucy. Snap me out of existence."

"I will when I'm ready. Don't rush me! I still have 50 seconds," he said, a bead of sweat running down his face. "I'm gonna do it right now!" he said, but he didn't snap. "That was just a warmup. Ok, now!" he said, but he still didn't snap. "Snap damn you! Why won't you snap?" he said, looking at his fingers.

I started to feel weird. Like I was suffocating, but not just my lungs were out of breath. My whole body felt out of breath. Like, every cell in my body was suffocating at the same time. "I don't feel so good," I said. Then everything went dark.