Chapter 41: Cold as Hell, Part 7

There wasn't a single spark of fire, but his entire body was burning anyway. Melting from the inside.

An angel of the Lord, he had said. If Satan and demons like him existed, it was natural that their counterpart would exist too, but he had never expected to encounter an angel. And now, what? Would it crush him like an insect? Would it annihilate him, just like that?

Without him having the chance to resist?

Without him being able to see it coming, without being able to do anything to avoid it? Unfairly?

No, things couldn't end like this. Otherwise, his second chance would have no meaning.

Sam closed his eyes and searched within himself, trying to ignore the divine grace or whatever was burning him from the inside. He still had a chance. A storm of power was twisting inside him, he hadn't yet exhausted all the new powers obtained in this massacre, there had to be something he could do.

Meanwhile, however, he tried his luck with ice. Creating ice spears behind him, above both their heads. He fired. He could barely open his eyes, let alone turn his head, but if they had done anything, it wasn't much. The being's grip didn't even loosen.

His legs were shaking. Sam fell to his knees shortly after realizing this fact. No. No, no, unacceptable! He had power now. He was power. He wasn't going to bow down to anyone again.

Relax. Relax.

He had escaped Blake's trap by destroying the floor, since he couldn't do anything against the magic circle. Neither dodge it, nor disable it somehow.

Similarly, if he couldn't do anything against the angel and its vessel, not right now, perhaps he could...

Do this.

Sam destroyed the ceiling with ice, and the debris fell on the angel. It didn't kill him, didn't even seriously hurt him, surely. But it made him loosen his grip, made him step back, more surprised than hurt, it didn't matter.

It was his chance.

To slip away with his tail between his legs. To practically crawl on the ground, just like Blake, whom he had left without a leg.

Like a worm leaving a trail of blood.

Like a beaten animal.

His teeth chattered. Frustrating. It was so frustrating. Another obstacle, one he couldn't have predicted or avoided.

I've won, he thought, however, when he reached Blake. He tried to defend himself with the cane, of course, but they were blind blows, easily dodgeable.

He lifted him off the ground, using him as a human shield.

"If you move, I'll kill him," Sam said.

If the difference between their powers was so great at the moment, he had to take advantage of that very thing. The difference. He was an angel, a force of good, but he was a demon without any scruples.

He didn't suffer the inconvenience of worrying about the lives of others.

The angel took two steps forward.

"Didn't you hear me?" He put an arm around Blake's neck and squeezed.

"You... you do it," Blake muttered, pleading. Sam squeezed harder, hoping he would ignore him and like a good boy scout put the life of a relatively innocent human above his mission.

An explosion of pain in the center of his chest.

His vision blurred, for a second he thought it would go out.

Sam fell backward, spitting blood from his mouth.

Without his consent, his arms relaxed and released Blake, but the man was also falling, he wasn't going anywhere. No, of course not, he had torn off one of his legs.

But it was more than that.

He could see Adams, the angel, through Blake's body. Because there was a huge hole where his torso should be. Sam fell with his arms spread out over a puddle of his own blood mixed with the blood of his human father.

His legs were shaking. No, his whole body was shaking. And suddenly he was hot.

Hot, in this hallway that was like a frozen tundra. In this mansion that he had tried to drown under ice.

Hot.

His blood, his life escaping him, was definitely very hot.

But above all...

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His insides were now literally burning. He hadn't seen what had happened, but he must have fired "something". Maybe because he didn't care about human lives and had made the mistake of assuming that because he was an angel he had to be benevolent, maybe because the victim himself had given him permission to get him out of the way.

In any case, he had shot him with something that was still destroying him.

The angel approached, stepping on his blood. Crushing the ice.

Sam crawled backward.

Back to where this had started. To Blake's office.

No, what was he saying?

They had fallen to another floor. What was behind him was just another room.

In any case...

As if it meant anything.

As if he could gain some time by closing the doors. He had already tested his physical strength in the flesh. The creature would tear down the thin wooden doors with just a breath.

He couldn't run and anyway he had nowhere to hide.

But he crawled.

He hadn't come this far to die, not now or ever.

"You didn't hesitate. Don't you care at all about human lives? And what's right? Yes, my father is Satan, but I... I didn't choose this. It's been less than a month since I know what I am. I never had a choice."

The angel stopped and looked at him with something akin to pity. He couldn't think of a worse thing to see in anyone's gaze.

"That won't work on me, creature. No one can blame you for your birth, but no one forced you to do any of this."

"Yeah, sure. As soon as someone discovered me I would end up at the stake. My birth decided everything for me."

"I wonder if you believe your own lies."

The angel touched his forehead again, bending down.

"Get your hands off me!"

And he began to burn again. The attack that the angel had launched still hadn't finished taking effect, so the impact was twice as big. He thought he was going to faint from the pain. In fact, maybe he did... and the pain woke him up a few seconds later.

His pain threshold had never been particularly high. He had been born in a modern, normal society, he had never had the need to fight for his life.

But still it was by far the worst pain he had experienced in his life.

He tried to get him off in the same way as the previous time. Then he hadn't been able to see anything, but now he was in the perfect position. He didn't know what kind of powers this angel had, but each and every one of the icicles evaporated an instant before sinking into his skin.

Was there nothing he could do to harm him?

If he hadn't hurt him yet, despite his maximum effort, killing him was a dream.

Ah, shit.

Shit, how frustrating.

It wasn't fair. He had tried, he had prepared and dedicated himself to make the most of his second chance. It couldn't end this way.

Sam punched him.

His punch went cleanly through the angel's chest.

Too cleanly.

There were no entrails in between. No ribs, no heart, no other organs. Adams was dead without a doubt, this being was just using him as a wrapper.

"Well, and you think you're the good guy in this story."

The angel didn't bother to respond.

I guess he saw me as a damn cockroach, he had already wasted too much time and effort talking to him, of course, it was natural. Fucking bastard.

A strong wind. Roaring.

No.

It wasn't a simple gust of wind. The black smoke monster came roaring to save him. He didn't know to what extent the angel had observed the situation, but it seemed to surprise him even though he had seen and heard it coming.

Belphegor took him head-on, dragging him to the other side of the hallway, crushing him against the wall.

The wall, of course, was the first to give way.

He fell to the other side along with the debris.

Surprised, but not worried, not scared.

Or even hurt.

The angel grabbed the smoke as if it were something with physical form.

The smoke writhed in his grip without, of course, any success. Sam tried to get up to help Belphegor. He needed all the help he could get. But his legs gave way and he also slipped on the ice, oh fuck.

A second later he had to throw himself down, with his arms crossed to protect his head from the spikes. Because the angel wielded the smoke through the hallway, destroying the walls, tearing down the floor, even reaching the rooms on the other side of the doors, stirring them up, making the windows explode. A great chaos. In the midst of that, the ice also shattered into a thousand pieces and flew through the air. The cacophony made his ears ring, his head hurt.

What a mess. And it wasn't over, the angel wielded the black smoke again, this time, of course, in the opposite direction.

Sam crawled over the ice, using his arms to protect his head from the debris. By that he meant the pieces of ceiling and ice that were flying as they broke and could end up falling on him.

Until he wielded the smoke against the ground, he only had to cover the upper part of his head.

He could only protect one thing, so obviously the head was the most important.

While he was busy killing Belphegor or trying to, maybe he could give the angel the coup de grace. Maybe the demon had been useful, for a change, providing a distraction at the most critical moment.

Well, and saving his life a moment ago.

He had to admit it.

Sam kept getting closer. The angel didn't seem to be paying attention to him, but he wouldn't assume such a thing.

He was an inhuman being after all.

Nothing told him that he depended only on the five senses, that he could only see with his eyes.

The mansion had already been unrecognizable in itself, but using Belphegor as a mace had practically decapitated it, so to speak. It was this close to being left without a roof. Or collapsing on their heads, whichever happened first.

When the distance between them was reduced enough, Sam launched himself at the angel like a panther.

He jumped over the black smoke, touched the angel on the chest and discharged his energy violently and with more force than ever. Channeling it into ice once again. Hundreds of spikes bloomed in the angel's chest, throwing him against and through the wall.

Without really intending to, this made the smoke impact him as the angel fell, releasing it.

So Sam fell too.

He flew against the wall and found himself in free fall before he realized it.

His chest was nothing but pain.

He surely had several broken ribs. His throat was blocking with his own blood. He had to concentrate if he wanted to survive this, but it was so painful.

He couldn't even breathe.

But he had to make it.

He was inhuman, but he wasn't invincible. If he impacted the ground, he would die. He would end up as nothing more than a large dark red stain. His organs would fly out in the same way as the ice through the hallway and everything else.

In the same way as the dozens of people he had massacred without mercy.

He wasn't going to die miserably like a background character.

He managed to transform into a pigeon before crashing into the ground, saving his life by a hair's breadth, but what mattered was that he had succeeded. The angel didn't fall far. The black smoke...

It had retreated, entering the house again.

He supposed it was looking for his body. For Mary.

The angel was trying to get up. His chest was open and covered in ice. At least something had hurt him, between the fall, the smoke, and his attack.

Because it was costing him.

Not as much as it should, not by far, considering how serious such a wound should be, but at least it was a sign that he could hurt him.

But he would have no problems approaching and finishing the job.

Cold as Hell, Part 7: END