Chapter 45: Cold as Hell, Part 11

Sam had a long and complicated conversation ahead of him. He didn’t want to be forced to kill them after all. That would be a waste.

Failing at the last moment, after having overcome all the obstacles in his path, whether by a hair or not—what a bad joke that would be. He focused, ready to give it his all, despite being so tired and in such pain that his legs trembled, and he didn’t want to think about anything. He just wanted a cup of hot milk and to go back to his damned bed… or at least make one in the forest, because his room wouldn’t be much better off than the rest of the mansion.

Oh well.

But that didn’t matter.

Victoria, Christina. Their feelings. His anger. His guilt.

He had to manage to come out on top. To appear like a victim in his own way, even though they had seen him act like the monster in a horror movie.

Victoria, to his surprise, was the first to open her mouth. But she didn’t get the chance to say it. Whatever it was. A question, a reprimand, a plea. She didn’t have time to say anything. Sam’s head exploded. Not literally, of course, but it felt like it had been blown apart by a gunshot anyway. He fell to his knees, groaning in pain.

He heard voices, but couldn’t understand a word.

It wasn’t hard to guess, though, from their expressions. From the fact that they approached, albeit with hesitant looks, as if he might bite.

Voices calling his name, trying to bring him back.

Back from where?

Where had he suddenly ended up? Everything around him was the same, but somehow different.

Underwater.

As if he were seeing the world through a layer of water, his lungs slowly filling with liquid. His head hurt like nothing had ever hurt before. He could almost feel the flesh tearing and shards of bone flying. That was the thing. Everything was in place, but it was all falling apart anyway.

Christina reached out to him, tears in her eyes. He should take her hands, but instead, he pushed them away. Harshly. He had made a mistake. He knew it, knew it even before he did it, so why had he done it?

Falling apart.

No sense, no ground beneath his feet. Turning around, running. To the mansion where the lost souls of the massacred wandered. By him. With his own hands. He could hear the voices.

No, no, there was only one voice. In reality, only one voice.

Who are you?

YOU ALREADY KNOW.

The voice made the earth tremble, made the few remaining intact windows rattle. Sam shuddered. But he didn’t give up, he ran up the stairs, as fast as he could, though he lost his balance more than once, stumbling forward, flailing ridiculously to maintain his balance by a thread. He didn’t care how he looked. All he wanted was to be freed from the pain.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

COME TO ME. YOU ARE MINE, ONLY MINE.

Each word was like a bullet hitting the mark. A steel curtain.

Sam clenched his fists.

He rounded a corner, then another, and another, and all he saw was blood, guts, and corpses.

Until one of the corpses moved.

Blake Wright. Father.

No, it was his father, but not the human one. What should have been just a corpse stood up as if nothing had happened, red eyes burning, nails grown and twisted like claws, skin an unnatural color. He had no idea if he was really seeing what he thought he was. He also didn’t know if anything he’d seen in the past few minutes was real in the first place. Was he witnessing a vision while he lay unconscious on the grass, in front of Violet and Christina, defenseless?

A thought too coherent for it not to be real, for it not to be his own.

Satan might not be here, likely wasn’t, the cage—he was in the cage—but that didn’t mean what he saw wasn’t real.

"What do you want from me?"

WHAT I’VE ALWAYS WANTED. NOW YOU WILL BE MINE. GIVE ME YOUR BODY.

Sam swallowed hard and took a step back.

NOW YOU ARE READY TO RECEIVE ME.

"Screw you."

I WILL KILL AND MUTILATE AND RISE ABOVE THE ASHES OF THIS ROTTING WORLD.

"I said screw you, you miserable bastard! I’m the one in control!"

And then the spirit—or whatever the hell it was now, the being with Blake Wright’s face—shot forward, its facial muscles twisting in ways that should be impossible, even with broken bones, in grotesque, horrifying ways as it slammed into him, knocking him back and grabbing him by the neck as if to drag him into the stillness of lands beyond human understanding, where flames roared and everything smelled of sulfur. He could almost see them beyond the curtain. Just a few steps away.

His back hit the wall. That was the only thing that stopped his fall. He doubted Satan had taken over Blake’s body like the angel Castiel had done with Adams.

He was still in the cage, for sure. Real enough to strangle him, but that didn’t matter. Because…

"You need me." Sam laughed. "Cut the act, Father. You had me so you could escape the cage somehow. Maybe not escape, but control my body. But either way, your only chance to be free again is in my hands. Because you need me alive. And you need me to say yes, don’t you?"

The inhuman expression of that absolute monster kept twisting like the surface of water. Everything shifting abruptly and violently. He could hear the sounds.

It let go.

Sam collapsed to the floor at its feet, struggling to breathe. He massaged his neck with one hand. At the feet of another being that could crush him like a cockroach. Humiliated again, but at least this one couldn’t kill him. He coughed several times, hard.

"Get out of my sight. I’ll never say yes to you."

Satan roared, his eyes yellow from corner to corner, his mouth opening in an unnatural way, as if his jaw had become unhinged. His eyes had been red just seconds ago.

Then he heard something like wings flapping, and suddenly, Satan was gone. Blake’s body remained there, standing upright like a statue, but there was no trace of the presence of the Father of Lies. It was obvious at a glance.

Instead, the Morning Star had ascended to the heavens like a pillar of light tearing through the storm clouds.

A new dawn had come upon the world. The herald of a new era of darkness, massacres, and sin was a pure, almost divine light. Satan was still in the cage. Without his cooperation, he would stay there. Even now, Sam was convinced of that.

As much as he knew he was doing something equally bad.

Somehow, he knew it.

Sam wasn’t in a hurry to find out what kind of dark forces he had unleashed upon the world, but he had a feeling he would soon find out.

The Wrights were no longer in his way. He had become as strong as he could be. Or would be, once he had time to sit down, examine all the new powers he had gained, and experiment with them in peace.

Now his only mission was the one he had known from the beginning. Kill Satan.

Only one of them could survive.

No. Surviving was one thing, living was something else entirely. Sam wouldn’t die even if he lost. He would have to witness everything from his own cage, alive only to serve that bastard as a vessel.

So, he had no other choice, really.

He would never be free until he drove a sword into that bastard’s heart and buried him forever.

Violet and Christina arrived shortly after, out of breath, worried.

Ah, yes. The talk, the questions.

I still have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep. Or something like that. He sighed, standing with their help. He had their attention, and he had cards to play.

How could they complain about being recruited to save the world?

Cold as Hell, Part 11: END