Zack is left on the bar table after his wounds were treated from the attack. I stare at him the smile still on his face. Why is it always like that? Rod is cleaning glass, and the sun was in the sky starting to set for the evening to arrive. The silence is long I want someone to break it. “So, you gonna tell us what happened?” Rod’s voice is so strange, a British man with a country vocabulary. At least the silence is broken. “I killed it,” Zack responds in a monotone voice. “Well, we know you killed it, but how? How many more are there?” I cut in, Zack glances over at me. He then sits up on the bar table letting out a sigh. “I saw a pentagram burned in the ground behind the bush it came from.”
What? What does that have to do with anything? “What does this mean?” Rod asks. “It means that the war has reached us.” Zack continues, “It means that” He pauses, “That you are in more danger than I thought.” Rod doesn’t say anything, I watch them both. His expression slowly changes from soft to enraged. “Did you cause this!?” Zack raises an eyebrow, “What? No, how would I cause this!?”
“I trusted you, Zachary! Now you are telling me there are demonic forces at play!” Zack falls back off the table, as Rod gets closer to him. “Now calm down, you already suspected something Demonic. This isn’t my doing!” They get into a loud argument. Rod continues to accuse him of summoning Demons into his town. Zack goes on yelling that he did nothing wrong, all he wants to do is help. I watch them fight it’s getting out of hand. I stand in the middle of the argument, “Enough!”
They both stop and stare at me, “Enough... Look, I know I haven’t been here long. You two know each other more than you know me. But I don’t think you should be fighting like this; I don’t know about Zack. But I have no intention of hurting you.” Rod lowered the glass he had raised in his hand to chuck at Zack. “I was there with him when the being appeared, he didn’t do anything. Please, just, let us help. Stop fighting.” Neither of them spoke, then I hear Rod start to speak up, “I’m sorry.” Zack nods, “I’m sorry too.”
I look out the window, noticing the sun was almost fully set now. We need to get some rest before we have to wake up again. “We should get going.” Zack notices me looking outside. He starts to head for the door, and I follow behind him quickly. Zack is silent while we walk down the street, I wonder what goes through his head. “Forgive me, I know I was trained to be a weapon for all this. But I know next to nothing, could you explain?”
He stops walking and looks over at me, “You really know nothing?” He looks surprised despite the permanent smile. “Yes, I know nothing. At least just tell me how it all started.” Zack scratches the back of his head, “Well that’s kind of long but I guess I’ll summarize.” I nod quickly, “Yes, yes, please do!”
“Well, it was about eighteen years ago. Everything in Hell was fine, we were prospering as people. We also had started to shift our ways from evil.” What? How is that even possible? “Isn’t that our job? I mean don’t get me wrong, I’ve never acted that way.” His smile grows wider, “Exactly as you said! It’s our job. Nothing more, nothing less, we don’t have to be that way. The days of making terrible deals and killing mortals for sport is over. Well, at least it was...”
“Go on.” I say eager to learn more, “As I was saying, we were changing. But not all Demons were ok with this change. Especially the eldest daughter of Lucifer, she was furious. She wants to keep things the way they were. But it was too late to get her opinion in with her being cast out of Hell and all.” I couldn’t believe all I was hearing! “The princess was cast out of hell!?” Zack leaned against his spear. “Wow! You really know nothing! Yes, she was cast out of hell for killing her younger sister. Well, she is believed to be dead, no one knows the truth.” Before I could say anything else, Zack put his hand on my face, “Let me finish. She was upset Lucifer was changing his ideals. So, she went back to Hell even though she was banished. She rounded up a group of Demons and took them to the earth. She decided that if she took over the earth Lucifer would realize he was wrong, that the old ways of life were better.”
I stay silent processing, “You can speak now, Lil.” I snap out of my thoughts and look up at him. “This is insanity! How does the princess expect this will work? We can’t seriously be on their side!” He laughs walking towards the inn again, “Of course, we aren’t on their side, we are on the side of peace. As I had said, we are on neither the Demon's nor Human's side. Once you gain some abilities, we will one day join the fight, with Demons and Humans alike by us.” So, I was a weapon, and now I have some hidden destiny to stop war instead of continuing it? My head hurts I can’t deal with all this information right now. Zack stares at me while I go into a panic, “Listen, this must be a lot for you. Let’s just get some rest and-“
“AHHHHHH!” We hear a woman's high-pitched scream off in the distance, near the bridge. Zack and I look at each other, immediately we know to go toward the sound. The scream gets louder and louder as we run down the street. Once we get to the source, we are too late... I see a woman lying on the ground her face frozen in an expression of horror. I feel my hands and legs are shaking, I’m filled with pure terror. Looking away from the woman’s lifeless body I see another soulless being, taller than the last. A shining soul in between its large white teeth, It swallows it whole in one gulp. “Zack... what... what do we do?” I look over at him and the fear in his eyes is just as bad as mine.
The townspeople were frozen until the monster let out a shrill yell, then panic set in. The people all ran away, and it reaches out for a young girl with bright yellow hair in the crowd. “ZACHARY!” My cries snap him out of his trance, I watch as his eyes glow a bright violet. He runs forward grabbing the child in his arms just before the monster takes hold of her. Spears form around his body and shoot into it, as it cries out the people have seen that we are in the process of saving their lives.
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Zack looks at me in panic, I have no idea what to do. Then I hear a yell of my name, Rod was yelling for me. I Look back and Zack runs past me to give the child back to her family. “Lilly!”, Rod cries, “CATCH!” I see steel glittering in the moonlight from two blades. I hold my hands up and catch each blade in my hands. The crowd gasps, they look at me with fear and wonder. I whip around to the monster it had pulled the spears out of its lanky torso.
I take a deep breath in and out, then point my blade at the monster. I am filled with fear and my hands are shaking, but I cannot give in to the feeling. “Listen to me! This town is protected! By two of the strongest demons of hell!” I notice that the spell vanishes from my body and moves into the blade magic coursing through it. My tail is revealed and the crowd of humans steps back without saying a word, their eyes fixed on me. “Not you or any other demonic entity that enters will touch a single human here! NOT WHILE I’M AROUND!” The being tilts its head to the side, I don’t know if it can understand me. But this speech isn’t for it, it’s for all the people behind me.
I run forward and jump into the air stabbing both of my blades into the eyes of the monster, “Now, get the hell out of my town!” I pull my dual katana’s out of the Soulless Being’s head, landing down on the ground. The monster screams and collapses backward, now lifeless. I look back at the crowd of people, Zack was still standing by the little girl. Everything seemed to set in about what just happened. Everyone backed away from us but the child. Her parents pulled at her arms to get her away. She breaks free from them and wraps her arms around Zack, “Thank you for saving me!” She wasn’t afraid.
Zack’s smile grows wide, and he pats the girl's head, “Your welcome.” The parents walk back over to him. The little girl looks at them with her bright smile, they thank him as well. The townspeople all look at each other murmuring, then they focus their attention on me. I stare back at them; I have no idea what they are thinking. One family thanks us but there are more than them in the town. Just when I think we might be thrown out they throw their fists in the air and cheer. I can’t believe what I am seeing, what I’m hearing! People run to me and there are so many voices at once.
“Thank you for saving us!”
“Will you really protect the town?”
“How did you do it!?”
“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” So many things at once I feel so overwhelmed. I hear Rod’s voice as he pushes people aside, “Please! Calm down, everyone! Give her some space!” The questions keep pouring in, “What’s your name!? Where do you come from!?” I hear Zack scream, “QUIET!” Everyone stops and looks back at him, but he just points at Rod. “Listen to him, not me.”
“Thank you, Zack. I am sure you all have a lot of questions! But let’s save them for tomorrow! These two need rest and I assure you all your questions and concerns will be answered then.” Many yelled out in protest, the more everything set in there was now a mix. A mix of people seemed to be happy and angry about our presence. Zack grabs my arm once the crowd started to make their way towards Rod, next thing I know I am being pulled towards the bar.
“What about Rod?” Zack continues on walking, “He’s a human, he can take care of himself. It’s us I’m worried about now.” He pushes me through the doorway and shuts and locks the door behind him after he walked in. I walk to the bar table and set down the katanas. I now notice that my name was carved into the handle towards the top. Then notice a red button located right next to my name on both. I press the buttons and with a WOOSH the blades retract into the thick handle. “Wow...” I gasp in amazement picking the now knives back up. “Lilly, please focus you need to listen to me!” Zack is standing in front of me, on the other side of the bar. How long has he been there? Was he talking?
“Huh? What is it, Zack?” He ran his right hand down his face, “The humans know what we are now! Your little speech to the soulless being seemed to make them happy for a moment. But by tomorrow they could demand Rod throws us out, or worse.” I put the knives in my back pockets, “Worse?” He looks to be annoyed that I’m not catching on, “We could be killed, Lil.” What? Why would be killed if we just saved them from a monster? I hear a knock at the door, Zack runs over and creates a purple knife in his hand. “Who is it!” He yells and a man’s voice with a British accent responds, “It’s me, dumbass.” The knife vanishes from Zack’s hand, he sighs and opens the door. “Don’t you have a key on you?” Rod pushes him aside not answering the question, walking to me. “Are you ok?”
I nod and give him a smile, “Yes, I’m fine. Are the people, ok?” He looks to be shocked I even asked, “Y-Yes they are fine, Lil.” He looks back to Zack, “The little girl, Marie, thank you again for saving her.” Zack scratches the back of his head, “Yeah, of course.” Rod looks back at me, “The entire town thanks you, but a good majority is now afraid of you.” He walks behind the bar grabbing a drink, “Although they are angrier with me, saying I was harboring a demon of war.” He slides two glasses down the table to me, Zack walks up taking one of them, “So what do we have to do? Make a big gesture now?” He asks, Rod smiles. “You just have to make them like you, which is easier said than done.”
Zack looks like he wants to frown but of course cannot, “How can we make them like us? I have a terrible feeling that isn’t the last monster we will be seeing.” Rod snaps his finger, “Why don’t we make the people at that church gain respect for you two? The townspeople look up to them greatly! Zack practically spits the beer out of his mouth, “Are you insane!?”
“Maybe we should do it,” Zack looks at me like I just said something outrageous, which I probably did. “Well, what other choice do we have? We want to help them, right? You said we aren’t on either side, we are on the side of peace. So, we should make these people like us, and want us here.” He groans in anger then slams his glass down, “Fine, Lilly, you win we can do Rod’s plan. But is there anything we can do first? Maybe talk to someone normal they trust.” Rod laughs at Zack’s response, “Well they trust me, but you see how that has gone. If by normal you mean not a religious nut, then we can go to the local café. There is a woman that runs it that everyone thinks of very highly.”
I look over at Zack, “How do you not know this stuff already? Didn’t you stay here and help for a while?” He sighs, “Rod didn’t let me out.” Rod nods in response, “He’s right, I didn’t.” I give Rod a look of disappointment, “Calm down Lil, I’m making up for it. Just trust me on this and come with me tomorrow. For tonight let’s just stay in the bar. I’m not risking either of you getting hurt by someone.” Zack rolls his eyes walking over to a table and sitting down. I sit with my glass looking into it. Tomorrow we will win their trust, tomorrow everything will be better.