Even mere slivers of light seeping through boarded windows revealed too much of the scene.

Each of his footsteps was marred by squelches as he waded through viscous pools of crimson. An overbearing miasma of iron and decay assaulted his nostrils. A symphony of groans filled the otherwise deathly silent room whenever the aged floorboards bore his weight.

Before him lay a silhouette of the limp remains of something once called human. A glint of the metal jutting from its chest flickered through his bloodshot eyes. He reached out to touch it, but his hand could not complete its journey. He recoiled after he approached it.

Overwhelmed by the knowledge that each path led to utter futility, his head fell back limp. The corners of his mouth twitched, twisting into a grimace. His eyes watered. The glower that polluted his visage warped into a smile. 

He laughed. Devastation rang through each raspy breath. 

Deacon.

Deacon. 

PILOT

“Deacon?”

…

“Deacon!”

As his eyelids slowly peeled apart, the midmorning sun assaulted his retinas with an uncaring ceaselessness found in every facet of nature. The iron frame of the aging bench had grown so hot that it began sticking to his flesh even through his two layers of shirts. Rubbing his eyes, he sluggishly turned to face the source of the noise.

“I can’t even go into the store for ten minutes without you falling asleep! Someone could’ve come up and stabbed you or something.”

“Stab me? Why would anyone do that?”

“I don’t know! Seems like every time something crazy goes down, it’s always in Florida.”

“I feel like that only happens to people in the news. Not normal people.”

Swiping away remnants of moisture that had welled in the creases of his eyelids, Deacon squinted at the woman standing before him. Sunlight shimmered from her golden-hued hair. Her irises radiated a particular fierceness that was only apparent to those who took the time to study them. Compared to that vibrant palette named Verity, he felt more like her shadow.

During a brief interlude between that final assertion and the continuation of this discussion, Deacon readjusted himself to his surroundings. Around him on all sides were young couples entering and exiting stores in seamless intervals. Children tore through clumps of passersby, giggling at one another or crying over some petty squabble that would be forgotten before the day’s end. Water burst from the top of a pristine, marble fountain that lay in the center of the circle of benches upon which he sat, refracting light onto every surface in its vicinity. To see even a single wispy cloud was a rarity to the point that gazing at the blank, azure canvas above could overwhelm anyone with its substantiality.

This sight-seeing was interrupted by a thud of crisp paper bags being plopped on the ground between Deacon’s feet. His eyes wandered downward, revealing their content to be toiletries, several canned drinks, and cheap snacks. Verity claimed the space next to him, leaving little space between the two.

“Why do you always have to sit so close to me? There’s a whole bench, you know.”

Verity had already begun tearing into a soft-baked pretzel wrapped with a napkin. From the struggle she displayed, Deacon could only assume that it had been made the day before.

“Don’t act like you wouldn’t get lonely if I sat—” Verity whirled her arm, and the pretzel, aimlessly before pointing at the far side of the bench, “—all the way over there.” Her words were muffled as they passed through a layer of bread and salt.

Deacon rested his hand over his lips in a shoddy attempt to hide his grin. He would sooner be found dead than grant his partner such satisfaction. His back met the clammy surface of his seat, for Verity had bent over him and dug through one of the bags, ripping its corners as items were shoved to the side. Her prize for this scuffle was a single canned coffee, which she promptly handed to her partner.

“Probably gonna be an all-nighter, so drink it,” Verity suggested with a wink. Deacon stifled the urge to wipe away the salt that had accumulated at the corners of her mouth.

He felt through the air for the can before claiming his gift, his head forward-facing. A stilted silence clung to the air between the two until being dispersed by Verity’s clearing her throat.

“It really is nice here, isn’t it? When I heard it was called Suncrest Valley, I thought it would be full of a bunch of old people.” The air between them remained heavy despite Verity’s efforts toward alleviation.

“Yeah, it’s a pretty nice place.”

The two sat in silence for some time after that. Deacon’s head would swivel whenever a resident of the town would zoom past on a bicycle. Verity spent her time eavesdropping on conversations, either shaking her head in disappointment or giggling at any drama that seemed compelling. Despite the boisterous affairs that surrounded them, their cramped space together swelled with uneasy stillness.

“I know you weren’t actually sleeping, Deacon,” Verity finally relented, “which means you were doing that thing you always do. You know, overthinking.”

Deacon sighed.

“Nothing gets past you, does it?”

“What’s going on in that head of yours?” Verity asked, reaching over and gently resting the tip of her index finger on his forehead. “If you don’t tell me—” her fingers curled. “—you’ll have to endure my wrath!” Without warning, she flicked his forehead. Deacon smacked her hand away with a grin.

“I tried asking some people here about the picture, but nothing’s really come up. Again.” Deacon rested his hand against the left side of his chest. A square photo embossed the surface of his jacket whenever it clung to his body.

“Guess it was a long shot. I mean, most of the people here probably haven’t even seen snow before.”

“Yeah, the furthest I got was a few kids asking me what it’s like—if it’s really cold and all that,” he continued with half a smile. “I don’t know. It’s starting to feel like a dead end. Maybe I should just—”

“I know what you’re about to say, so I’m just gonna stop you right there,” Verity snapped, crumpling the now empty napkin within her palm. “Don’t even think about giving up.”

“It’s been crossing my mind more and more lately. Guess I don’t have the same drive as you. I mean, your goal seems more realistic than mine, anyways.”

Verity was now turned toward her partner, her emerald gaze searing through his skin with such intensity that Deacon could feel it burning a hole through the side of his head. His body shrank.

“Why are you talking like it’s one or the other? Are you really satisfied with giving up now? I mean, you’re acting like you’ve asked every person in the country already.” The volume of her voice increased with each passing syllable. “Could you sleep at night knowing that there’s one person out there you missed? One that could give you answers?”

“And what if there isn’t? What if this is all for nothing?”

Verity huffed, throwing her napkin on the ground. Deacon shook his head, picking up her litter and dropping it into one of the bags at his feet.

“Even if you don’t find it, are you saying everything we’ve been through has been for nothing? You’ve really gotten nothing out of it? When I eventually get a seat at the Apostle’s table, it’ll be because of you, Deacon. Every time we kill an Angel and the people of that area can sleep soundly again, that’s because of you, Deacon.” Verity’s voice was marked with a tremble, which only Deacon would have been able to perceive. “All you think about is the end, but that’s only one percent of your journey.”

Deacon’s head hung past his shoulders. He mindlessly flicked the tab of his canned coffee at regular intervals. The toes of his feet pointed toward each other as Verity wore him down.

“Can you make me a promise, Verity?”

“A promise? Er, sure…”

After taking a moment to compose himself, Deacon nodded. His visage waxed with revitalized determination.

“Every time I get like this, can you snap me out of it? If you do, I’ll do anything I can to make sure you sit among the Apostles.”

With a smile whose intention was to stifle tears, Verity nodded her head rapidly.

“It’s a promise, Deacon.”

—

“So, did you see the actual attack?”

The remainder of that morning and subsequent afternoon were much less compelling than the conversation on the bench. In a desperate bid to track down the whereabouts of their target, Deacon and Verity conducted a series of interviews with anyone having even a faint connection to a rumored attack that occurred outside the town. The man sitting before them was the last of these people of interest and their only remaining chance of gaining any sort of meaningful lead. Frustration was palpable in Verity’s flat affect and irritable tone.

“No! Weren’t you listening?! I said I heard lots of screaming and carrying on. By the time I hauled my skinny little ass over there, they were already dead. I didn’t even know people could bleed that much…”

Deacon, Verity, and this man were sitting in a dingy café tucked away just outside the view from the main road that ran through the town’s center. Its entrance was placed in such a manner that one would have missed it unless they possessed prior knowledge of its existence. The sign that hung on the brick siding just above the main threshold read “Pour Man’s Café,’ which, in Deacon’s opinion, was not an enticing moniker.

Verity’s eyes lit up despite the lack of natural—or otherwise—lighting. She leaned forward, biting her lower lip.

“And did you see the perpetrator? The one who did it?”

“I know what ‘perpetrator’ means, lady! What’s the deal with you uppity Northerners comin’ down here assumin’ we couldn’t tie our own shoes without instructions?!”

“Now you’re just putting words in my mouth! Why don’t you just answer the question, sir?” That final ‘sir’ was spat with such vitriol that the man felt an urge to wipe his face after being bombarded with such crassness.

Deacon placed his hand on Verity’s shoulder, gently pulling her away from the table. He assumed her seat. With a deadpan gaze marked by his dull, gray eyes, he instantly quelled the turbulence with which the interview had been rife. The man instantly felt soothed by Deacon’s presence.

“Sorry about that. We’re just a little frustrated; she didn’t mean to imply anything about you.” Deacon’s tone gave the impression that he had been through this conversation a thousand times before, for a sense of routine emitted from his steady, humdrum cadence. “Could you tell us anything that stood out to you? From the way you tell it, you would’ve been the first person on the scene.”

Verity pouted as she stood behind Deacon. From her vantage point, she was able to study the interviewee in depth for the first time. He was a man of unusual proportions: his nose pierced the air before his face like the widened blade of a dagger; his knees and elbows jutted from their sockets and looked almost like spheres; his limbs were thin and long. He adorned a bright blue eyeshadow and a receding hairline. Despite this appearance, he still maintained the unmistakable twang of a lifelong resident of the South.

“Well, you see, I was just out hunting in my usual spot. It’s really quiet out there, yaknow? Not a soul beside me and God.”

“Hunting?” Verity chimed in.

“Not animals or anything! I’m actually vegan. I was tracking down some of nature’s most delicate offerings.”

“You mean, like… mushrooms?”

The man winced at both the efficiency of Verity’s conclusion and the loudness by which she stated it. His eyes darted to either side of the café despite the only other soul inhabiting it being the barista at the counter. She had spent her time counting the cups stacked by the register with glazed-over expression.

“Don’t worry,” Verity appended her previous line, “we’re not cops or anything. I don’t really care what you do in your free time.”

With a sigh, the man continued.

“I saw… a shadow.”

“A shadow?”

“Yes, a shadow.”

“A shadow, huh…”

“This wasn’t just any shadow, though. This thing was big. I’m talking, like, bigger than a bear. You ever see a bear’s shadow? Bigger than that.”

Deacon and Verity glanced at each other with knowing smirks.

“I could even hear its footsteps. When I tell you I was fearin’ for my life—I just hid behind the nearest tree and waited for hours. Soon as I thought the coast was clear, I hightailed it outta there. Didn’t think my old-ass could run so fast.”

“And you’re sure that’s what you saw? Don’t worry—we definitely believe you.” Deacon’s reassurance was exactly what the man needed to continue his harrowing tale. With a hearty gulp of his iced coffee, the man nodded.

“Really? Y’all believe me? Does that mean you know what I saw?”

“You’ve heard of Angels, right?” Verity interjected, claiming the seat next to Deacon.

“I mean, I saw that big attack on Orlando in the news. I didn’t think those types of things would come here, though. Do you think it’ll attack Suncrest Valley Next?! Oh, God in heaven…”

“Don’t worry.” Deacon plastered a smile over his visage, something that he had been practicing following Verity’s advice. “We’re going to take care of it before that happens.”

“Does that make you’ns Missionaries, then? Like, from the Church?”

They both nodded synchronously.

“We aren’t exactly sure why, but there hasn’t been a single verified report of this attack despite it happening last night. We just happened to be in the area when someone submitted an anonymous tip to the Church,” Verity explained, her demeanor much calmer now.

“That is odd. You’d figure the news would be all over it. Maybe they’re too afraid to go out there themselves? It’s in the middle of nowhere, after all.” A mutual interest grew within the party as they attempted to narrow down the reason for these circumstances.

“Just tell us where it happened, and we’ll take it from there. Give us a day or two, and you’ll be back to your ‘hunting’ again.” Deacon’s voice gave away his being over conversing with people for the day.

Thus, the man gave the two precise directions toward the sight of the attack. After countless interviews and monitoring of local police radio, this was the first meaningful lead Deacon and Verity had gained—the first fruit of their labor.

With urgency the two dashed from the café. It was only after they took their leave that the man noticed both had failed to pay for their drinks.

—

“I didn’t think it would be so out of the way.”

Verity’s Church-issued white SUV rolled across the smooth pavement of Suncrest Valley, the worn highway that fed into town, and now the rural Florida road riddled with potholes and patchy tar from previous attempts to repair it. They had been on the road for nearly an hour.

The sun had traversed across much of the firmament since the final interrogation at the café. The edge of the horizon hinted at streaks of orange, and the pillowy clouds grew dark on their undersides. Driving along that stretch of road was maddening, for there lay no landmark or even curve in the pavement that shattered the monotony. The only sign that time still marched forward was Verity’s occasional dodging of a pothole or splattered remains of an animal that had strayed too far from nature’s embrace.

“Guess that’s one reason there haven’t been any official reports yet,” Verity replied, her focus narrowing on the road.

“At least the last interview ended up leading somewhere. The first guy wouldn’t stop hitting on you; the next lady wouldn’t even take out her earbuds; and the last dude was blind.”

“Guess we were a little desperate by the time we got to the blind guy…”

“What do you mean ‘we?’”

Verity scoffed at Deacon’s closing comment, her eyes squinting in an attempt to discern the various landmarks the man had provided in his directions.

“Based on the eyewitness report the Church received, our target is of the Archangel-class. That doesn’t mean you should let your guard down, though—you don’t even have your Sin Power yet.”

Deacon’s forehead rested against the passenger window. A circle of condensation was constantly replenished with each of his breaths. His eyes gradually glazed over as he stared at the same scenery over and over. He could only conclude that God had gotten lazy when creating this area, for without the aid of a clock, Deacon would not have been able to say with confidence that they had even progressed down the road.

“You sure it’s not a Virtue? They like secluded places.”

“Positive. Virtues only attack individuals. And they certainly don’t take on nonhuman forms.” Verity’s gaze darted toward Deacon for just long enough to convey her discontentment. “You of all people should know that. This is an Archangel.”

“Seems a little weird that we got assigned a Class One. Our last three assignments were all Powers.”

“Like I said before, we were already in the area. I doubt this place is crawling with Missionaries. That guy was acting like he’d hardly even heard of Angels.” Verity cleared her throat, her voice harboring a growing frustration. “And stop getting cocky, Deacon. Just because I’m your partner doesn’t mean every assignment will be a walk in the park. Just remember your fundamentals, please.”

Verity’s lecturing was interrupted by a sharp right turn onto a pathway comprising dirt and gravel. She had nearly missed it entirely given its unassuming presence; however, a peeling green sign that bore the words CROOKS RETREAT ensured her that this road was correct. Her SUV bounced and jolted with every painful yard it was forced to endure across a road obviously not built with automobiles in mind. Deacon stared with widened eyes as puffs of dirt and barrages of pebbles and stones danced just outside his window

“You sure you’re going the right way?”

Verity sighed.

“Maybe you’re right. Let’s just keep driving another hour and make sure there isn’t another sign that says the same thing.”

“Maybe we should’ve written down his directions. Or paid for the coffee,” Deacon suggested in retrospect as he stared at the two empty cups in the center cup holders.

While Verity was armed with an arsenal of retorts, both of them fell silent as she slowly rolled into the gravel parking lot of an abandoned school building. The ground surrounding the structure was riddled with boards that had eroded from the school’s siding. The building itself was a relic of a bygone era, for it comprised but a single floor and, from outward observation, no more than one or two large rooms. Warmer memories of pouring over child-aimed fiction recounting the pioneer era of America raced through Verity’s mind—though, this nostalgic lens was shattered by the derelict depiction before her.

With a deep breath, Verity nodded at her partner, and the two exited their vehicle.

“You first. You’re stronger than me, after all,” Deacon suggested before the car’s doors were even fully shut.

“Oh, so now you wanna play the humble card? All right, fine,” Verity huffed, fishing a flashlight from her purse.

As the two approached the building’s entrance, they studied the scene in great detail.

Though the sun still shed adequate light across the exterior of the dilapidated edifice, the windows that were not boarded shut exhibited a pitch-black scene within the building’s interior. The two tread cautiously toward the door, which lay ever-so-ajar; neither of them dared to walk more than a pace in front of the other. After a glance toward her partner, Verity reached for the door, its surface bearing remnants of white paint. The door opened with a groan that filled the interior.

Upon entering the premises, Deacon and Verity parted ways without skipping a beat, just as they had always done under similar circumstances.

Deacon dragged his feet along the ground to avoid tripping over stray furniture or shattered floorboards. With every occurrence of his bumping into a wall or an edge of moldy furniture, he grumbled over his failure to bring a flashlight of his own. He thought of the phone that he had left tucked in the center console of the vehicle. The phrase ‘remember the fundamentals’ rang through his mind, taunting him.

Instead, he allowed the surface of the wall to guide him. His fingers glided over the frame of a window, feeling its rough, splintered wood. He skirted up its length, narrowly avoiding splinters along the way. With a firm grip, he pried one of the boards by its hastily nailed edge, squinting as sunlight streamed through the gap. That light illuminated the corner in which he now knew himself to reside. He turned his head to study the room. A footstep could be heard on the other side of the building. His eyes traced the cracks of the floor. Another footstep. His eyes soon reached the border of sunlight’s embrace. He squinted. The entrance to a hallway lay just beyond the darkness. Nothing could be seen beyond the edge of that room. A veil of darkness awaited him in the short corridor beyond. He released his grip. The board bounced back to the window’s frame with a thwack. Deacon sucked air through parted lips. He took his first step.

“In here.”

Verity’s call gave him a start. His heart raced as he dragged his hand over his chest. With a sharp exhale, he followed the voice that beckoned him. As he approached her, the stagnant air that lingered in his nostrils was replaced with malodor.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Verity stood at the threshold of the main room of the building. Deacon coughed as he reached her side. He followed the trembling beam of her flashlight.

Strewn across the largest room of the schoolhouse were several bodies—roughly twenty, or at least, that is the total Deacon reached given the sparse lighting and the state of the corpses themselves.

A single step. The floorboard groaned. Another. Iron overwhelmed his senses. One more. A pool of crimson rippled as his foot broke through its surface. Deacon lifted his foot, taking a step back.

“This is bad. This many…” Verity reflected, allowing herself a rare moment of outward revulsion. Throughout the years, she had prided herself on her level head and detachment from the job, but the presence of children among the fallen had torn a hole in her professional exterior.

To describe the attack as mere carnage would be a disservice to the ineffable horror that lay before Verity and Deacon. Each thread of light that spilled through the gaps of the windows illuminated far too much. Some bodies were slashed until mere liquids clung to their skeletons. Some were severed into pieces and strewn about the floor, walls, and ceiling, being connected only by entrails stretched far beyond their intended elasticity. A few of the heads were caved in after having been flung and bashed with a force not typically seen in nature. It had occurred recently enough to not bear the stench of decay, but rather an overwhelming fetor of iron and excrement.

Deacon had no witty comment or juvenile retort. Instead, the corners of his mouth stretch to either side, twisting into an expression that could not be classified by any chart or diagram. One of the women had had her silver mirror shoved into her sternum. Deacon’s eyes fixated on that particular aspect—a microcosm of the overall horror on display.

Verity, after studying the scene intensely, looked at her partner.

“Let’s… get outside. There’s probably a trail of some kind. It’ll tell us where it went next.”

Verity’s voice bore traces of an attempted reassurance, though not the convincing sort to which Deacon was accustomed. Rather, it sounded like an audition by an amateur actor. Not wholly convinced that his partner was any better off than him, he stuck close to her as they exited the building together.

Verity had never felt so relieved to feel sunlight kiss her skin.

After a few moments of swallowing as much fresh air as possible, Deacon plopped onto the soft, damp soil where the building’s shade had not allowed much vegetation.

“Definitely not a Virtue,” he noted with an air of bewilderment, leaning against a splintering wall.

“What kind of Archangel attacks that many people without provocation, though?” Verity added with a similar level of puzzlement. “There had to be at least twenty people in there. There weren’t any Ether remnants, but still—”

“What were that many people doing here? This place looks like one bad storm away from falling to pieces.”

“I saw a lot of backpacks and a few tents. I think this was a homeless camp of some sort. It’s the only explanation that makes sense, anyways.”

Deacon shook his head.

“They couldn’t catch a break until the very end. Geez.”

Deacon lifted himself to his feet, patting mud from his posterior. He was already prepared to receive an earful from Verity upon sitting down on her light-gray vinyl upholstery later.

Verity cleared her throat.

“The bodies were still fresh. A couple of them had guns, too, so it’s a safe bet to say that they at least injured it. If we hurry, we’ll catch up to it. Let’s poke around out here a little longer to see if we can find out where it’s headed.”

With an understanding nod, the two split apart just as they did inside the building, though this occurrence was marked with a palpable hesitation on either party’s end. Once again, Deacon watched his support disappear behind the jagged edge of the schoolhouse, leaving him to his devices. While this was standard for any leg of their journeys that involved investigation, it was a feeling to which he could never be fully accustomed, especially after moments like that.

Pastel pinks and oranges painted the majority of the sky by this point. The sun dipped toward the edge of the horizon with meager space separating the two. It looked like two young lovers on the cusp of merging their lips and finding their sought-after release. Deacon shook his head, remembering that his attention ought to have been pointed toward the ground instead.

Deacon traced every divot and path of folded-over grass. Given the volume of people who had been populating the premises, it proved difficult to discern which of these footsteps were carved by their target. His eyes narrowed on particular sections for agonizing lengths of time as he struggled to reach a sound conclusion. One set of footprints stuck out from the rest, for they were spaced much farther apart and sunk deep into the soft loam of the humid South. He followed this particular trail, taking large strides to mimic the assumed actions of the Angel in question. One step. Two steps. His legs stretched to match the gait of the creature. Three steps. Four–

Bump.

With a gasp, Deacon jumped backward. He shoved his open palms in front of his face. He stared at the imposing silhouette before him.

“And just what in God’s precious, green-and-blue fucking earth are you doing out here, boy?!”

The voice bellowed, filling the open marsh. The man to whom the voice belonged was adorned with overalls, a stained white t-shirt that was many sizes too small, and bare feet. His gut protruded far beyond any other part of his body. He gripped a rifle firmly as though some cosmic force had been constantly attempting to yank it from his possession.

Deacon gazed beyond the man, noting a quaint farmhouse on the other side of the hill that separated the two properties.

“Whoa, whoa! Let’s take it easy,” Deacon pleaded, his eyes now narrowed down the barrel of the gun. “We’re just out here looking for something. We didn’t mean to cause any trouble.”

“The only thing people over here get up to is no good! You with them bums that keep throwin’ trash on my property?!”

“No, no! We don’t know anything about that! I swear!” Deacon’s hands trembled as he pleaded. While he considered himself well-equipped to deal with any Angelic threat, his human confrontations still left plenty to be desired.

Locked into a staring contest, neither party dared to make a sudden movement—one was a complete unknown, and the other wielded a firearm. With a bite of his lower lip, the farmer gradually swiveled his gun toward Deacon’s vicinity in a desperate bid not to be second to the draw. Deacon swallowed, feeling as though a brick of lead had just forced its way down his throat. His eyebrows scrunched above the bridge of his nose. A faint breeze teased his shoulder-length, jet-black hair as he prepared to survive this encounter by any means necessary.

“Oh, there you are, honey! I still can’t find that damn phone of yours!”

Both Deacon and his newfound adversary exhaled sharply. The dreaded rifle was allowed to fall to the man’s side as he studied this new participant.

“You sayin’ you’re with this fella, then?” He interrogated Verity, still not fully absolving either of their guilt in some yet-to-be-known debauchery.

“Ah, you found my fiancé, did you? He always has a way of getting lost, lemme tell ya,” she continued with a roll of her eyes. She attempted a breathy giggle to ease the tension. “We’re urban explorers! We like to find, like, abandoned buildings and stuff and look inside them. My lesser half over here lost his phone somewhere out here, so, here we are!”

Verity’s recounting of falsehoods was met with squinted eyes by the man. When the farmer’s glance darted back toward Deacon, the young man attempted a half-hearted smile in a desperate bid to bolster Verity’s claims.

“... Guess that all checks out. Sorry for being so, uh, confrontational, as my ex-wife liked to say. Don’t get a lot of outsiders out here.”

Verity had already made her way over to Deacon and began pushing him back toward the car. She turned back toward the man as she walked, a grin still plastered across her countenance.

“Just, eh, one more thing…” A distinct click of a rifle being prepared rang through the air, deafening the two to all other stimuli. “... all of them people in there are dead. I saw it with my own eyes. So now, I’ll ask ye again: Why are y’all here?

‘Shit.’

‘Farewell, world.’

Deacon turned to Verity, waiting to see what brilliant lie she would construct to rid themselves of the farmer. By the grin on her face, he concluded that she had already thought of something.

“Heh, you’re more perceptive than we gave you credit for. Congratulations, citizen, for you have us all figured out.” Verity’s voice was much deeper than moments previous. She brandished a pair of sunglasses from her purse, whipping them onto her face. They sat slightly crooked after this grand display of sangfroid. “Never in a million years would I have suspected our cover to be blown. You see, me and my partner, well, we’re actually—”

The man gripped his rifle in suspense.

“—federal agents with the Central Intelligence Agency!”

“You’re kidding!” exclaimed the farmer, taking a step backward to recompose himself.

“You’re kidding…” groaned Deacon.

Deacon slid his palm down the length of his face, sighing upon the realization that he would have to play along with this obvious fabrication.

“We were told to look out for people like you, Mister, eh…”

“It’s Brooks! Wyatt Brooks!” The man finished Verity’s statement with awe-struck expression.

“That’s right, Mister Brooks. You see, we’re just pretending to be a young couple in love. But in reality, our target is—” Verity glanced to either side, then leaned forward and cupped a hand over one side of her mouth, “—Venezuelan spies.”

“I just knew it! I knew something big was going on here! You guys are dressed way too business-like to just be some nobodies.” He paused, being stricken by a sudden realization. “So, does that mean, all those people in there…?”

Verity feigned bereavement, shaking her head and clutching the bosom of her blouse.

“It’s truly a tragedy we could not catch them in time. To think, even after the fall of the Wall, that the communists would go to such lengths.”

Mister Brooks clasped her shoulder, clicking his tongue against his teeth empathetically. Deacon scratched at his philtrum to hide his scowl toward his partner, who always seemed to travel the path of falsehoods.

Verity’s visage flashed from grief to gravity. She nodded toward Deacon then procured the flashlight from her purse, aiming it toward the man’s face.

“Of course, we cannot allow a civilian to go spouting off our mission to everyone in town.” Her thumb caressed the button at the flashlight’s end. “I apologize for this, Mister Brooks, but I must wipe clean the slate of your mind. In a moment, all of this will be but a vague dream.”

Wyatt Brooks threw his rifle to the ground in a display of amnesty. His hands jutted up to either side of him. His head shook violently.

“Now, now, wait a damn minute! Ain’t nobody wanna see those Reds dead more than Wyatt Brooks! Now, why would I go flappin’ my jaws about such important matters?!”

“Can we trust him, Agent Jones?”

By this point in the conversation, Deacon’s face waxed utter apathy. Blinking a few times, he offered a deep sigh before attempting to mimic the seriousness of Verity’s charade.

“Seems like he might be an asset to us, Agent Boofus.”

Verity winced at this impromptu moniker. Mister Brooks stifled a giggle.

“Er, I believe you may be correct, Agent,” Verity continued, a vein now protruding from her temple. “Seems like he exhibits true American values.” Verity dropped the flashlight back into her purse, zipping it shut and nodding. “From this point forward, you are Civilian Agent Brooks. You will be our covert operator for this area. You are to report any unusual sightings to us by means of—” she presented a business card with the words POUR MAN’S CAFÉ, “—this number! Though it may look like a normal business card, that is simply our cover.”

Mister Brooks goggled with utter infatuation. A dazzling gleam shone through his irises as all his dreams were coming true before his very eyes.

“When you call this number,” Deacon added, “be sure to tell them: ‘The thorns of the rose run red on the promised day.’ It’s our code.” 

“Y-yes, Agent, er, Sir, er…”

“Just call me Jones,” he reassured with a smile. “Now, we must pursue the perpetrator before we lose our advantage. We’re all counting on you to monitor this area for further criminal activity, Agent Brooks.”

Wyatt Brooks took his exit in a daze. Before even being out of sight of the Missionaries, he skipped and frolicked through the wooded strip that separated his property from the schoolhouse’s lot.

—

“CIA? Really? Isn’t that a felony or something?”

Deacon and Verity were on the road once again. After the intrusion by one Mister Brooks had been resolved the two continued their investigation; they narrowed down the Angel’s course to one direction. Darkness shrouded the path ahead. Verity leaned over the steering wheel, scrunching her eyes such that not even the slimmest path would escape her line of sight. There remained not a single sliver of sky that had not succumbed to dusk.

“You just don’t understand people like I do, Deacon,” Verity answered, her voice having notes of a slight rasp as a result of their arduous day.

“What’s wrong with telling them the truth? The Church is recognized by the government, so it’s not like they’ll take ‘no’ for an answer.”

Deacon nearly bit his tongue as the SUV nailed a pothole and sent him flying.

“Honesty gets you nowhere, Deacon. People prefer living in a lie because the truth is rife with mundanity. Why do you think fiction is so popular?”

“I’d rather be told a boring truth than an exciting lie.”

“And you’re not like most people, which is why you interest me.” Verity rubbed her eyes. “There are certain times when I conclude that it’s easier to lie. I’m just trying to save us some trouble.”

“Verity, does that mean you lie to me, too?”

Verity bit her lower lip, then smiled.

“Of course not, Deacon.”

Any facet of the outside world that was not within the confines of the two beams of light projecting from the car’s front became imperceptible. As Deacon’s eyes adjusted to the endless conveyor belt of obsidian darting across the window, formless blobs became the edges of trees, leaves, and signs.

“He didn’t even ask to see our badges or anything,” Deacon mused. The fact that his partner may have been correct stung. “Have any idea where we’re headed, by the way?”

“Funny you should mention that—” Verity began before being interrupted by a sharp veer onto a dirt path hardly stamped into the grass. The vehicle jolted and bounced as it trampled outside humanity’s domain. Deacon clutched the handle just above the passenger’s door, though his visage did not express any form of concern. The razor’s edge of Verity’s concentration sliced through the dark, humid air.

A circle of trees formed out of that shapeless void—a meager grove spanning not even a mile but whose contents were dense with foliage. The two slid right to left to right again as Verity weaved through trunks that appeared mere seconds before potential impact. Deacon glanced at his partner with furrowed eyebrows. Revving roared from the SUV’s engine, culminating in a prolonged skidding as they found themselves in a clearing that lay in the grove’s center. They both fell back in their seats and wheezed.

Compared to the cacophony of chaos rattling his skull moments prior, the serenity of this spot tucked away from the affairs of the world was a blessing to Deacon.

“Not the worst I’ve seen from your driving, at least,” Deacon choked out. He cupped his hand over his heart to ensure it still lay beating in his chest.

“I don’t wanna hear it from someone who can’t even drive.”

Verity leaned forward in her seat, eyes closed, and drew in a deep breath. After this respite, the two exited the car. Verity elected to leave the headlights on, for the moon was but a sliver that particular night. Deacon could just make out the bags that sagged under her eyes. Her cross-shaped necklace shimmered in the light and reflected onto the trunk of a tree on the other side of the clearing. Their shadows stretched across the clearing, tearing and distorting upon reaching the trees at the other end. They each brandished a flashlight, aiming them straight ahead. 

“I can go first this time, if you want,” Deacon offered with a hint of teasing. Verity shoved his shoulder and marched forward. He followed the gentle curves of her silhouette.

“Stay close this time. It’s here. It’s gotta be.” Verity’s voice was the most curt it had been all day. Deacon straightened his posture and obeyed.

“If there’s one thing in this world I trust, it’s your intuition.”

Verity smiled at this comment, and the two proceeded.

After a few feet of cautious advancement, Deacon stumbled over some mass on the ground. Verity snapped around and shone her flashlight at the obstacle. Before them lay the ravaged corpse of yet another victim. Its entrails were entangled with one another, and four deep gouges burrowed down its back. Its outstretched arm clutched a cellphone with such tenacity that its edges splintered under the pressure.

“Guess we know where the anonymous tip came from,” Verity muttered, suppressing the urge to gag.

“It’s impressive they managed to run all the way out h—”

The trees rustled just beyond the headlights’ sanctuary.

Deacon shushed. Verity froze. They glanced at each other. Neither blinked. One monstrous footstep shook the ground. Verity’s hand snaked through her purse. Deacon’s body drifted toward the noise. Another step. More rustling. Their breaths grew quieter. Deacon swallowed. Another step. An exhale so sharp that it whistled streamed from Verity’s lips. Her fingers wrapped around the grip of her pistol.

More silence.

Nothing.

The two whipped around. Verity pointed her gun forward. Deacon’s feet planted into the soft ground. He looked up. The Angel was already before him. A hulking mass of ineffable geometry filled his view. Deacon brought his arms up to either side. A colossal arm hung in the air. His eyes traced the line. He clenched his jaw. Too late.

“Guess you were right,” he said flatly, smiling at Verity.

“Deacon—!”

The mammoth arm came crashing down with such force that the sound of a jet engine swelled through the air. It slammed Deacon. A crunch. His body careened through the air, twirling. He crashed into a tree, spine first. His body fell limply to the ground with a thud.

Verity wished to grieve, to check on him, to have this affair be done with; there was no time. The Angel had already laid its sights on her.

Verity shakily aimed her flashlight in front of her. She traveled up the length of the monstrosity before her.

It was white. Splotches of red spattered about its bulging features. Blue veins ran just below the surface of its skin in intricate, criss-crossed patterns. Two distinct bullet holes in its abdomen. A thick, golden ring clamped tightly around its throat. Its head—

Verity’s light had finally reached its head—at least, its approximation of one. Its mouth encircled the circumferences of its blocky head for as far as Verity could see. One of its sickeningly bright blue eyes—like those of a husky—was turned upward, as though it were not sure in which direction eyeballs were meant to lie on a face. One arm possessed more pronounced musculature than the other, and both hands were far too large in proportion with the rest of its body.

The Angel opened its mouth, the entire top half of its head tilting backward. A low hum shook the very air. Verity could feel her bones rattle against her flesh. She could feel her brain smacking against her skull. She dared not cover her ears, for the Angel would sense that vulnerability.

The Angel took one gargantuan step forward, clearing several feet. Verity froze. Her eyes did not wander from its hypnotic gaze. Another step. The hum continued. One of its mammoth limbs climbed into the air. It looked as though it would pierce the very firmament. The humming ceased. No frogs croaked. No grasshoppers sang. Not even the leaves would allow themselves to rustle. The two stood in infinite mutual petrification. Verity sucked in no air, nor did she allow any to escape.

The arm came crashing toward her.

Verity leaped backward. With a roll she landed on her feet. From her purse she yanked out her handgun. She fired once. Twice. Thrice. The third tore through its head. The Angel bellowed in agony. It swung again with its smaller arm. It was much faster. Verity ducked. The cold, damp flesh brushed against the top of her head. She fell to the ground. She pushed herself onto her feet. Taking aim, she fired again. Another headshot. The Angel did not waver. She huffed, then threw the gun and her purse away from her. She bolted toward it. With a leap, she cleared its head. Before it could turn around, she kicked the back of its knee—or where its knee should have been. The creature roared in agony once again. Verity gasped. She looked downward. A third large, white palm was inches from her face. It shot out from beneath the ground.

“Ah—”

It was the end. She had been outmaneuvered. While reeling from the rarity of Deacon being dispensed of, she failed to account for a potential Technique from her adversary. She was really about to die—to a Class One, nonetheless. Memories overwhelmed her mind. Despite only knowing each other for three years, Deacon constituted most of them.

“It’s a promise, Deacon.”

That’s right. They had made a promise. Verity could not die here. No matter how she typically conducted herself, those words from earlier flowed from the deepest recesses of her heart.

Verity managed to send her forearm in between her head and the hand. With a fleshy thud it struck her chin. She lurched backward with a sharp yelp. She landed on her back. She staggered to her feet. Her knees wobbled. They wished to buckle so badly. She clenched her fist. Nails pierced the base of her palm. She looked toward her left.

“You still alive, Deacon? I need you right now.”

A groan emanated from the darkness. A figure sauntered into the beam of the headlights. Deacon swiped mud from the knees of his slacks.

“That strong, huh? Maybe we were both wrong,” he mused, his saunter morphing into a jog until he reached Verity’s side. He studied the hulking frame of the Angel, who now faced them, whose edges were illuminated by the car. Its breathing was much more dilapidated than at the start of their encounter. Deacon grinned at his partner’s strength, taking pride in it as though he were a part of her.

“You need me to use it?” He asked.

“It’s fine, I got this. Just wanted to make sure you’d be able to speak,” Verity replied, a smirk pushing out her earlier glower.

The Angel, visibly frustrated with its prey, galloped toward them, its gait uneven. Rather than even steps, a brief pause interspersed two rapid, sequential ones. Deacon hopped away a couple of paces. The Angel was so close that they could feel its cold, dry breath. Verity pointed at it. It was now so near that they could hear its irregular blinks.

“Deacon, may I hurt you?”

A pause—a moment of hesitation.

“Yes, you may.”

In that moment, it was as though time itself vacated that clearing. No one breathed. The Angel was halted mid-stride. Indeed, if one were to lie on the loam to observe the stars’ passage above, it would have been one hundred years without a hint of movement from them. It was so quiet that Deacon’s head began to feel as though it would cave in.

“How much?”

“... as much as you want.”

A snap of her fingers. A glowing construction of Etheric, green light rose from the ground. It encircled the Angel. Two smaller ones materialized around Verity and Deacon, these circles cerulean.

“With this covenant, I invoke the Sin of Pride. Listen well, Angel, for this is my Sin Power.”

Heavy golden chains constructed of that same dense gleaming energy emerged from the circles’ edges, dragging along the ground until meeting in the middle. A golden spike rained from the sky like a comet, threading through the chains and pinning them to the ground. The chains grew taut as they tugged against one another, suspending themselves in the air.

Deacon inhaled deeply as though he would never be granted the privilege of breath again. Verity laughed. Her face was flushed with pink.

“You have been forced into a contract with me. If you fulfill the condition of this contract, you will be set free. If you refuse, you die. If you attempt to uphold your end and fail, you die. The same goes for me, of course.”

Deacon unfastened the buttons of his black overshirt, revealing a white, collared, long-sleeve shirt beneath it. He bunched his shirt into a ball and sank his teeth into it.

“While our condition will be the same, the difference in severity of our respective conditions will depend on two factors: the difference between our total amounts of Ether, and the amount of pain my effigy is willing to endure to serve as collateral on my end.”

Verity closed her eyes, squeezing them tightly as she wandered deeply through her mind, conjuring a suitable condition. The Angel was in a seeming state of suspended animation save for its raspy exhales and trails of liquid that oozed from its mouth as a result. With an approving ‘hm,’ Verity clapped her hands together, staring defiantly at her target.

“I have now explained the details of my Sin Power, fulfilling the liber apertus Restriction; thus, we can begin. This is my Partisan Covenant.” Verity clicked her tongue, struggling to subdue the rage that had bubbled inside her just from being in the presence of such an abomination. “Not that you understood any of it.”

Verity knelt, revealing a pocket knife that had been stashed within a leg strap under her skirt. She rested the point of its blade on her neck’s skin. Each throb of her heart pressed her flesh against the blade.

“My condition will be the following: I shall pierce the flesh of my neck.”

Verity dug the blade not even an inch into her neck. A single stream of blood trickled from the entry point, snaking through her clothes, then plopping onto the mud intermittently. Deacon braced himself, expelling a sizable breath.

“Your condition shall be the same, though as explained before, with differing severity. For you to gain freedom from Partisan Covenant, you must—”

The Angel, as though it began to understand the severity of its circumstance, ceased any bestial noise it had been producing up until that point to listen.

“—cut off your head.”

Deacon chomped onto his shirt, strained and muffled screaming being tangled into the fabric. Blood poured from his nose, and he clasped his ribs as he buckled in agony. His nails dug into the soft, squishy earth.

The Angel outstretched its arm until Verity could only see its palm. It brought its fingers together, its nails several inches in length. With one, quick strike, its nails soared through its thick, veiny, trunk-like neck. Its head glided through the air. It spun slowly as it crashed into the ground, sinking into the mud. The circles and the chains disappeared. Deacon collapsed just as the Angel’s remaining body did. Verity stood in the middle of a festival of blood and agony.

Verity’s head fell back, and her whole body shuddered. The weight of the Angel’s presence had weighed her down much more than she had realized. She flipped the knife, flinging its blade back into the handle. It fell from her fingertips and landed on the ground. She turned toward Deacon, who lay prone behind her.

“Don’t be dramatic, Deacon. It’s not like it’s permanent.”

“It still hurts. This one even broke my ribs…” he retorted, his voice being muffled by the shirt that still rested within his maw. He allowed himself to remain planted in that position for quite some time after the confrontation, a rare display of pouting by an otherwise apathetic man.

“Let me know how long it lasts. If it’s more than ten or so minutes, I might have to take a bit more of the burden next time.”

Verity with guarded steps ambled toward the Angel’s corpse. She took a photo of it from several angles. The flash of her phone’s camera pierced the darkness. Its head lay many feet away vaguely attached to its body by a splotchy trail of blood. Verity rolled its head over with her foot until its dead eyes, void of luster and even malice, stared into her. She snapped a photo of it as well.

“Isn’t it weird how they bleed and stuff when they’re supposed to be made of Ether?” Deacon’s voice was still muffled. He still refused to relinquish his now cozy orientation.

“Given that you’re musing to yourself over there, I take it you’re healed already?”

“Yeah. It wasn’t as bad as I thought.”

Verity approached Deacon, a tender smile brightening her face. She drew near and stared down at him. Her expression twisted into a scowl. She walked on and over him to retrieve her gun and flashlight from the ground. She wiped them of their mud on the back of Deacon’s pants leg.

“Time to go, buddy. Think we’ve had enough for one night.”

By the time she collected her things—and herself—and turned around, Deacon was already on his feet. His shirt was defiled with blood and soil. Several puncture marks positioned at the points of his ribs dotted his undershirt. Verity winced at this revelation.

“Say, don’t you think that was a little strong for an Archangel? We had an easier time with the Powers.”

Verity could not help but nod in agreement.

“I wasn’t expecting to have to use my Sin Power. I’ll have Father figure out which Bishop was responsible for such a shitty classification.”

“That thing coulda really killed someone if we weren’t the ones that got assigned to it, you know?”

“It did kill people.”

“You know what I meant.”

Deacon and Verity walked side by side to the SUV, whose underside was now marred with dents and scratches. Deacon rested his head on Verity’s shoulder and clutched his abdomen; she did not object. She noticed his slight limp.

“I think my caffeine’s starting to wear off—”

Verity’s eyes widened. She pushed Deacon away from her.

“Run—!”

Standing next to the SUV was a tall, dark figure that both of them had failed to notice. The entity stretched its arm toward them.

Bang!

PILOT: END