“Get away from her!” Eclipse shouted as the Masked Demon glided his fingers down the length of my neck. Eclipse made a move to get out of his seat, but was immediately restrained by two other Demons.
“What a protective boyfriend you have,” the Masked Demon murmured with an entertained laugh. His crimson eyes darkened. “What a shame it would be for him to die. What a shame it would be for you to witness his death.”
“Don’t you dare touch him,” I gritted out, rage pulsing in my normally composed voice. Eclipse was the closest thing I had to a friend in this world. Not to mention, I still had tremendous use for him. No one was going to take him away from me. I would kill this motherfucker if he even made a move to kill Eclipse. “Mark my words,” I breathed out coldly. “If you try to take him away from me, I will kill you.”
The Masked Demon grinned evenly. Whereas my warning words appeared to have terrified the Demons on the train, he did not look afraid. If anything, there was an approval in his gaze that I didn’t understand. Strangely enough, it was as though he wanted me to feel this way.
“Like I said,” the Masked Demon continued, appeasing the tense atmosphere, “I really need your soul. However, wanting your soul and actually acquiring it are two different things. For one, if a human has a Guardian Demon, then it must mean that you’ve made the unbreakable vow to that particular Demon. It must mean that you promised your Demon that your soul will only go to him.” Severity dripped into his eyes. His grip on me tightened and I could feel my backpack inch closer to my hand. “I would not like that. So please . . . tell me where your Demon is so that I can find him, kill him, and come back to own your soul.”
Struggling to breathe when I realized the implications of my backpack being so close to me, I slyly asked, “Why do you need my soul so badly?”
“That’s for me to know and you to find out.” He chuckled darkly, oblivious to what I was preparing to do. “Now tell me,” he went on, unaware that my fingers were grazing over the zipper of my backpack, “before Eclipse here learns what it feels like to have his skin peeled off. He may not believe in Demons, but I know that you believe. I also know that you’re aware of what Demons are capable of. I don’t have my full powers with me, but I know how to torture someone. I will not hesitate to punish your boyfriend.” I could hear Eclipse scoff from the side as if to say, “I’d like to see you try,” before the Masked Demon impatiently prompted, “Now tell me where your Demon is.”
“Gone,” I finally answered, unzipping my backpack in utter stealth.
“Where?”
No one could hear what I was doing with my backpack. No one but Eclipse. Realization rippled in his eyes when he saw what I was doing. He stiffened marginally, no doubt getting ready to spring into action once my plans went underway.
“Into the pits of Hell,” I lied as the train crackled over the tracks, giving me another opportunity to completely unzip my backpack without anyone deciphering the sound. “He is angry,” I plowed on, subtly reaching into the pocket. “He does not like anyone threatening the soul he has already claimed.”
“I know that he is angry, which is why I would love to meet him.”
Something changed in the Masked Demon’s crimson red eyes. He froze the moment he saw the train station appear and the words “Serenity” flash in his face. The Masked Demon gaped at us, his eyes swarming with stunned curiosity.
“Where are the two of you going?” he unexpectedly asked, as if that had more importance than the question about my Demon. He scrutinized me carefully, his eyes burying deeply into mine while I unscrewed the cap from the bottle of water. He tilted his head at me, suspicion manifesting on his face. “Why are you heading back to the very place you murdered your family, Grace?”
“Memories,” I taunted before I locked eyes with Eclipse. At the same second, the train came to the station’s platform with a wheezing screech, indicating that it was almost ready to stop.
It was time for Eclipse and I to put our escape plan into motion.
I clutched the water bottle with my hand, ripped it out of my backpack, and proceeded to splash it all across the room.
“Ahhhh!” screamed the Demons who got hit by the holy water.
Sounds of water sizzling on melted flesh spilled into the air.
Unfortunately, as he was wearing a hoodie and a mask, the Masked Demon was not affected by the holy water. Afraid that he’d rip my head off if I didn’t weaken him somehow, I quickly grabbed the saltshaker from my backpack and hurled salt in the direction of the Masked Demon’s face.
To my horror, he was gone before the salt could touch him. His main focus was not on me, but on Eclipse, who had fought his way out of captivity by attacking the Demons around him.
“Ahhhhhh!”
In a train filled with distracted Demons, whose faces were burning like they had been doused with industrial strength acid, Eclipse was able to attack all of them with bone-crushing punches that sent them sprawling to the floor.
Wheezing for air after I was released from the Masked Demon, I thrust the remaining half of the holy water at them again. While the rest of the Demons screamed at the new dosage of holy water, the Masked Demon easily and skillfully evaded every droplet. It wasn’t until he lunged at Eclipse to prevent him from snapping the neck of a Demon that the Masked Demon stopped running like prey and started behaving like the predator he was.
Boom!
At the force of the lunge, the Masked Demon and Eclipse crashed into the window behind them, cracking it on impact. A series of punches were exchanged before they were able to push themselves away from one another.
Standing across from each other, Eclipse and the Masked Demon regarded one another as two lions would before they fought for territorial estate.
“Let’s see what you got, Eclipse,” the Masked Demon taunted, walking in a slow circle around Eclipse.
Eclipse merely smirked back, walking in a circle as well. Gone was the clueless human boy. In this battle between the titans, Eclipse was ready to prove that he was the most powerful entity amongst the two.
“Let’s see how well you fare without anyone standing behind you, boy.”
No sooner had he said those words, Eclipse went in for the attack, sideswiping the Masked Demon and effectively knocking him to the wall with a loud crack.
Bam!
Even though he was reeling from the force of the attack, the Masked Demon managed to maneuver away from the wall before Eclipse was able to smash his foot onto his face. With a pained and determined grunt, the Masked Demon used one of the walls as his prop and flew into the air. He attempted to kick Eclipse in mid-air, but Eclipse reacted quickly. Eclipse swiftly blocked the move with a punch to the jugular that sent the Masked Demon careening against the tables behind him.
Boom!
The Masked Demon was down, but not for long. Coming back with impressive rebound—and catching Eclipse off guard with how agile he was—the Masked Demon swept the floor with his leg, forcefully stealing the ground from underneath Eclipse’s feet. With the dexterity of an animal, he jumped back up at once and right when Eclipse was about to counter his attack by performing an uppercut, the Masked Demon blocked it with his arms and then punched Eclipse clear across the face. He finished his assault by kicking him across the solar plexus and sending Eclipse flying to the wall.
Boom!
The collision with the wall did a number on Eclipse, causing blood to flow from the arm that had stitches. Eclipse was strong, but he was running low on fuel from his earlier fights. There was no way he could defeat this Demon in this state.
Shit.
In a moment of panic, I went for our backpacks so we could get out of the train as soon as possible. We could fight them off, but we didn’t stand a chance of winning. Evasion was our only option.
I was able to hoist my backpack on, but when I reached for Eclipse’s backpack, the Masked Demon’s right-hand man pulled me by the hair and thrust me back. I fell to the ground with the backp
ack smacking my nose and giving me a nosebleed.
“You’re not going anywhere!” screamed the Silver Tie Demon.
With the flesh nearly melting off his face from the holy water I threw onto him, he displayed powerful strength as he attempted to pull the backpack from me. He was strong, but I was a determined little girl. I was not going to let this Demon foil my escape plan.
“Fuck you, asswipe!” I screamed, vocalizing unusual vulgarity in my moment of fury.
Adrenaline blanketing over me, I fought him profusely, wriggling relentlessly while he screamed as his skin made contact with the residual holy water on the ground. I was still trying to wrestle the backpack out of the Demon’s grasp when, from the corner of my eye, I spied Eclipse and the Masked Demon still going at it.
Both were jumping over walls while fighting ruthlessly with one another. They seemed evenly matched, until the Masked Demon got lucky and kicked Eclipse’s already injured arm. Once I saw the pain explode onto Eclipse’s face, I concluded right then and there that the Demon of Lust was in serious trouble. Like a shark, the Masked Demon smelled blood on Eclipse’s arm and wasted no time in going after the lacerated limb, each time earning a gasp of pain from Eclipse. He was getting paler and paler with every passing second.
“It would seem that we have just found your Achilles’ heel,” the Masked Demon voiced before elbowing Eclipse across the face.
He grabbed Eclipse’s left arm and looped it behind his back. Then, he did something that had me cringing where I stood. He began to slowly pull at the stitches on Eclipse’s bleeding arm. As Eclipse’s curses rang throughout the train, the Demon used his fingers to dig into the stitched up flesh, ripping all the sewn area apart and causing the blood to flow like water out of Eclipse.
“Stand down, human,” the Masked Demon ordered Eclipse, whose eyes were canvassed with insurmountable pain. “As a potential recruit of mine, I admire your stubbornness and your ability to fight, but you’re pissing me off greatly. Surrender to me and I will let you go. I will heal your wounds once we pass this place.”
“Fuck off!” was all Eclipse said before he pummeled backwards and crushed the Masked Demon on the wall behind him.
Although Eclipse got an attack in, it wasn’t enough to neutralize the Masked Demon. Furious at Eclipse’s stubbornness, he continued to dig his fingers into Eclipse’s gaping wound.
Worried that Eclipse would not make it out of this train alive if I didn’t do my part to save him, I struggled harder against the grasp Silver Tie had on me. With my concern for Eclipse fueling my adrenaline, I kicked the Demon hard in the face, grabbed the fork I was eating off of earlier, dabbed it over the remnants of holy water and salt on the ground, and then with a loud, “Get the fuck off of me” scream, I stabbed the Demon’s right eye.
“Ahhhhhhhh!”
An earsplitting scream came from his mouth before he recoiled like a wounded snake with the fork sticking out of his right eye. His grip on me loosened, and I was able to pull the backpack out of his grasp.
At the same time I threw Eclipse’s backpack over one shoulder, the door to the train slid open, right behind Eclipse and the Masked Demon. They were still battling one another. Though Eclipse was holding his own, he was slowly losing because of his injury. His attacks became less potent and his deflections became weaker. He was not going to survive this battle.
No.
Desperate to save Eclipse, I abandoned all rationale and instinctively jumped into the middle of the fight, looped my arms around him, and thrust him out the door with me. As we became one with gravity, I could feel a hand reach out to grab my arm—to pull me back onto the train.
But it was too late . . .
Thud!
We fell hard onto the platform. It was so excruciating that I swear I could feel my bones vibrate from the impact.
“You alright, Teacup?” Eclipse whispered beside me, his own voice threaded with pain. He too was trying to catch his breath.
I nodded, blinking out of my daze. I turned to him while we laid on the platform. “Are you okay?”
“I’ve been better,” he answered hoarsely, his answer coming out in short, wounded breaths.
Spread out on the platform, we redirected our gaze back to the train where, standing behind the opened entryway, was the Masked Demon. His feral eyes were staring at us in fury. The rest of the Demons were up by now, the holy water still simmering on their faces.
In a fit of rage, one was ready to jump off the platform to come at us.
The Masked Demon stopped him in time by grabbing onto his shoulder.
“Stop!” he ordered at once, causing all the Demons to freeze and stare at him in confusion.
With his cold eyes still fixated on us, he parted his lips forebodingly. “We cannot trespass on the Holy Land.” He looked at the sign that said, “Welcome to Serenity” and smirked derisively. “We’re in Serenity. If your foot touches just a whisper of this holy ground, you will turn to ashes.”
At the knowledge of this, the other Demons stepped back, their eyes filled with horror. With a bow of adherence, they all simply stood there, staring at us with the hunger for vengeance in their eyes. Yet, the most terrifying gaze came from the Masked Demon. His blood red eyes rested on us before they suddenly feathered over to a particular spot on the ground where a drop of blood laid. He bent down, wiped his finger over the floor, and slowly lifted his finger up.
I froze when I realized that the blood on his finger was from my bloodied nose.
Dread consumed me.
Oh no . . .
He sniffed it, his eyes glowing. Almost too methodically, he moved over to the fallen Demon I had stabbed with the fork. He allowed the blood to drip over the Demon’s lips. Upon the digestion of my blood, the fork melted out of the Demon’s eye and within a split second, his once demolished eye was cured.
There was no emotion in the Masked Leader’s stoic eyes, but as a cold draft moved around us, underneath the shadows of his hoodie, I could’ve sworn I saw him smirk. At first, I thought it was a trick of the eye. Then, when I felt Eclipse stiffen up, I knew he saw the smirk too.
It was a smirk that promised retribution, a smirk that promised a reunion, and a smirk that told me he knew what I was—a Source.
“Hey! Are you kids okay?!” a loud male voice shouted at us, jerking us out of our reverie. It was a security guard. “What are you two doing?!”
“Yeah,” we answered him, instantly getting up with a groan. I made sure to stand close to the left side of Eclipse’s body to block the sight of Eclipse’s bloodied arm. Despite the untidy state of our appearances, we tried to appear as normal as we possibly could by smiling widely at him.
“Sooorry, siiiiir,” I slurred cheerily, pretending to hiccup like a drunken bimbo. I leaned carelessly on Eclipse, who was also acting as though he was some brainless guy who was drunk off his mind. “We got too excited and tripped when we ran out of the train . . .”
The middle-aged security guard’s eyes turned into suspicious slits as he appraised our disheveled appearances. “Why do you have blood on your faces and why do you two look like you were run over by a car?”
Eclipse grinned suggestively and “drunkenly” pulled me close to him. He affectionately nuzzled his lips against my neck.
“She likes it rough, sir,” he breathed out in a husky, sexually satisfied tone.
The security guard scrutinized us for another second. When it was clear that he had no reason to doubt us, he scoffed at us and walked away.
Once we were sure he was out of sight, we snapped out of our feigned drunkenness and turned back to face the train. When our eyes landed back on the tracks, the train had already started moving again at full speed.
The Demons were gone.
Despite the fact that they were on a train and speeding away from us, dread filled like acid in my stomach.
We had made new enemies on this trip.
They had found out that I was not only the six-year-old murdere
r, but that I was also a Source. Because of this, I had no doubt that I would run into them again in the very near future. They already wanted me badly when I was just the six-year-old murderer.
Now that they knew I was a Source, they would stop at nothing to capture me, torture me, and eventually kill me.
“Forgive me for the sins I’m about to commit.”
09: The Genesis Tale
The trek from the train station towards a place of refuge was one of the most challenging things I had ever experienced.
I had no idea how far we ran through the countryside with rain and wind deluging over us. I was shaking persistently from the cold and my body was aching from the beating I took on the train. It did not help that I had placed one of Eclipse’s arms over my shoulder to help support him during our journey. I could barely maintain my own equilibrium, much less his. To make matters worse, I was worried sick about him.
After we left the train station, I was adamant on taking him to a hospital. Eclipse vehemently opposed the suggestion, telling me that being poked and prodded by human doctors—who did not know the first thing about helping a Demon—would do more harm than good. When I began to suggest that we stay at a motel for the time being, Eclipse vetoed the idea, expressing that he did not trust anyone. I didn’t blame him. After what we experienced at the inn and on the train, I was also too paranoid to trust anyone else.
In an effort to maintain a low profile, we darted across the rural countryside, searching for abandoned shelters as refuge for the night. I was starting to feel faint from all the running when we finally came up a hill and spied a dilapidated looking shed in the distance. It looked quiet, abandoned, and like the perfect place for us to call home for the night.
Bam!
We kicked the old wooden door open and ran inside. The shed was small and utterly rundown; it appeared to have been abandoned for years. Rain was leaking through the roof while the windows were quivering from the force of the wind. The wooden infrastructure looked like it could fall apart at any given moment. I sighed, pleading with the fates for the shed to survive one more night—just enough for us to rest for the evening.