"Why should I trust you?" said the angel with white glowing eyes. "Because i'm the only one who can help you reach the devil himself." I, the devilishly handsome half demon replied. "You're nothing but a filthy half breed, not even all the way human." he said pressing the barrel of his gun harder on the back of my head,. My patience was wearing thin as i protested: "I may be part demon, but it doesn't mean I don't want the son of a b**** dead for what he did to me, to the people I cared for. If you let help you, we could end this war and save earth before he claims it for himself." there was a long pause. "...get up..” the man uttered  “we'll get a room in that hotel and wait until dawn. You try anything irrational and I will end you." He picked me up off my knees and shoved me towards the hotel with my hands still tied behind my back. "Now don't shove, this is why people don't like angels very much now, oh so demanding." my witty banter is greeted with a pistol whip to the cheek. "SHUT YOUR MOUTH AND MOVE." he barked. We walked into the hotel, him having his gun trained on me at all times like he thinks I can really do anything, I mean really, I don't even have the physical demon strength to break these cuffs and kick his ass like no tomorrow. Good thing I get to have creepy and haunting visions, but it does give me the location of the Dark Lord, thinking that i'm just like one of them. He opened a door to one of the hotel room and ordered me to get inside before he "beats me to a pulp", what a charmer. "Get some rest now, tomorrow you lead me to him and I send him back where he belongs." he said to me as I dozed off. I was too tired to argue about a plan for now.

Everything was dark. All but small television that almost whispered to me, telling me to sit down and watch what was being shown."Hey dad watch this!" my son said as he attempted to do a summersault. Static. A strange crater. Static. People with black eyes surrounding me. Static. Running for my life to get home. Static. My son's corpse twisted and contorted with a smile carved into his face. Static. "Welcome home" written in blood. Static.
   

I woke up in a cold sweat to the angel taking off the cable ties that rendered my hands useless. "We're being attacked, I barricaded the door and windows." he explained as he handed me a shotgun and a handful of shells "It's already loaded, we gotta go, better keep up." he said "If you're an angel why don't you just fly away or something?" I exclaimed questionably, "I'll explain later, we gotta haul ass!" the angel shouted. He kicked open the door and struck fear into the creatures as his veins glowed white, the same happened with his eyes.They knew they were dealing with an angel in the body of human, that didn’t stop them from trying to fulfill their bloodlust. Six, maybe seven of them crawling on the walls with piercing black eyes and  lightning speed. We ran the opposite direction to the fire escape. Those things got closer and closer, showing their razor sharp teeth and gory tentacles that bursted out of their backs with sharp and jagged bones to ready to cut us down and rip out our insides. I shot, one went flying back, shot again, another goes flying. We barely make our way out as I slammed the door, crushing the skull of one of the foul creatures. We quickly made our way down and hid in a nearby dumpster. We heard them break through the door and start searching for us as we covered our scent and our bodies with garbage bags. I could only hear the dumpster opening and the bags being clawed at slowly and being sniffed around. After what seemed like ages, it left, they left, and everything went quiet.
   

We got up and both breathed a sigh of relief. I turned to him "So you got a name or what pal?" I asked. He didn't say anything so I rolled my eyes as I slowly opened the dumpster. "Logan, Logan Fletcher." I smirked "Ok Logan, i'm Jack Alexander, your guide to the apocalypse. Now let's hurry up and get lost before those idiots show up again." I said as we crawled out of the garbage pile. We brushed the garbage off of each other until we heard screaming coming from the street. Cautiously we snuck over and peeked around the corner. They were holding down some scrawny kid and cutting him open like surgeons. Logan attempted to rush forward in order so save the kid but I pushed him back because it was already too late. They were mixing their own blood with his. As the black liquid poured into the kid he stopped screaming, stopped struggling, stopped breathing. Immediately he jolted upright and his wound had glowed orange as it healed itself. His eyes grew black and he slowly smiled, showing off the very same razor sharp teeth as before. "Demon possession." I said "He's one of them now." We could do nothing but watch as they opened a sewer hatch and took their newfound minion down into the depths of the abandoned city. Slowly we noticed more and more demonic vessels followed them. "This may sound idiotic...but we should follow them. It may work, but it may also lead us to our inevitable death." Logan confidently said as turned his he looked to me for approval. I was uneasy about the idea but I had a feeling he didn’t give a s*** if I like the plan or not, he has no real reason to trust me seeing as he could somehow sense the evil growing inside me. So I promptly agreed but for only one reason, I knew the devil was hiding under this city, I could feel it. We grabbed our supplies and slowly started descend into what I sure felt for sure was a deathtrap, but it didn't matter, I had nothing left to lose anyway.
   

The sewers used to smell of deification and other bodily wastes but with how things are now I would be surprised to see rotting corpses of people who tried to survive. The tunnels were made of stone but had slimy, green fluid all over with a heavy smell of copper. As creepy as it was we were focused on the demonic screeches coming from the end of the tunnel. We crouched down, guns in hand, and slowly made our way into the darkness. "Lignitus!" Logan said softly. A small glowing orb appeared in front of us and provided seemingly natural light. "Oh NOW you do spells. Where was that when we needed it earlier genius?" I whispered angrily, " I only have some of my powers, none of them are that effective in battle."He replied. "Well, look at captain useless." The demonic screeches became louder as we reached the last thing we expected. They had dug a massive underground base that glowed with flame-like colors. There was large pit where two demons fought to the death, a shooting range, large guard towers that stood with no one on watch luckily. "Heaven's commanders told us they arose from underground, but none of the exfiltration points have been this large and organized...almost like they're-" "Close to home." I said, expertly finishing his sentence. I was awestruck, part of me was afraid of how easily we could be discovered, but another part of me felt...excited. "There must be thousands here." In the distance we saw some of the grunts slitting sharp bone across their arms and mixing it with the corpses they had gathered. It took a while but eventually the corpse was reanimated, black eyes and contorted limbs. "So, before we hop down here and get carved up like a thanksgiving turkey, any ideas?" I remarked, looking over at the dumbfounded angel. He looked over at me and jumped as he pulled his pistol on me.
     "Back up! Now!" Logan barked quietly. I was confused "Hey, I may be an intimidating motherfucker, but that's just not very nice." My humor seemed to calm him down. "I said back up!" he reluctantly said. I slowly backed away, "What's your problem?" I asked, "Your eyes...they're completely black! Why now?". His words became nothing but gibberish, my breathing became heavy but my head felt lighter, my veins began to turn black, the only words that I could hear was "Oh, you lost little lamb, you think you can stop me?" the voice burned into the back of my mind with it's deep and terrifying tone. I felt like I was falling. I landed in a chair that quickly strapped me in as a towering figure loomed over me, nothing visible but it's glowing, smoking red eyes. "You can try your best but, as you can tell, my little pets buried in the blood of my children are starting to finally take over your feeble little mind." I struggled to get free and yell for him to get me out, but even though my mouth moved and my vocal cords vibrated, no words came out. "Your hands will be the ones to kill your new friend. He's just using you anyway, he would let you die if it came to you and him, you can count on that happening very soon. I could have killed you but you're a very peculiar subject. You could prove useful. For now I have things to attend to. I'll see you VERY soon Jack." He slowly walked away but turned his head to meet my gaze one last time. "By the way, your son says 'hi'".
   

Instantly I snapped back to reality but i wasn't hiding with Logan anymore. I was in the middle of the base covered in blood and surrounded by body part with a pistol in each hand and the sharp bones slowly retracted into my arm and back. I started to panic, "What happened when I was out?" I asked as  my eyes scanned the bloodbath, all i could see was thick pools of blood covering the walls of the massive cave. Logan was crawling away from me in a panic, he was heading towards the exit. He was trying to blend in with the bodies by covering himself in black blood and staying low. "Hey, what the hell happened?" I said running over to him. He stopped and looked up at me with the most pissed off expression I have ever seen. Something told me I should have left him alone when he damn near broke my hand when I was helping him up. "So you got answers for me or-" my question was cut short by an uppercut to the jaw. "You told me I could hit you." he said, "When did I say that?" I angrily replied. "You told me you had a plan to blend in as one of them, make me seem like I was a prisoner and we could basically hide in plain sight." he said calmly while scraping off the black liquid off him."Except you forgot the part where you still look human while they look very much abnormal. After that you violently tore them all apart, at first with your bare hands, then with guns, then came those arms growing out of your back, along with your large spikes you used to impale the remaining hostiles. So basically you agreed if you did something completely stupid, I could hit you as hard as I wanted." I couldn't remember any of that happening, couldn't even feel it. Back then I didn't know what it could possibly be that could make me fight like that or even gain those sort of unnatural abilities, but in the back of my mind, I knew it was the darkness inside of me trying to overthrow any human feeling or morality. "Your human spirit is getting weaker isn't it?..." he spoke in a somber tone "...well if we're gonna go end this we better do it before you do anything else unexpected, can't have you dying on me before we save the world." he continued. I could see the smirk on his face after he said that, it was a kind gesture and surprising that he didn't just yell at me. We stole some ammo and made our way through the sewer. "Oh, when you were having fun ripping demons apart you definitely urinated on yourself.” Logan pointed out. "Ah wha- EWW, these are my favorite pants too!" my face was red, I loved those jeans, but now I ruined them. "Hahaha, they'll dry off, lets get moving." Logan replied. The light from outside was dim, sundown, we had to move fast or find somewhere to rest, for ever knows that demons mostly roam the streets and attack any settlement at night.
   

We found a small abandoned resting place with ripped up tents and destroyed cardboard boxes, at least it was a place to sleep. "I'll keep watch first." Logan said as he sat in the corner next to the entrance, "No, i'll keep watch this time, you need some sleep." I argued. He nodded his head and immediately passed out. I loaded my shotgun, pulled out my flashlight and granola bars from my backpack and kept watch as I used duct tape to attach the flashlight to the shotgun. Hours passed as the worry of horde finding us. Faint snickering and deep whispers filled the air, the room began felt like it was pulsating, we had to hide, they were coming. Quickly sliding myself over to  dark corner where Logan slept, I pressed up against the wall and kept the gun trained on the one entrance that stands between us and a massive wave of blood hungry parasites. I guess i shouldn't be the one to call them that, seeing as I was turning into one. The whispers grew louder and closer with every passing second. So many exchanges of the word "Angel" and "Traitor" were thrown around and a plan of something big coming up, something that will have the world at the Dark Lord's mercy, and something that will bring what was left of the angels to their knees. Trying my hardest to not make a single sound i held my breath but Logan started mumbling in his sleep. I quickly covered his mouth, he woke up and looked at me as I motioned him to stay silent. A head poked into our dark, my head just inches to the left form the empty black eyes and a wide grin he scanned very slowly, making sure not to miss a single detail. I was ready to pull the trigger on the shotgun aimed for it's head, this was it, if they found us we'll fight our way through. We looked at each other and nodded as he mouthed the countdown, 3...2...1. The demon's eyes connected with barrel of the gun "Surprise!" was my clever remark as the gun blew it's brains all over the wall, we charged into the crowd with no plan, no fear, and no looking back.
   

I wasn't blacked out this time, I felt this rush, this...excitement of the fight as large spike shot from my arms and two large tentacles with sharp bone fought their way out of my back. One stabbed through the head, another bashed against the wall, third one's arm broken off and shoved down his throat and out his back with almost no effort required. We tore through the crowd flashes of light from gun fire reigned over us but the bullets just couldn't stop us from knocking the guns out of their hands and executing them swiftly. "Lignitus!" Logan shouted as the glowing orb of light blinded almost every foe, saving him from a fireman's axe to his face. Stab, execute, repeat, stab, execute, repeat, it was the only thing I can thing besides the fact that that I was having the time of my life taking away all of theirs. The shotgun ran out of shells, time for some batting practice. Jaws breaking, feet stumbling, screams of pain being silenced by a good old kick or slice of the neck. I must've stabbed my last victim around 30 times before my partner showed me everyone was dead. For the first time in forever, I had fun and by the goofy grin on Logmiester's face I can tell he hasn't seen any combat action for a while. "Oh wait, something’s under my tongue." Logan spat blood into his hand "It's just some of my teeth, nothing to worry about." he says as he snaps his jaw back in place. "We need to learn how to work together, that took a little longer than it needed." said the angel as the surface above rumbled. The other hunting parties were up there while the one we ran into won't be showing up for roll call. "If you wanna work together, we gotta trust each other a little more, you don't know me and i don't know you. That's gotta change either now or very soon." I said as we leaned on the walls. We played rock, paper, scissors to see who would go first. Unfortunately I lost. I needed a minute to collect myself before we started to continue our journey decided it's time to listen to what has me wanting to face the devil instead of running for the hills.
   

"How the hell are you gonna sit out here and drink away your problems when you have a son at home?", it took me a while to recognize that my wife was talking to me. I didn't care what she had to say, she was divorcing my ass anyway. "Just get out of my life will ya? That goddamn kid isn't even mine, you're the one who decided to screw my best friend while I was in Afghanistan!" I shouted "I needed a man to take care of me! You were never there for me in the first place!" she argued "Oh, he took care of you alright." I said as I grabbed my beer and walked away from the from the front porch, "I'm going for a walk, don't wait up!” I yelled. It's not like I didn't love the kid, honestly he was the one who kept me going until I found out he wasn't mine. Just because he wasn't a part of me biologically doesn't mean he isn't family.
   

I walked into town where the news playing from the electronics story was talking about massive sinkholes from all sides of the earth that really couldn't be explained, it was being investigated by the U.S. government. People saying it's the end of the world and all that crap, I didn't care at the moment, anything would have been better than living. I passed out on the outskirts of town in a puddle of my own vomit and self pity. I woke up to some blurry figures standing above me. "The hell do you want, huh? Can't you see i'm getting my beauty sleep?" my attitude was quickly gone when my vision cleared up and saw they all had black eyes and were standing over me with a knife. I tried to get away but they caught me by my leg cut it open, they continued to cut themselves and mixed some of their blood with mine but only for half a second. I managed to wrestle them away and bust through the back door of the grocery story I passed out next to last night and shut the door behind me. It was chaos. People fighting each other, getting trampled, I saw some dude blast a hole in a old man for a can of baked beans. I needed to get home, my son Michael, it wasn't far. I dodged my way through the crowd and  went through back alleys and away from the roads where people were getting shot, torn apart, and run over. I made my way to my neighborhood but it was quiet, too damn quiet.
   

The front door was open so i bursted into the house. Everything seemed normal downstairs. "Michael"?, Kate?, Anyone home?", no response. As i climbed the stairs two men wearing smiley face masks ran out of my son's room, holding a duffel bag and jumped out the hallway window. I slowly made my way to my son's room "No, nonononono not him, please god not him." I uttered while wrestling away the tears building up in my eyes. I honestly didn't care for Kate's body shoved away in the corner for Michael's corpse was on display. His limbs were cut up and twisted, almost like he had been tortured, a smile was carved into his face but his eyes just looking at me as if to ask "Why didn't you stay?" His body was cold and stiff, he'd been dead since late last night it seems. I broke down and looking into the eyes of what used to be my kid. I raised him for years after I came home from my service in the marines. He loved to draw, he loved video games, he was in little league, but most importantly: He always made my day. Now it was gone, I gave up on hope and I gave up on God as I read the two words that i will never forget: "Welcome home."
   

"After that I gathered supplies from the scraps that remained of the destroyed town, I decided to end this once and for all. I have nothing left to lose, but everyone else does, can't let what I witnessed continue. I managed to hear two of the grunts talking about how his home base was here, hours later I get knocked out and wake up to realize that I had been captured by you." silence filled the room, like my son was listening beyond the grave. Minutes went by as I finally decided to it was his turn now. "What about you? What's your story?" "It's not as tragic, it was simple really. Before man was created we trained for this war, I was always brought up to respect authority and never trust anyone that wasn't one of us or one with religious beliefs." this just raised more questions. "Then why don't you have your wings or most of your powers?" I asked, "I was banished for protecting my mother who was believed to have fallen in love with a mortal man. I defended her and even fought some of those who dared disgrace her name. I was casted down onto earth and stricken of my powers, I found a small book of spells at a pawnshop but only the one you saw actually worked. I've been here for many years but my training still remains.". Damn, I didn't think heaven would do something like that and just forget about them. "So we both lost family in a way." "Yeah, we have." he replied. My head started to burn again, that voice, he was back, not inside my head this time, but from a hole under a large set of concrete stairs. "This is it. I can't tell what he's saying but he's down there." we looked at each other as we both uttered the same phrase: "let's finish this.".
   

We fell down a 100 foot drop but landed on our feet without injury. The Dark Lord’s voice boomed through the echoey arena that was filled with a cheering, black-eyed crowd with him sitting in his throne on top of the stands.  "So, you finally came. I see you brought your friend along with you." the large demon said with his stupid, smug voice that infuriated me. The Dark Lord leaped from his throne and down into the arena with me and Logan. Blood red skin, glowing red four eyes, a muscular build, and large black horns that stuck out from his slicked back 1950's hairdo. "You're shorter than I imagined." I said "Still taller than you, especially taller than your son, seeing as he's buried 8 feet deep." the evil devil remarked, "As you see I have my lovely children here to watch this event of a lifetime! Demoniod and angel take on the kind of all sinners himself! Just us, no guns, what do you say boys?" he said as he exchanged glances with me and Logan. Logan didn't like the idea "What if we keep our weapons and decide to take you out right here?" my friend questioned. "Well, we will all just open fire on you, it would be a hell of a fight but you know you wouldn't make it out alive that way. I'm giving your world another chance this way. You lose, you die and the earth is mine. You win, the spell of those who are possessed will go away, and everyone will go back to normal." he extended his arm for a handshake, "What do you say? Make a deal with the devil?" We agreed and shook hands, the contract was sealed. Holes opened up with fire raging in them, we threw our weapons in the fire and they were immediately burned to ashes. We turned around, my spikes and extra tentacle arms were ready. Logan was ready to attack stood right by me. The crowd counted down: "3....2...1...Fight!!".
  

 I immediately lunged to stab, he caught me by my face and threw me across the arena. Logan dodged two swings and socked him jaw, that was before he was  backhanded into a wall. The massive beast leaped for me, as his claws came out to slice my throat, I managed to roll out of the way and get up on my feet until he slashed my face and broke several of my ribs. Logan jumped off the wall, leaped off satan's back as he came down and delivered a devastating kick to the face. Two tentacles shot out of our opponent's back and swiped at each of us. We both grabbed one held on as they slammed us into the ground multiple times. Both of us held his tentacles down, I dragged mine over to Logan and we yanked on them until the devil fell on his back. Logan kept holding them on his own while I ran over and stabbed both his arms to the floor with bony tentacles and looked down at the sad little man whom they worshipped. "No!! You're not supposed to win!!! Let me go and i'll leave everything alone, i'll leave everyone alone, i'll bring your son back for f***'s sake!!" the room went quiet as all his followers saw him as nothing but a weak coward and watched in anticipation. I slowly leaned down and just smiled with three fine words I had to say: "Go to hell" I said with a smile. "I'll f***ing kill y-" he didn't get to finish due to being stabbed repeatedly though the jaws, eyes, and throat with my massive arm spikes.
   

That all happened just a few years ago. I was longer in fear of turning demon because I was no longer being possessed, the demons retreated to what was left of hell, and I stole Satan's best pair of pants to replace my piss-stained ones.  With the devil gone, the angels stayed on the surface to watch over us. Logan was welcomed back into heaven's army, with some time to think he decided to accept, to go back to his family, but not without talking to me for one last time.
  

  "So, this is it." said Logan, "I guess it is." I replied. When no one was looking we hugged "It's been fun, it really has. Also sorry for hitting you in the jaw a while back, you didn't really say I could, I just wanted to." he said and chuckled. "Aww you piece of s***, looks like some of my personality rubbed off on you." I said smiling, our hug ended. He slowly walked away while he said his last words before leaving, "I really hope we meet again." He said as  his new wings grew from his back and he blasted off towards the sunset. I'd be lying if I said the end of our adventure didn't bring a tear to my eye, because after all, he wasn't that bad...for an angel.