Post by thefangedrose on Oct 5, 2023 20:03:00 GMT -8
Disclaimer
This series contains elements of a supernatural nature and will play a parody to the Judao-Christian faith. It is not meant to be mocking or subversive and is simply done for a creative outlet.
You. Were. Warned.
The supernatural elements of this storyline were not always present. “The Pact” is a concept that kept Jesse’s original “Walk the line” idea alive while honoring that none of them had these “” abilities” five years ago.
Hope you enjoy it.
I give you Chapter 6!
Civil War 2
Chapter 6
“Misery”
Location: Uknown
Date: September 19th
Time: 12:18 PM
“Can someone tell me what the hell happened?”
A voice called out from the dark the sound of footfalls carried multiple people closer.
“You…were there My Lord….”
A soft voice whispered.
The door bust open with a thunderous concussion slamming the back ends of each door into the wall, leaving the faintest of cracks as Lord Lucifer strode in. Remi walked in directly on his heels and Josie followed allowing Sariel to lean on her side still holding her ribs but it was clear she was already better than after the bike had hit her.
Sariel heals quickly.
When he reached the desk on the far side of the room Lucifer's arm swept over the length of it sending files and papers into the air as the contents were dumped to the floor.
“I KNOW I WAS THERE!”
The blonde man screamed and spun around pointing an accusing finger at the tiny Asian woman standing between him and the pair.
“47 seconds. That’s how long it took that sniveling ingrate to convince your sister and the traitor Asmodeus to turn. 47 seconds Remiel!”
“.....Yes My Lord.”
“And you think that is probable?! Or do you think it more likely the decision had already been made?!”
The woman stood silently with her head down saying nothing. Lucifer stood staring at her for a time breathing heavily through his nose. After a few seconds that usual calm washed over him and continued, this time in the even controlled tone he was known for.
“I want you to increase Demon production and bring all the canines you can find.”
The woman leaning on Josie's side pushed herself off and walked around Remiel to put herself the closest to Lucifer of all of them.
“Sire, are you sure that is wise? You have said that it weakens you for a time to do it and we cannot know if Michael intends a counterstrike.”
“Counterstrike?” Lucifer asked with a dismissive laugh. “He has no idea where we are. No one finds us unless we want to be found.”
“Or you are one of us.” Sariel countered blankly. “And like it or not Sire, all of them are.”
Lucifer stared into his right hand’s eyes in silence for a moment considering her words carefully. She was right of course, and he knew it. Maiko, Hana and even Michael himself. The only one who may be denied is whoever was behind that strange scaled mask.
However, that truth itched at the corner of his mind.
“Fine.” He said at last.
“We could use the other thing?” Josie told her Lord from the back of the room. “You did have us procure it for this very purpose.”
“The….” Lucifer paused in mid statement and his eyes narrowed in thought. He never wanted to see that again, but she was right. It could do the job just as well as he could. “...So be it. Retrieve it and bring it back here. It needs a very powerful source of energy so it needs to be used in Hell.”
“It will take a couple of days to get everything in place to move it safely,” Ramiel told her Lord.
“Do it.”
**
Location: Reddick, Florida
Date: September 20th
Time: 7:39 PM
For nearly fifty years the Rivers family resided in a little house on a creek in the small town of Reddick, Florida. Three generations of religious leaders ended suddenly when the only surviving member of the fourth generation showed up one rainy evening with a soaking-wet teenage girl.
A girl who had suffered unspeakable abuse. A girl who was now so mentally damaged she offered her body to anyone who approached. Seeing this the patriarch of the clan, the boy's father, immediately cast the girl out to survive on her own.
His son, seeing how alone and vulnerable she was left his home for what he said would be the last time to ensure this girl had a guardian.
A job he did for 10 long years before her untimely death to a deranged obsessive super fan that claimed her life and began this nightmare in the bathroom of a hotel in downtown Baltimore.
In the long years since while Michael served as the host for Lucifer and built the army his parents had each passed of one physical ailment or another.
Nonetheless, he had never stepped foot in the home of his forefathers since.
Not until that door opened on the 20th of September.
Michael unlocked the door and opened it allowing Maiko, Hana, and the strange man called simply “The Sins” to enter a large living room-style area. The furniture was all covered in furniture coverings with paintings of various religious scenes littered the walls. A piano sat covered in one corner sitting at the bottom of a set of stairs that led up to the second floor.
As they walked in, eight of the plain-clothed Demons walked in behind them, closing the door after they were all inside. No sooner had the door closed than the mammoth man turned and stormed his way across the room.
Chairs, tables, whatever was between him and the pair were turned end over end without regard or concern. One hand grasped Hana by the throat and the other took Maiko by her own. The arms lifted, lifting both women into the air without effort and drove them back into the wall.
“UGH!” Hana chokes.
“‘’Et ‘eh go!” Maiko spits.
“What are you doing?!” Michael shouted as he turned at the sudden crashing.
“Thirty seconds of talking is enough to make these two betray their God?” The massive beast of a man growled. “Noooo…I don’t think so.”
Michael stood for a moment watching the three of them then strode across the room and laid his hand on the monster's biceps.
“Let them down.”
The masked face turned down to him staring in silence but ultimately the fingers uncurled and the two women dropped to the floor. Michael however turned and looked down at them with his arms over his chest.
“He’s got a point ladies.”
Hana averted her eyes, unhappy that Michael seemed unhappy with them but Maiko didn’t. In fact, she rose to her full height, shoved the Hulk's arm out of the way, and pointed a finger straight into Michael’s face.
“Do not dare question Our loyalty!” She growled. “Even when I sided with his big tree-looking ass…”
She snapped motioning to the man in the mask.
“We did so out of loyalty to Lord Lucifer. And We side with you now for the same reason. What he is doing and how he is doing it aren’t the God We dedicated Our life to. Even if things inside Us….rebel…a bit.”
“And all it took was thirty seconds with him?” The giant asked in that husky hiss.
“No one is talking to you, creature!” Maiko snapped. “Absolute filth! My kind should have wiped you from the planet eons ago.”
“Try me Demon.” The man answered.
“Asmodeus!” Michael snapped. “Enough!”
When the eyes of the Demoness turned to the former host they softened.
“It was Sara.”
“Sara?!” Michael asked sharply, confused.
“Things she said….things about the way it used to be and the things that happened to Us.” Maiko’s eyes suddenly faded into a faraway look but after only a second she shook her head clearing it. “When you spoke it struck a chord in us, Hana and Us. We want things to be the way they used to be. You were good to Us Michael…When We looked down at you lying there We knew we couldn't do it. We could not strike you down after you protected Us for so long. Gave Us purpose. Family.”
Michael listened without a word, though, he did smile at the end. Reaching up he touched the side of her painted face. His first daughter.
His rebellious child.
Then looked up at the beastial figure.
“You assured?”
All the big man did was growl then turned without a word and walked to the Demons. Michael turned his attention back to the pair, offering his hand to the tiny Asian woman still hunched on the floor.
“The Demons and Hellhounds?” Michael asked. “What do you know?”
Maiko and Hana looked at one another and Hana shook her head.
“Not much Lord Luci…”
“Michael.” He interrupted. “I am simply Michael….”
“....Michael.” Hana corrected. “....However he does it? It takes something out of him. He can only do it once a month and must rest for hours after.”
Michael nodded along to her words as if he had suspected that that was the case. Or more, the creature had.
“How many times?”
“A dozen?” Hana said but Maiko shook her head.
“More. 14 or 15 was my last count and two dozen of the dogs. The Dogs take less out of him.”
“And none of you care about the Pact?” The growling voice of the man who had once been Dean asked from across the room.
Maiko shot him a murderous look but it was Hana who answered. She bowed her head in homage answering.
“We were not aware of one.” She told him.
“We knew something was wrong but this is the first any of us have heard of a quote-unquote pact.” Maiko snapped.
“We were…” Hana added looking back at Michael. “....Hoping you could tell us what it is.”
Michael’s face balked a moment and he shook his head sadly.
“When Lucifer found his new host I lost a good deal of the energy that he once had…and unfortunately the memories we shared went with it. Our new friend…”
And he motioned to the huge man standing once again with the Demons.
“...Knows a bit. Only that it was an agreement made between Lucifer and the Father when Lucifer was sent here.”
“The Harbinger would have known,” Maiko said sadly. “We all know how extensive her studies were.”
“...Dan….” Hana sobbed biting back tears at the memories of their lost Harbinger. “My sister and Father miss her. I know they do.”
“Well, she is gone.” The hulking figure said as he returned from speaking to the Demons and they went to work cleaning and readying the house. “I have instructed the Demons to get the house ready and bring in all the boxes of files and books we took from the warehouse. Where would you like them?”
“Put them upstairs in the second room on the left,” Michael instructed. “It was my father's study.”
As he said this the balding middle-aged man Michael had called “John” approached with a box full of old-looking books in his arms.
“Where do you want these Dean?”
The reply from the behemoth of a man was a deep resounding growl but Michael motioned with his hand.
“Upstairs, second door on the left.”
John looked up at the masked face, searching in silence then sighed and did as he was instructed. Michael turned his attention to the three standing with him.
“The Garage is heated, it’s not comfortable but the Demons that joined us will be comfortable. You three can take my sister's and parents' rooms. Hana and Maiko? You two share my sisters. There is a spare foldout bed for guests in the closest.”
“I will see to it.” Hana assured him and Michael turned leaving the three of them alone. Hana bowed once to the masked man and then disappeared to do what she had been instructed to do. Maiko’s lip curled up at him in hate before she did the same.
The Masked man however turned his eyes up to the ceiling where the footsteps and thump of the cane announced Michael’s path. It was like he could see him. Steps heavy and shoulders hunched now that he was alone. His eyes were weary and heavy with emotion.
They had escaped fate once, it wasn’t sure they could do it again.
**
Location: Uknown
Date: September 21th
Time: 8:03 AM
The compound known as Hell was quiet. The sun had long since risen and those inside went about their business…all except the Demons with those strange ink-like black veins creeping out from around their eyes.
They did what they always did.
Stand.
Constantly still and awaiting instructions.
They didn’t eat.
They didn’t sleep.
They just stood waiting.
Inside the main building of this new Hell, someone had risen early, however. The wrapped Japanese garb swayed as she walked. Bypassing the stairs leading up to Lord Lucifer's sanctuary she walked instead down a hallway to their left.
The hallway spread out into a series of doors on each side. Most of the doors stood open with the empty rooms revealed inside. Some stood open with the room ransacked, the items inside destroyed per Lucifer's command.
The traitor's rooms.
Sariel however had only one destination in mind. The third door on the left was closed but she grasped the handle and turned it nonetheless. The room beyond was dark with a silhouetted figurer sitting on the edge of the bed by candlelight.
The figure inside was a woman with hair like moving shadow and a half-moon nose ring in her nose. She wore a simple black robe that was wrapped around her body loosely. When Sariel stepped in and closed the door the woman looked up and smiled.
“Hello dear,” Sariel whispered.
Shamsiel looked down at the bed beside her but Sariel shook her head.
“I cannot stay.” She told her companion gently. Shamsiel sighed but ultimately nodded without a word.
It was still unsure if her silence was by choice…some vow taken to never speak…or if the abuse that brought her to them had taken her tongue. But it didn’t matter to Sara.
“Is it ready?” Sara asked.
Shamsiel looked uneasy but nodded very, very softly.
“How long until you, Father, and Rami will go retrieve it?”
Shamsiel considered and then lifted a hand with two fingers…a slight pause and then two more while motioning from one side of the room to the other.
‘Two days. And two days to get there'
“And two days back,” Sariel added and Shamiel nodded in agreement.
“Good.” The right hand said at last and turned to leave but a strange clicking sound brought her attention back around. When she turned she saw Shamsiel looking to the right side of the room at the wall. She then looked back and shrugged questioning.
Sara knew what she was asking. That had been where Asmodeus slept when she was here. Why did she do it?
“....The same reason she did last time dear,” Sariel said in that soft even tone.
Sariel left it at that, leaving those words drifting through the air as she headed out to perform her daily tasks. Less than a week and they would have it.
**
Location: Reddick, Florida
Date: September 21th
Time: 9:39 AM
It was constant. The thudding of the cane on the floor of the room upstairs. Not once in the night did it stop. When the hulking, bestial man came down the stairs bare-chested and wearing a pair of workout pants he found Hana sitting on a couch they had uncovered looking down at a series of scattered papers with a small handful of the plain clothes demons they had kneeling around the table.
“They have to go and get it.” The demon told Maiko. “With Lord Lucifer weakening and Michael in play? He wouldn’t take any chances on his numbers down….”
A harsh look from Maiko cut the demon off short and the group looked up at the man standing at the base of the stairs. He raised a brow, though they couldn’t see it beneath the mask. He chose, for now, to ignore that and motioned up with a finger.
“That didn’t stop once.” He said in that broken growl. “You are aware of that.”
All those around the table turned their gaze up to the ceiling, their faces troubled. Hana looked down first and over at the man.
“He often paced for hours.” She told him but her voice turned sad. “...This is different. I can feel it. He suffers.”
“Of course he does.” The man said dismissively with a wave of his hand.
“Oh, and you know what is bothering him?” Maiko asked him mockingly rolling her eyes.
The room grew quiet after this question. The only sound was the cane clicking on the ceiling and the booted feet of the massive figure as it approached.
“Of course.” It said finally. “He mourns.”
“Mourns?” The Demon John asked shocked. “I was under the impression he surrendered that grief a few years back.”
“Different grief.” It whispered.
He looked up at the ceiling and as if he could see beyond the wood he saw Michael pacing the floor, his eyes weighted down by fatigue and a pain he would never let any of them see. His shoulders are heavy from the weight he carried alone.
A man haunted by a thousand tiny cuts.
“He mourns being abandoned. His wife? He never got to say goodbye. The first Harbinger? She betrayed him and abandoned him without a word when she fell in love with…Matthews. The next one? Sela? She vanished without a trace. And the newest one?”
“Gone in the night,” Hana whispered in sorrow. “No word. Just poof and then devoted to someone else a few days later.”
Softly the masked man nodded and looked back down at the group.
“He mourns not being able to say goodbye to any of them.” It growled. “He will never talk about it. Not to us. We have enough to carry in this fight without carrying his broken heart. So he suffers alone.”
“Maybe we should….”
“No.” The man snapped. “You will honor his wishes. His heart was taken from him a piece at a time until only heartache remained and you will not under any circumstances do so again by not giving him time.”
Maiko balked at the depth of that statement. She looked up seeing the man he had once been in the monster he had become.
“Are you still in there?”
Slowly the eyes inside that mask leveled on her and he growled.
“Careful Asmodeus.”
“Fine…..” She said and raised her hands in defeat. “Fine.”
“What….” The figure asked to change the subject. “Is this?”
Hana and Maiko then looked at one another and then back at the figure unwilling to answer. None of them noticed the lack of the tapping sound until a voice broke the silence from above them.
“Answer him,” Michael commanded.
The two women looked up at their leader and Maiko let out a sigh. She pushed a stack of papers across the table to reveal a U.S. map.
“We and Hana believe that Lucifer will go here.” She motioned to a circled spot in eastern Georgia.
The tap of Michael's cane told them he was coming down the stairs as the hulking figure approached. Michael stepped up beside him and looked down at the map, then at the two women.
“Why?” He asked. “We already have the supplies we need to build a Tombs of our own.”
“This isn't supplies,” Hana told her Lord. “Lord Lucifer was often concerned about keeping the creation of Demons constant. He sent them out six months or so ago to find something and store it there.”
“What is it?”
Michael asked but Hana shrugged.
“We don’t know,” Maiko answered for her sister. “Only that it was something that could do it instead of him.”
Michael looked a little perplexed but the masked man standing beside him had his eyes narrowed on the map.
“We need to get it.”
Michael looked over sharply at him.
“We have less than a dozen of us.” He reminded the behemoth. “We should be hiding and recruiting. Another direct confrontation with Lucifer and his forces and this war of ours ends before it begins.”
“Nonetheless.” The masked man said. “If that is what I think it is? We need to get it.”
“And what do you think it is?” Hana asked.
The masked man shook his head, dark dirty blonde hair swaying about his face.
“Not until we have it and I’m sure.” It told her and then looked over at Michael. “We need to keep it away from him but more than that? If we get it? We can do a hell of a lot more than that.”
“I am not raising actual demonic souls!” Michael growled and then looked at Maiko with a wince. “Sorry.”
“What?” She asked him with a grin. “We're one of a kind.”
Michael grinned back, the first time he had smiled since they got here.
“We aren’t raising demonic souls.” The masked man told him. “Get it? And I’ll show you everything.”
For a moment Michael said nothing. He and the masked man stared at one another for a moment then he sighed.
“It’s an awful lot of trust you are asking for,” Michael told him, adding. “Considering what you are.”
“I think I have earned it.”
The stare between the two men continued until Michael finally nodded and looked back at the others.
“Do it.”
Maiko and Hana placed a fist to their heart and inclined their heads in unison.
“Thy will be done.”
