The End of Days

by A. E. Watson

  The acoustics really blast the thump.

  My heart aches, what’s left of it.

  My face is frozen in a blank stare but if it weren’t, I’d be sobbing. I’d be on the floor in a puddle, trying to press her beautiful head back on her body. I’d be begging for forgiveness and offering my own death to replace hers.

  Because no matter what else happened, once upon a time we were friends. She was a sister and a brother and family. There was a time, a cherished moment, that we were frozen in fun and frivolities.

  My eyes long to cry. But I don't. I stroll back to Lucifer, desperate to give the disgusting blade with the blood of my friend on it back to him.

  There’s no response from any of us, apart from Stella. She sniffles in the corner, staring at the face Michelle is still making, one she will always make. I lie to myself and whisper in my mind that maybe it’s the same face I wore when she betrayed me. Maybe it’s the same expression I wore when her blade was in my back repeatedly.

  But that isn’t a comfort. The blanket of justification does nothing.

  I killed my friend and for no reason other than to prove to my father that I am a mindless zombie.

  Maybe I am becoming the thing I am pretending to be.

  “I have to admit, I didn't see that coming.” He nods. His eyes dart to Arra’s. “Well done.” A sneer crosses his face as his stare leaves her and lands on Stella who is crying in the corner. “Get my son.”

  She bows subtly once.

  The soft, warm fruit I handed to Mystica enters my palm from nowhere. I lift my hand when no one is looking and take a single bite, confirming my evil deed and my intentions. I pass the fruit back to the ghostly figure behind me.

  Hate and evil starts to fill me.

  The act of murdering my friend in cold blood and the bite of the forbidden fruit are exactly the deeds I needed to do. The spirit of the Antichrist starts to enter me. I am the one who chooses what we are, and I have chosen the wrong side this time.

  Lucifer folds his arms. “I never imagined this was the way you would die, Rayne. I knew my true heir would kill you if you didn't join us, but I never imagined you would hold out. Your resolve to be pure and good was wasted.” He takes a step in closer so his face is right above mine. “Now you will die in the cowardly way you killed your mother.”

  He’s speaking to the dead-faced girl in front of him, not realizing I am slowly becoming his true heir. The rage, hate, and pain searing their way through me tell me I am changing. If I could scream and shout and cry out loud, I would, but my reactions are still frozen with Mystica’s spell.

  The fire burning inside me is the evil eating away at all the good.

  All of Willow’s hard work is melting within me, only to harden again as hate.

  The memories of the deaths of my sisters start to create warmth in me. I relish the sensation of the dagger slicing into each one.

  Lucifer’s face grows less and less disgusting. In fact, I see his reasoning. It’s not solid in me yet. It’ll take time to firm up, days maybe. But once I am truly the Antichrist there will be no turning back. I will believe mankind is nothing more than a plague. I will resent the scent of them, the mess they make, the selfishness of their every breath.

  But unlike Wyatt, I won’t let it go that long.

  My face doesn't change with my heart, not even slightly. It almost hurts it’s so relaxed. I miss moving my mouth and lifting my eyebrows. I miss biting my lip and laughing.

  I miss Michelle and Mona and me. I miss the world I have destroyed.

  I miss my mom.

  I nearly miss someone else, but the moment Wyatt struts in like the cock in the henhouse, I see through all the magic that once made me love him. In fact, I even recall the way the blood tasted in my mouth the moment his hand exploded across my cheek.

  I don't love him.

  Maybe I never did.

  Maybe it was all magic and low self-esteem.

  His eyes don't look as dark as they did the last time I saw him, regardless of the wicked grin on his face. The dark heart is leaving him, and like a trail of ink, it’s seeping from him and filling me.

  His bitch of a mother is behind him, strolling in with a look on her face I’d like to slap off. She cackles when she speaks, making my already cooling blood chill more. “Oh look, it’s the light of the world. How wonderful it is for you to join us.”

  I wish I could tell her that I am in the process of dimming the light and killing all the remaining goodness off, but I don't bother. I’d hate to give them anything close to a warning.

  She waves her hands. “Leave us!” Gretel calls the shots, not Lucifer. It’s obvious right away.

  Arra gives me a look before she leaves, bowing to Gretel slightly. Stella follows with her streaks of mascara running down her cheeks.

  Gretel’s eyes drift to the headless body of the rapidly decaying vampire next to her. “She killed her best friend?”

  “One fell swoop. It was remarkable. The vampire controls her.” Lucifer kicks Michelle’s ash-colored head. It turns to a pile of dark dust.

  “She’s a zombie?” Wyatt looks annoyed. “How will we have our fight to the death?” He grumbles like a petulant child.

  “You wouldn't win,” Lucifer snaps at him.

  “I am stronger, faster, smarter, and a man. I wouldn't lose.” He mocks me with the hope of provoking a response. But I don't budge, not even to blink.

  Gretel strolls to him, sliding her hand along his perfect jawline and then slapping softly. “You would lose. She has the light. She cannot be defeated by something lesser.”

  Wyatt opens his mouth to argue but she pushes his lips shut.

  Lucifer goes back to pacing the room again. “She’s destroyed the mirror.”

  “Great,” Gretel growls. “Faranelle is of no use then.” She starts pacing too. “I was just about to say this has all been too easy and there it is, the hitch in our plan. You are such a disappointment!”

  “Don't speak to me of disappointments. God has gone back on every single one of his promises. He said I was to sacrifice my daughter. He said that she would suck the evil from the world. This place is hell on earth, not a paradise. It’s been centuries of disappointment and sadness.”

  “Don't start blaming God again for this. You do everything so selfishly.” Their love is as dark as they are.

  Wyatt has clearly seen this fight before. He shakes his head, waving them both off. “Come find me when you want me to kill the already dead girl. What a waste.” He exits the hall, leaving the four of us behind. Lucifer and Gretel don't know there are four though. They think it’s them and me.

  “What would you like to do?” Lucifer sneers.

  “I would like to find a way into that bloody garden!” she seethes. She closes her eyes for a second to sigh. A ghostly shadow creeps behind me, sliding a dagger into my hands.

  I take it as the signal that it’s time.

  I cannot look fierce or even cry out as I run for him with my wings still out from killing Michelle. My face is still completely stoic. But the blade in my hand, the one stained with the blood of my sisters, is all I need.

  He glances up, even though I don't make a sound, and jerks back as I jump, slicing the hand he has reached out. “GRETEL!” he screams but it’s too late. As he swipes the huge sword in his hands at me, I slice the underside of his arms and across his chest. Her footsteps come, joined by a battle cry as the invisible person in the room stops her. Mystica screams from behind me, but I don't look back. I can’t help her; we’re all lost.

  This was a fool’s errand, doomed from the start.

  “Father, I have come to end your reign,” I whisper, dropping to one knee and using my wings to bring me in a circle around him, slicing along his thighs until his legs lose their balance.

  “You can’t kill me.” He groans, buckling to the floor. “It’s me that's going to kill you, child.”

  “For this moment, I am the light of the world, and I cannot be
killed by anything lesser.” I lift my face and look straight into his fierce stare. “And you are lesser by far.” I jump up, coming down hard with the blade as his wings burst from his back. He lifts himself at the wrong moment. Again the sound of slicing fills the air. He drops, gurgling as his dark blood pours onto the wooden floor below. I reach down as I land on my feet, using all the hate in me to carve his screaming head from his neck.

  His blood pours out, but I don't stop until I am holding him by the hair and his body is slumped on the floor.

  It feels good. It feels right. I close my eyes for a moment to savor the deliciousness of killing someone.

  “Rayne!”

  I turn to see Mystica staring at me. Wyatt has her by the shoulders and holds a blade to her throat. Gretel is dead on the floor below them.

  “I’m sorry.” I shake my head, forcing my eyes to stay with hers. I want to say that it’s because I need to feel guilty for the fact I am going to let him kill her. But that's not it at all. I want to see the fear fill her eyes as the recognition of her own death hits her.

  Her eyes widen as she gasps and the realization hits.

  The sadness within me is a conflicting feeling as I say goodbye, even if Wyatt won’t understand anything I am about to say. “I still love you. It’s not the same as it was. It was maybe never the right way before now. But I love you. You are my opposite, my soul mate, and my brother in some disturbing respect. I’m sorry our lives have never been easy or good.”

  “What?” Wyatt looks conflicted, but I don't have time to explain any of it. My heart is darkening with every second that passes and I have one place to go.

  After one long friggin’ flight.

  I turn, leaving Wyatt to kill Mystica and then attempt to follow me.

  I need a head start which Mystica will provide.

  Bursting from the front doors, I immediately fly as high as I can.

  As I soar upward, air witches fly down with fire witches in their arms. Michael stops mid air above me. “Arra sent word. She called my name from here.”

  “The battle is half won already.” I hover when I get next to him.

  “What have you done?”

  “I killed Lucifer again and I stopped Wyatt from becoming the Antichrist.” I have to assume he is putting the pieces together.

  His eyes are made of azure flames as the answers find their way into his mind from mine. “You can’t do this. Don't you care about yourself at all?”

  “Thanks for coming to end the evil. If Mystica is alive tell her I truly am sorry.”

  I head for the East Coast, for the castle where the reclusive vampire lives.

  Leaving them all behind isn’t hard. Not as hard as it should be.

  Chapter Twenty

  The flight is long and I can sense the air witches behind me. They aren’t tracking me to kill me. They’re following me so Michael knows where I am for when he’s done finishing off the lower angels and vampires.

  Having them behind me as I fly starts to aggravate me. Anger and hatred become my fuel as the darkness owns my heart.

  I’m about to turn around and kill them all when I hear my name.

  “Rayne!”

  I glance around but see no one, not even the air witches behind me.

  “Rayne!”

  I look to the right again, flinching and then rubbing my eyes when I see the man with the white eyes floating in the cloud next to me. Tears fill my eyes, regardless of the fact I cannot make a face. I cannot show emotion. I want to. I want to cry and beg him to end me himself so this will all be over.

  “Yahweh!”

  “Yes, my child. I tried to reach you in your dreams but Lucifer blocked me out.” He floats closer. “Your heart is almost completely dark, Rayne.”

  “I know.” Regardless of the stoic face I am wearing my voice cracks like I am sobbing. I am on the inside. “I’m so tired.”

  “Help is always there, Rayne. It’s always there for anyone who asks for it.” His eyes lower to the gray sea below us. “It’s funny how they kept Wyatt in the light for so long. He fooled you and everyone for such a long time.”

  I look down at the ocean and then back up to him but he’s gone. It’s me and the clouds and my dark heart.

  I don't even soar or try to fly lower, I just drop.

  I pull my wings and arms in and fall from the sky.

  It’s the strangest sensation.

  As I get closer to the earth I move faster, like it’s sucking me in.

  I hit the water like a bullet shattering against a window. Pain rips at me from every side but I relish it. I savor the feeling of hurting and hating, and even the little bit of me that loves.

  When I open my eyes there are a few lights in the ocean around me. So few.

  The rest of them are dead or so deep they won’t ever come back up to the surface.

  The redhead I saw before swims to me, moving like a dancer surrounded by soft silk. Her eyes light up and pierce my dark heart. She drags a hand, like a feather, across my cheek.

  “I need help.” The words fall from my lips.

  She nods, taking me by the arm and swimming to the surface. We break and I realize how cold it is here. She drags a nail across her wrist and offers it to me, her words singing in my head. “Take my light, Rayne. Let it shine brighter than the dark.”

  Greedily I take her hand, sucking the blood into my mouth with little regard for her.

  What’s left of my light hates what I am.

  As the last of her fills me, she slips into the water below just as the next nixie comes baring her bleeding wrist.

  I drink until I don't want to and even then I push on. Once the idea of killing one makes me want to stop I know I am returning from the brink of being the Antichrist.

  When the last one offers me her wrist tears stream my face. The magic of Mystica is gone, thankfully. I can show the nixie who is about to die how sorrowful I am for doing it. “Thank you.”

  She shakes her head. “You have a much harder task than killing us ahead of you. No one is ever alone, Rayne. Remember that.”

  Lifting her wrist to my lips, I attempt to ignore her words. I almost think the words “she doesn't know alone.” But I stop myself.

  She is the last of the nixie in the sea of bodies around us.

  For the seconds it takes me to kill her, she knows alone. Perhaps even better than I do.

  As she runs out of blood and my soulless body glows from the pure love of their sacrifice, I let her drift away from me, sinking below like a wilting flower.

  There isn’t enough hate in me to hate myself, but I try really hard as I jump up, letting my wings lift me into the air.

  The scent of the air witches catches my nose in the breeze as tears fill my eyes. They witnessed my killing of fifteen nixie. They watched as I drained the life from the purest creatures on earth. This is my legacy.

  I desperately want to turn my kaleidoscope eyes to the sky, to my true father, and scream “why?”

  Instead, I force myself to continue flying to the western shore of the English coastline where the fog never lifts much.

  My wings hurt. My head aches. My heart burns with the vile emotions still trying to claw their way in.

  I want to give up.

  The flight has never felt so long, nor has the air felt this cold. Hell on earth is an extreme of temperatures and suffering.

  My eyes sting but I force them to stay open as daydreams plague me. Old memories and versions of the world before I became this broken husk. Before the good left and the evil flourished. Before, when I was a regular girl and not this version.

  The memory of being me, the real me, the one who was wide-eyed and bushy-tailed when she met her equal the moment she strolled into the dorm room, tripping with a box in her hands. I miss that girl. I miss Mona. I miss Willow. I even miss the sly stare from the overconfident boy who was playing pool and assuming I was a lesbian.

  That journey into my truth had seemed so short and mildly excit
ing, compared to this version of me.

  This is the very opposite of exciting. It’s exhausting.

  My body is losing the battle of the dark heart.

  The light energy that cleansed me is fading, and I am at the end of the transformation. It’s gone much quicker for me than it did Wyatt.

  My fingers are frozen and my lips so chapped they bleed for no reason.

  But eventually I land on the cliffs overlooking the sea.

  It’s not graceful. It’s a slumped-over flop that ends with me crawling and dragging my lifeless body to the castle.

  My wings cover me like a blanket, trying to protect me.

  But nothing can save me from this fate.

  It is the end of everything.

  The end of me.

  The end of the world.

  The end of days.

  All I can do is hope there will be a rebirth for the world.

  I am far too exhausted to even contemplate a rebirth. I just want to end it and sleep for the rest of eternity. A real sleep. The kind where no one enters your head or heart. You just fall and let the darkness take you away. Not evil darkness but peaceful and serene nothingness.

  The smell of the wretched decay and vile deeds hits me before I even see the door through the fog.

  My fingers bleed from clawing at the earth and stones but I don't stop. I pull and drag until I can finally get to my feet.

  The transformation is sucking all the life from me. Taking all the good. I wonder if this was what Wyatt was going through. I assumed it was my feeding, but I see now it must have been this. He was becoming the Antichrist while we were together.

  Stumbling to the castle, I burst through the back kitchen door, letting it slam against the wall. The plaster drops to the floor in pieces as I lean and try to catch my breath.

  The kitchen looks different than the last time I was here.

  I have to assume he will too.

  He has no love in his heart.

  I never put a dagger in it and linked him to my humanity and light.

  Our past is gone, but I am praying to God that there is a way to make him recall it.

  I only need a glimmer of that previous love to get him to do the thing I need.