by Callie Stone
“Why should I believe you?” he asked.
“Because,” I explained, looking right in Troy’s eyes. “Have I lied to you since you’ve been here?”
He shook his head. “No, but that doesn’t mean you won’t start.” It was a fair accusation, I figured. Still, I had to convince him of this. “I know of the curse on your father,” I said. “The magic is black and rotten, and that’s me saying that. No good comes from it, trust me.”
“Do it then,” he said. “Break it.”
“Sure.” As I was preparing to do just that, Troy got it in his head that he wanted a bit extra.
“And help me bring him back to Madrid, I can create another portal.” Yet again, I was just about ready to go along with my instinct of telling Troy to go fuck himself, but I realized that might not be the most beneficial thing to do .
“Tell you what,” I told him, “I’ll take you right to the portal I’ve already set up.”
15
The Big Bang
Natasha
“You’re not doing this,” I said to him. “I am.”
I no longer had control over my body and was reduced to a spectator. What I was confident in, or at least what I thought I was confident in, was my growing ability to summon the power of pure light to make short work of any demon bastard. The problem was, Kalgin was not just any demon bastard. And after getting those words out, words I meant as a threat, I was completely paralysed once again both inside and out.
“Ah, come on. You’re making this too easy for me,” he said as I helplessly watched from the corner of my eye as he walked over to me, raising his palm with the movements of someone readying to slap. A slap? I thought to myself. It seemed so tame.
“Don’t you dare lay a finger on her.” I heard Michael’s voice, struggling to make out the words from somewhere behind me, barely able to move, from the sound of it, just as I was.
“Don’t you dare lay a finger on either one of them,” Kieran’s nearly immobile voice chimed in after that. Those daft bastards, was all I could think as I pushed and strained with every fibre of my being to move, to activate, to summon my power or my fists or just fucking something to try and protect my poor, daft, absolutely lovely teammates from the wrath of one of hell’s highest demon priests. But it was no use.
I couldn’t move. I couldn’t do anything. I could only watch as Kalgin stopped in front of my face, before speaking once more.
“No, I don’t think I will,” he said softly before walking away.
It happened so fast after that. He backhanded Michael first—I could tell by the sound of the demon’s hand on his face—sending him flying into the wall I could see in front of me, where he slumped down it, motionless.
Hearing Kalgin’s slow, deliberate footsteps behind me, I knew he was walking in Kieran’s direction. I trudged, I toiled, I strove and laboured so hard to activate my power or just any part of myself. But I was still hopelessly immobile as the sound of Kalgin’s palm slamming against Kieran’s face sent an enormous crack echoing through the room. After I heard Kieran’s unconscious body drop to the floor behind me, it was silent for what felt like an eternity times infinity until I heard Kalgin’s footsteps coming back in my direction.
“You. You’re the one who's been getting in my way for the past decades,” he said, and I knew very well that he was speaking to me. There was no doubt about that, I could feel it. And then the footsteps stopped, as if he had realised something. “Oh... and you are an angel, aren’t you?”
Kalgin’s voice changed from that of bitter hatred to one of cruel curiosity. It sent a shiver down my spine, and not a good one.
“No. I’m not.” Somehow, I was able to speak again, with some pain and effort.
“Oh? So you’re a fallen one, then?”
“I am no such thing,” I said, feeling the weight of the entire world in balance, desperate to think of some way out of Kalgin’s imminent victory.
Even though we both knew full well what I was.
“Then what are you, exactly? Surely you must be something.”
“I am human,” I lied, but I could hear the hatred return to his breathing.
The medusa-like grip that Kalgin’s pure dark eyes had on me had been growing, and grew again as he drew himself closer to me.
I could feel his face so close to mine that I could almost feel the texture of his rough skin.
“A human? A filthy, disgusting, mortal, miserable human?”
“Yes,” I said.
“You lie!” he snarled, just as I knew he would.
I had never felt such fear. So, naturally the next thing I said was, “Fuck you, Kalgin. Do what you want to me, but all you’ll ever have is an eternity of being a miserable little shit.”
The room was silent once again.
“I have always done whatever I want, mortal,” he said. “And I will keep on doing so.”
Then, I heard a ripping sound. My heart leaped into my throat, and as the world turned upside down, it fell into my stomach. The world turned pitch black as my eyes were covered by something.
Then, I felt myself falling through the air.
It did not last long, as I soon felt myself back in that strange, large room in Madrid. But it was hot. It was uncomfortable. It was more than that. It got hotter, and the heat was inside of me, scorching the inside of my skin, starting at the bottom of my toes and traveling upwards with a glacial slowness.
My ears started to ring from the pain, and my eyes shut themselves as a reflex.
It got hotter still, even in the parts of me that lay covered, and I heard something bursting. Water? No. Something worse, something like blood gushing out of me. It did not stop. I screamed for it to stop, but it only got hotter still. Something inside me had broken.
“Relax,” said that voice, that awful voice of Kalgin’s, sounding as if it were in some cave in the distance. “I’m taking your angelhood so you can be a woman at last. A regular, human woman.”
The heat continued to burn as the ringing in my ears continued. I felt him cutting something inside of me, and then I felt something coming out of the opening that was my wound. It felt like water, or blood. I couldn’t tell which.
“You’ll bleed for a few days,” said that terrible voice of his. “But then you will be a true mortal. You will live. You will die. And I will be there to make sure you do both.”
The heat increased, as did the ringing in my ears.
“The congregation will get you, monster! Your kind is going to die!” I yelled at him.
“We’ll see about that,” said the voice of Kalgin. “Because the portal is ready.”
I felt myself being ripped open wider as something else came out of me. There was a burst of cold air inside of me, and then an explosion of pain. I screamed, and screamed, and screamed.
But there was no sound.
It seemed impossible, but it was clear that my hearing had gone.
The last thing I felt was something pulling me upwards. My body was lifted into the air and then turned upside down as I dangled there. Then, I was pulled in two and the top half of my body was ripped away from the lower half, as if my waist had been sliced open.
While I could not hear, I could feel. I could feel every nuance of agony.
I was sure I was screaming, but, at least for a long moment, I heard nothing.
As my sense of hearing slowly returned, I could make out the shuffling of Kalgin’s feet as he scurried away from my dying body and my faltering screams. The last thing I saw was his back as he ran away.
I could feel myself dying.
There was some part of me that had no body. I could sense it. I could feel my entire body, but something fundamental, something that had always been there whether I realized it or could describe it or not, was wasting, burning away fast.
Though my body was burning up, something else within me was cutting down to the bone. Something that could only be described as angelic energy and power was bleeding out of me. My an
gelic essence, that was what was burning.
It would seem the director had been correct about the nature of angels. That they were indeed made of something, angelic energy or an essence that powered them and gave them their abilities.
The power was there, some auxiliary well of it left, but it was fading, evaporating fast. I could see again, crystal clearly, as Kalgin was growing, inflating almost, his horns stretching and curling, his arms stretching into wings, his legs stretching into a reptilian tail, everything growing fur and scales.
He was evolving, transforming into a higher, stronger, more devilish form. There was a sound almost like air escaping a tire as he grew, a sound even more horrific than Kalgin’s own voice.
“Natasha!” I heard my name being called.
Just before I lost all senses, all consciousness, all purpose and meaning in this world, all of it slipping away from me forever, I heard Zavier’s voice.
Then, there was nothing.
Then, there was everything.
Then, there was the Big Bang. At least that’s what it felt, looked, and sounded like. And then, there was light. Bright, really gosh darn bright white light and a deafening bang. I was much like what I had seen and heard when summoning my own power. Except, instead of the usual feeling of it draining afterwards, I felt power, energy, the blissful spark and spirit of life returning, flowing into me.
They say that you forget your time in the womb, but I didn’t. It was all there, every bit of it, clearer than when I had experienced it first hand. Like when you’re dreaming and can remember everything about everyone you meet in the dream, even after you wake up.
It was like that, but for the first time, I was experiencing it when I was awake.
That ultimate feeling of anima, of the pure comfort of life, of my life and who I was, continued to wash over me as my eyes opened wide to see Kalgin collapsing, devolving into a wrinkly mess on the ground. Behind him was Troy, and someone who looked like Troy but a bit greener with longer hair, and a whole mess of what looked like fairy-folk, themselves surrounded by that dazzling, brilliant light, and...
“Zavier?” As I spoke that word in confusion, the slithery heap of wrinkles that was Kalgin shot towards me in a flash of a second. The feeling as he grabbed me was indescribable. Not the agonizing pain I’d felt earlier, but the feeling of all my worst, unspoken fears surrounding my being in a tight embrace. That feeling of my life force flowing into me stopped suddenly as Kalgin started flying, wrapped around my body, up towards the ceiling.
“TROY! ZAVIER! ANYBODY ! HELP!” I screamed, praying to whatever god might be listening. But as the walls of the room started shifting and twisting again, my attention was turned once more to what was in front of me. Up close, I could see that Kalgin’s skin seemed to be made up of countless tiny runes and symbols. The symbols seemed to be constantly moving and changing, as if they were each their own growing, changing life form.
He opened his mouth once more to speak, and I prepared myself for whatever horrors a demon might do to me. “Kneel, worm.” His voice boomed with an unspeakable force. It was deep but also grating, powerful but also screeching...unbearable. My mind was wracked with pain as his very words seem to attack my thoughts, attempting to turn them against me.
“Y-you c-can’t kn-know...” I began to say, trying to muster my own strength against his.
The burning started again at the bottom of my feet, but getting ready to travel through my body again. I shut my eyes but that did no good. I felt the fundamental part of myself, whatever it was, draining again. There was no death. There was no way out.
But then, it stopped. The feeling of my deepest terrors hugging me, the burning agony, the vitality draining, it all stopped, replaced by the sensation of falling from the high ceiling. Compared to what I had just been through, it was not that bad.
“Natasha!” I heard Zavier’s voice crying out. Soon enough, I was in his arms.
I didn’t know how long I laid there for, but I slowly and surely came to. My eyes opened, and I saw the blurry image of Zavier’s face. His eyes were red with tears, his mouth was open in an ‘o’ shape. Slowly, I raised my arm, moving it towards him. He grabbed my hand and moved closer to me, sniffling all the while.
“Natasha,” he said in between sniffles. “I thought you were dead.”
“Never thought I’d see you cry,” were my first words.
“Must be my damned human side at it again,” Zavier replied. “Now, come on, we’ve still got my fucking bastard of a dad to defeat.”
Out of focus in my vision, the unmistakable forms of Kieran and Michael were walking slowly in my direction, or at least somewhere in the vicinity.
My teammates, like me, were still reeling but were recovering from the battle’s initial blows.
By this time, I had gotten up. While my mind was still dazed and addled from the experience, I knew I had to fight this demon. Even though he didn’t love me, I still loved Zavier and didn’t want to see him die. Now that I knew how powerful these demons were, I wanted to make sure Zavier survived this as well.
I channeled all my energy into my legs, finding a brand new source in myself.
I sprung up, slamming my fists into the surprised demon’s face. He stumbled backwards, hitting the wall and sliding down. I could see in his eyes that he was dazed. But he wasn’t out of the fight yet. There was a crowd of fairies directly behind Kalgin. None of the mean folks I had seen recently in Troy’s kingdom, or in Zurich, but a much healthier and happier looking bunch. And by happier I mean pissed the hell off. Unfortunately, so did the congress of little satyr and insect demons who began appearing in the portal behind them. A few of the quite battle-ready looking fae were starting to turn their attentions to the monsters behind them.
“He is the one responsible!” the pony-tailed fae who kind of looked like Troy thundered, trying to focus the faes’ attention while pointing to Kalgin’s half-deflated back. “Attack and show no mercy!”
“Stop them,” Kalgin hissed at the demons in a high-pitched whisper with what I only hoped would be the last of his strength. The fairies did as they were told, as did the demons.
The battle had begun.
The demonic creatures were small but vicious things. Both types of beasts emerging behind the fairies had sharp teeth and long tongues to lap up blood, although as my vision continued to focus I noticed some had bizarre looking proboscises that squirmed in a grotesque, wormlike fashion. The fairy-folk were considerably larger than any of the demons, but the demons had the advantage of being behind the fairies and having monstrous appendages to contend with the faes’ arrows, hatchets, and fists. And, of course, whatever magic they could muster. I already had a feeling much of their collective power had been used on that blast which had seemed to fell Kalgin. However, that remained to be seen.
The faes were a spectacular sight. They swooped and dodged with such grace that it was almost as if they had years or decades of experience soaring around and fighting in that weird, cavernous room, as opposed to having just wandered in from their own realm. They took advantage of their size by using their massive armoured limbs to shield themselves from most attacks while they picked away at the demonic creatures with their fists and handheld weapons.
The demons were not stupid, however.
I saw one pluck an arrow right out of the air and another caught a hatchet right before it embedded itself into his shoulder. The demons moved so quickly that it seemed as if the weapons were being pushed away by some invisible barrier, although this didn’t stop several from dying at the faes’ hands.
Inhaling deeply and rallying whatever energy I had to move back into the fight, I took a step forward as the demons latched onto two faes and viciously attacked them with tentacles that appeared from their mouths and noses.
In the thick of the melee, a tall man in dark corduroy joined the action in a blur. It happened so swiftly that all I saw was his muscular back straining against his reddish-black jacket as he ran t
owards the demons. It took me a moment to recognise who it was.
“Alexander!”
Alexander quickly pivoted on the balls of his feet to face me for the briefest moment.
“I made it just in time,” he uttered quickly in a low voice before continuing to rush forward and join the battle. Witnessing this was an instant jolt of inspiration, hastening the regrowth of my drive and vigour.
Like some errant sneeze, a narrow beam of angelic power escaped from me with only minimal conscious awareness on my part. The moment I had the strength, the thin streak of light struck the middle of the demonic horde with precision, sending the small creatures flying, or fleeing, back into the portal from whence they came.
Even Alexander took a step back as the cloud of monsters were shot in the other direction, away from this realm.
It was as if both the small hairy monsters and the creepy-crawlies were being drained in a blur of brown and black from the earthly realm back into the portal as the fairy-folk turned their focus towards making sure every last one of the horrid things went into the portal post haste.
Unfortunately, as almost everyone present drew their attention to the lesser demons and ensuring their departure, Kalgin was using the reserves of strength he had remaining, and the strength he then had growing, to focus straight on me.
As I took another step in Kalgin’s direction, the fairies beat me to the punch.
Literally.
The first few went straight for the kill, shooting arrows and flashing bolts of lightning into Kalgin’s eyes. He fell to the floor wailing in agony, trying to pull out the arrows. The rest just started stabbing him repeatedly, like a bunch of vengeful children throwing tantrums.
“Damn, thought they would last longer,” Zavier said with a grin.
Alexander shot Zavier an understandably suspicious look and then addressed me. “Do your thing, Natasha.”
Feeling a fresh well of life-defining energy like I never had before, I shot a bright blue streak of pure angelic fucking power into the centre of Kalgin’s forehead with such precision that the fairies still kicking and stabbing at him barely even noticed. Kalgin let out such a pathetic little screech that I actually started giggling.
