Written Anything Lately?

[ER]

Rise of the revanent destroyers.



It was without warning Szarekh, the silent king of the necron,  race received a missive from his agents in the triarch of most disturbing events on a small throneworld thought lost.

Triarch forces had reached the throneworld of the Ra' Mephis dynasty, a small one but still a world under the mandate of the triarch, To their dismay they found a gutted ork hulk in orbit, ork life signs on the surface and, curiously, readings that were unmistakably necron but did not comport with any known Necron forms.

With a sense of urgency, a team of praetorians was dispatched to gather data.Were these anomalous necron forms a threat to the race? Had the orks somehow with their vile ingenuity created an altered form of necron? Neither scenario could be allowed to continue.

Careful observation over time revealed the anomalous necron reading to be an apparent amalgamation of necron and canoptek construct, a horror and blasphemy in necron eyes. The forms had bodies similar to the wraith construct, tho with definite alterations. The wraith face plate bore a necron head, the scythes of a wraith were replaced with a weapon that appeared to be a pair of immortal gauss blasters merged into a single weapon that fired in a manner indistinguishable from a gauss cannon. The other scythe was replaced with a necron arm, apparently from an immortal and usually gripping a blade much like those normally mounted on immortal gauss blasters.

The anomalous entities were clearly not automata like wraiths, and showed intelligence and behavior that were near identical to that associated with destroyers.

Continued observation was ordered, and a pattern was found. The unknown necron units would wait until a new wave of orks emerged and had had time to spread their spores, then launch a calculated wave of attacks that resulted in the annihilation of every mobile ork on the planet's surface in an orgy of raging hate and cold calculation that left even the praetorian observers at least slightly shocked.

Orks were routed, allowed to retreat and regroup then assaulted again over and over in a clear effort to make the slaughter last as long as possible.

The strange necrons would withdraw, new orks would emerge from the ground, grow, spread spores, and the cycle would repeat. Evidence suggested it has been going on for over a century, as men reckoned time.

Eventually the praetorians were ordered to make contact with these mysterious necrons and determine if they were a threat or possibly a resource.

Messenger scarabs were sent. and destroyed on sight, more and more were sent until one was apparently allowed to deliver it's holographic communique'.

Not long after a new form of necron appeared, similar to the others but with the head of a high ranking necron lord affixed to it's fore, and approached the praetorians.

The Lord of the unknown necrons spoke, with some difficulty, and told the story of how the orks had assaulted his throneworld before it had awakened and wrought horrific carnage upon it before the defense batteries could open fire and rip the attacking vessel asunder.

But by then orks beyond number had landed, and the central tomb complex was overrun, the destruction of the still dormant necrons nearly complete.

But only nearly.

The phaeron barely survived despite much of his form destroyed, as did his greatest cryptek, likewise maimed. The two were driven by despair, hatred and thirst for vengeance.

The cryptek assayed the resources the orks left them and began to work with efficiently. Combining parts of necrons with intact mindcores with the forms of canoptek automata in a normally unthinkable operation he created powerful combat units that were as effective as they were abominable. To a necron, there was a sharp and unbreakable division between a true necron, even the humblest, most mindless warrior , and a construct . All necrons were at one time living, feeling beings with souls and minds. To merge one with a construct was a phantasm of horror and an unspeakable obscenity to any necron.

Perhaps thru pure hatred and need for vengeance the lord and cryptek ignited sparks of renewed sentience in the inert mindcores of the rebuilt necrons. Deathmarks were chosen first due to their intelligence and cunning to be the minds driving the metal chimeras that emerged, and the destroyer combat model was used as a template to imitate.

As the orks claimed ''their" new world they were unaware that the "junk" they had discarded was being reanimated in a new, twisted and deadly form driven by hatred and a need for vengeance that was both blazing and frigid at the same time.

The attack caught the greenskin filth unprepared. tho they rallied and fought with their customary speed and enthusiasm, it was too late, the enemy was upon them and their thirst for vengeance would not be denied.

Within a month the last functional ork was naught but carbon dust in the winds.

Within a year new orks were emerging from the ground, in an act that initially enraged the lord of the reverent necrons, but then intrigued him. The most stable minds at his disposal were assigned to study the situation and concluded the "orks" as they called themselves, were likely a seriously degraded form of the Krorks created by the Old Ones and, just as the silent king predicted, had degenerated and decayed over time to a far smaller, weaker, more anarchistic and less combat effective form that reproduced by spores with grew underground and produced a functional and so called "educated" individual capable of combat almost upon emergence.

A joy colder than the depths of interstellar space grew in the Lord's memory of a soul. they would allow these beasts to grow, spread their spores, then savor the joy of massacring them over and over.

And so it was.


To the horror mof the praetorians it was found the crypteks spent their time not involved in killing orks creating more of the revanent destroyer abominations and there were millions of wrecked bodies to continue working on.

The lord of the revenant necrons then, with great difficulty, asked the triarch to find out if other worlds of his dynasty still existed and if they could be saved from a fate like their throneworld. It was clear that to feel or express concern for the welfare of his former fellows was difficult for the wretched abomination before them, and the praetorians felt tremendous respect for him to be able to do so as he now was. Clearly he had been a leader of great nobility, once. Even as a warped perversion of a necron he retained some traces of his former self.

They assured him they would seek out his former fellows and do all they could to aid them, and made plans to destroy the entire planet to erase this horror upon the necron race.

Szarekh himself stayed their hand, recognizing that these atrocities were indeed unspeakable, yet were a useful resource to his race. In exchange for allowing them to continue to exist and create more of themselves, numbers of these revanent destroyers would be taken to serve other dynasties. Better such abominations be used and expended in battle, doing the killing which they craved so fanatically, than intact necrons.

There was no protest from the revanent lord, and the monsters he had created took their place fighting for the future of a race they were now an abhorrence to.

Yours, Sven? It's interesting. Keep writing.

[Svengoolie 3]

Yes,  mine. Thank you. Background to justify a conversion i'm doing.

[ER]

A keeper, Alex! Nicely done. Your tales just keep getting better. 

[Alex]

Reworked the story a bit, added an day before chapter. Still need to run a spell checker over the whole thing so it is still in a rough format.

Surviving the end of days. A journal.

A-Day -1.

Damn but the weather was f**ked up today. The sky was a dull reddish colour and tainted clouds sent big fat raindrops that looked and tasted like blood. Two guys on the car radio were arguing about how this had happened. I preferred the explanation the weatherman had given this morning anyway. He said some big storm had kicked up a whole bunch of dust from a copper mine and that is what gave the rain its red colour and why it even tasted like blood. I half-listened to the two jerks and their theories. Whole damn world gets f**ked up a little bit more each day. He’ll, the other day I’d swear I saw a small dog humping a cat. I’d seen a lot of messed up stuff in my life, but right now that seemed to take the biscuit. Everyone stood around filming it on their phones. I guess it would be the next big meme or whatever the f**k the kids were calling stuff these days. Beyond the guys at the bar the only human being I spoke to regularly was my woman Joanne. I have always been a loner and when your face has been punched and stabbed in more continents than people know exist you sort of end up expecting things to remain that way. I’d met Jo somewhere in Australia. I remember it was a bar, but I didn’t remember much about the epic three day drinking binge that had ended up with us both being deported and told not to come back for at least ten years.

Heh.

Must have been a good time. Anyway, we’d drank the plane dry and been arrested for disruptive behaviour when the plane landed. Got banned from flying for a while, but that didn’t matter too much. We’d been travelling with fake passports and assumed ID’s. Some poor smuck is in for a real shock if he ever goes to travel overseas. Stupid bastards getting there ID stolen anyway. Got to say I was impressed with anyone who could keep up a drinking session with me be they man or woman. We think we got married in Vegas six months later. Least that’s what one of our friends told us. We were both too drunk to remember and we don’t have any photos.

When we were told we were married we decided there was only one place we could take our honeymoon. So we got another couple of fake ID's and went back to Australia.

Anyway we took jobs together when we could for the next couple of years but mostly they were separate. That kind of annoyed us. We figured between us we’d had enough money to quit the game, but a house and settle down a bit. Still do the odd gig now and again, mostly body guarding. Keeps the bank account topped up and it does me good to keep the old skills fresh.

I looked at the newspapers, one of the nationals. The front page had some sex scandal while on page five was an article about how unusually large infestations of locusts were decimating crops in many countries, while in others unusual weather patterns were destroying all but the hardiest plants. Guess food prices would be going up then. Nice to see the papers had their priorities right then as per usual. I’ve met a lot of real nasty customers in my line of work, but none of them made me feel deep down dirty the way journalists did. If I had my way I’d take the lot of them and throw them in a deep pit with all the lawyers and politicians and let them all fight until only one was left standing.

Then I’d shoot that bastard. Make the world a better place.

Jo walked into the room carrying a plate with a steak in each hand. It was burnt all to hell as usual. She was one hell of a sharp shooter, but that woman couldn’t cook for s**t. Then again neither could I. I poured us both a generous Jack and Coke then sat down beside her. We tried a few bites of the meat, then looked at each other and then laughed. “Pizza?” She asked and I reached over for the phone to order a home delivery.

A-Day +0.

The apocalypse came while I was sleeping. I was awoken by the sound of Joanna screaming. She’d gotten up in the middle of the night feeling thirsty, went down to the kitchen. In the time since I’ve always assumed it was one if those damned demons that got her, but honestly it’s 50/50 wither it was one of them or a f**king angel. After a while it gets hard to tell the difference between the two when you are in the middle of a war between them.

Anyway I am not sure if it was really the scream or the crashing roar of the wall collapsing if I am honest. I jumped out of bed and came running downstairs still butt ass naked. Downstairs, everything looked normal until I got into the kitchen. The fridge door had been torn off and the light from it cast an eerie light over the rest of the chaos. Something had ripped half the outer wall off leaving the house with a gaping wound that showed me the moonlit hillside sloping down towards the port area of the city. At first I thought an earthquake had hit and Jo lay under the rubble that had once been part of our dream house.

It never occurred to me that it was odd how if the damaged wall was mostly outside the house that Jo could possibly have been beneath it. But then there was a lot strange going on that I never noticed at that point. I sobbed her name and ran over, tearing at the bricks and mortar lying strewn around with my bare hands. The only time I stopped was when a strange noise sounded. I have no idea what caused it, maybe some metal framed skyscraper it’s steel bones broken by the earthquake? It sounded like a long, mournful trumpet note, impossibly loud. I clamped my hands over my ears feeling a physical stab of pain from the volume. I looked around but I could see no signs of any of the towering buildings that marked the financial heart of the city were falling over and the skyline looked much as I last remembered it.

I returned to digging through the rubble but I never did find any sign of her there. Not a strip of torn clothing or smeared blood that might have given me some clue as to what had happened to her.

The signs had been there beforehand. Only the religious nuts took any real notice though. Anyway we spent the night cuddled up watching the news on the tv, but it was all the usual chaos on the Middle East and international tensions. Who’d have believed that funny guy with the stupid hair would have made it to being the president of the European Union and that he’d be the honest to God Anti-Christ? We got bored and made love on the carpet, then I carried her upstairs to our bedroom for a second round of lovemaking. Ten years of being married and I still couldn’t keep our hands off each other. I fell into a contented and happily exhausted sleep.

I don’t know how long I dug through the rubble, long after it was obvious she wasn’t there. The sun began to rise casting a ruddy red glow over the landscape and that is when I noticed something wasn’t quite right. My brain refused to accept it, wouldn’t let me look up at the sky. I noticed a lot of houses portside were smoking and fires burned here and there. The sounds of faint screams reached my ears. The quake must have been a big one could see something... things crawling and climbing over buildings. Some movement skyward attracted my attention. I tried to look upwards, but my body fought me, the muscles in my neck screaming against me. I forced my eyes upward.

I think I went mad then. It was a glorious and terrifying sight. Rank on rank on serried angelic figures hung in the air, somehow stretching off into infinity. Ever seen infinity? It isn’t something the human mind is meant to take. I don’t remember doing whatever I did next, but the next thing I knew I was walking down the street, one of my shotguns in my hand and as much weapons and ammo strapped to me as I could carry. The air was thick with the stench of sulphur. Some twisted perversion of the human form was running towards me lopping along in two misshapen legs and an overly large arm. I remember the eyes, those glowing sickly green eyes filled with hate. As it got close I fired my shotgun catching it full in the face. Half it’s head was blown off, and the other half was a ruined mess but it still kept coming. Took two more rounds to put it down. I put another five in it just to make sure it stayed there and mechanically reloaded thinking that I’d better stock up on more ammo if I was going to use that many rounds. I don’t know what the angels were doing all this time. My body still refused to look skyward and this time the brain agreed with it.

I recognised my surroundings. My feet had taken me towards the local mega-church. Not a place I had ever stepped inside, but I knew it was a big thing in the tellyvangilist scene. It was impossible to completely hide from its influence with its pastor, big s**t eating grin plastered to his face on billboards or advertising his services on the radio. Funny how they all came with a $ sign attached. Well right now I might just need some Jesus. It was a Tuesday morning and outside his regular business hours but you had to think that On a day like this he’d make an exception.

The preacher man was standing outside the open doors to his church. Bat winged creatures were swooping down on him and he was fending them off, bible in one hand, heavy golden crucifix in the other. A gaggle of terrified looking parishioners looked out from the shelter of the doorway at the holy man fighting off the beasts of Satan in their behalf. His southern drawl impeached them to “Get back ta hell!”
As I watched I found something was off. The skinny flying demons didn’t actually seem to be trying to attack the preacher. Sure they were diving towards him, but they seemed to be trying to attack the crowd in the church rather than the man himself. One of the creatures noticed me at the edge of the plaza, wheeled in the air and swooped towards me, the rapidly becoming familiar hatred burning in its (quite literally) hellish eyes. I dropped my pump action and grabbed my trust sawn off, giving it both barrels as it’s cruelty taloned hands reached out for me. The body crashed into me, splattering me in the foul smelling ichor that ran out of the smoking hole that had been its chest. The momentum of the thing hitting me knocked me off my feet. It was surprisingly heavy as I heaved the body off me, it’s wings twitching as the news that the body was dead filtered through. The shotgun blast had attracted the attention of everyone and everything else. The preacher man called out to me in that huckster voice I’d heard a thousand times “Oh my son, guns will not save you on the day of judgement.”
His southern drawl stretched the save into something that sounded more like “Sayahved”.
“For just $10,000 I give yah shelter in mah church and my personal guarantee that when the rayhapture comes, you my son will be one of those sayahved!”

I have to admit, right at that second his pitch sounded pretty persuasive. I was about ready to throw down my weapons and write him a personal check. Right at that moment the plaza was filled with a beautific light. No, it was more than that. It was an aura of peace and love. The demons screeched as if it’s very presence caused them agonising pain. One of the angels flew down. Seems so simple when you put it that way. How to describe the feeling when a being of perfect love and beauty enters your presence. My legs felt weak and I struggled to stand. The parishioners certainly fell in prostrate worship if it. The flying demons circled around and dived at the angel. In its hand appeared a flaming sword and it lashed out at the hellspawn, cleaving them in twain. I’ve used a sword a few times in my life and I was awestruck by the artistry the angel moved with. It was impossible not to be. If the demons were lumpy and misshapen then the angel was perfection incarnate. Every move was the perfect blend of grace and masculinity.

Just like Patrick Swayze in Road House really.

Then I noticed the angel had been wounded. Bright silvery blue blood dripped from a cut in his chest. It didn’t look deep or serious but it shocked me that anything could even think about hurting something so loving. The angel didn’t quite land. It seemed to float an inch or two above the ground, fresh grass breaking through the concrete beneath where its feet walked just above the earth. It walked over to the preacher who like the others was on his knees. With one hand it helped him to his feet, embraced him and with a couple of powerful beats of his wings it bore them both skyward. I heard the preacher call out to his flock “Ah told you it was the rayhapture and ah have been sayahved!”
His followers cried out to him to come back, to save them too. I wondered if I should have led a better life. Being a retired mercenary might not be the best way to get to heaven.

Then the body of the preacher came crashing hard down onto the hard plaza. His body burst open like some overripe fruit splattering blood and gore in a wide circle. A few of the faithful picked that point to throw up noisily.

I looked upwards and could see the angel hovering there,his beatific face twisted in disgust and anger. It occurred to me that if an angel was created to have perfect love for God then it would have all the other things that went along with that. Like hating anyone who disrespected the object of their love.

I had a chilling and unshakable feeling that I knew what had happened to Jo, but I had to keep looking. If she was alive (and I sobbed at the thought she might not be). Would she have headed to the church for shelter? I moved over that way, retrieving my pump action as I did. My hands felt like they were burning from where the demon blood had splattered on them, even after I’d done my best to wipe them off first on my tee shirt and then on the remnants of the preachers fine suit. The crowd were literally shaking with fear as I approached. Some of the slightly more together members started pulling the doors shut, and I broke out into a run, jamming my gun barrel in the narrow gap left just before they closed on me. In a loud growl I roared that if they didn’t open the doors I’d ram my shotgun up their ass and pull the trigger. The door didn’t open, but they did stop trying to close it. I took the opportunity, grabbed the door with one hand and wrenched it open, then almost fell inside and closed the doors behind me.

The faithful gathered inside backed off from me, forming a wide semi-circle. I am a pretty big guy, and my scars don’t make me any prettier. My hands were all messed up from digging through the bricks at my house and the demon blood. Damn but my hands still burned. Anyway, you put all that together along with the weapons I was carrying (the two shotguns, a fire axe I must have picked up somewhere, an eighteen inch skinning knife, a couple of pistols and every pocket seemed stuffed with rounds as well as the bandoliers of shotgun rounds around my chest), and well I look pretty intimidating. I pushed my way through the crowd roaring Joanna’s name but there was no answer. Heading deeper into the church I found it pretty crowded. I wondered if they had all paid the ten grand or had the preacher only thought of the money-making scheme later? Still a church was holy ground and if anywhere was safe it had to be here, right?

Right?

I spotted the baptismal font. Perfect. Making my way through it I plunged my hands into the water to wash them. If I’d to put my money on anything washing demon blood off, that should do it. The cold water stung my hands, but it felt good and cleansing. My hands still burned a bit when I took them out though. I looked. at the altar with the statue behind it of Jesus on the cross. Thanks for nothing big guy I thought. I thought you guys were all about peace and love.

Word of their leader and personal saviour (for $99.99 an hour) demise at the hands of an angel was spreading through the assembly and I could feel the rising tide of panic. Give it a few more minutes and things were going to get damn ugly in here. Either they’d riot or they’d go all Old Testament style and start looking for someone to sacrifice.

I don’t normally get to move through a crowd unnoticed but today everyone had other things on their mind. I climbed up on top of the altar and at the top of my voice, struggling to be heard over the people shouting at each other called out “QUIET!”

That didn’t get much of a reaction so I fired off the pump action over everyone’s heads.
“Your preacher man might be spread over the ground like a watermelon that’s just been tackled by a tank, but you are all in here safe and you are going to stay safe while you are in here ‘cos their ain’t no hell beasts gonna come in to your God’s holy ground! So why don’t you folks just get down on your knees and keep it safe by praying... or what ever the hell it is you do.”

That got me two maybe three seconds of quiet while they thought about it. I’ve never been much use at much that wasn’t fighting. Certainly public speaking is not something I’ve ever felt overly talented at, but I thought all things considered it was a pretty good speech all things considered. ‘Course the big ass demons that came flying through the goddamned stained glass windows spoiled it and everyone was panicking and hollering again, spoiled the effect.

With a “f**k it”, I unloaded into the back of one of the monsters as it landed on a parishioner. It’s back rippled and exploded and it collapsed on its would be victim. I had no idea if he or she was still alive or not, and I had no time to check as dozens of the creatures came pouring in, tearing through the other windows all along the hall. We were caught in a trap and they only way out was on the far end with a whole mass of people and demons between me and there. f**k it I thought again. I’d made stands in worse places before this. I fired off both shotguns. The demons were so thickly clustered I couldn’t help but hit them. I might have hit some people too, but a shotgun is hardly something you’d perform surgery with.

Also firing a shotgun one handed is a seriously stupid idea. Firing one in each hand is moronic. I thought about that as the recoil took the guns from my hands and I fell backwards off the altar, landing heavily on the floor. One of the bastards saw me fall and in a second was trying to bury his teeth in my throat. I clamped my hands on his head, one on his jaw, the other grasping its forehead and desperately tried to keep its jagged teeth from chowing down on my jugular. My remaining weapons were out of reach even if I had a spare hand and the straps were catching in things making it harder to fight back. I managed to keep ahold of its jaw and work my other hand down its face enough to grab its upper jaw. “Got you now you dirty f**ker”, I thought. Gripping tight I wrenched my hands damn near tearing the jaw clean off. The creature rolled off me, it’s hands fumbling at its jaw while a thin blackish tongue loiled around wondering why it had so much freedom and exploring its new surroundings. Since I was still on my back I lashed out with one booted foot catching it full in the chest with the crunch of breaking ribs. It disappeared into the swirling mass of people and demons.

Getting back on my feet I glanced at my hands. The wickedly sharp teeth of the demon had lacerated the flesh. I’d need stitches. The demons were wreaking havoc on the other humans who seemingly could put up no resistance. A woman was screaming as one fiend clawed at her. I ran up to it and wrapped my powerful arms around it, crushing it in a bear hug. I’d pinned its arms, but it still had its feet and kicked violently catching me more than once in the shins which hurt like a b***h as I held as tight as I could and shook it like a rag doll. I could hear its ribs cracking as it tried a backwards headbutt. It had tiny twisted horns protruding from the top of its head, one of which caught me on the forehead tearing a deep cut over my right eye. I heaved the body up then slammed it down hard on the ground, letting my hold on its chest go. I put one arm under its chin pressing on the throat. I had no idea if the things needed to breath or not but I figured it was worth a try. It’s sharp fingernails attempted to claw at my arm, but only left scratches on my leather jacket. My other hand went over it’s face, pulling the head sharply to one side. I heard the satisfying snap as it’s neck broke.

The church was quickly turning into a cathedral of carnage. I smiled at the woman I’d just saved, pulled out my knife and waded into the morass. If these creatures really were demons then they really weren’t none too smart. I was the only threat to them in the whole damn place but only the ones who got in my way tried fighting me. If they’d worked together I’d have been overwhelmed in seconds. As it was I used my blade to carve a bloody harvest, cutting and chopping. My arms were soon elbow deep in blood and ichor, and my muscles were quickly aching but I fought on. One tiny demon barely the size of one of my hands came flying through the air and grabbed my hair from behind, distracting me as I tried to shove my knife deep into the chest of what looked like a humanoid shaped mass of warts and boils. I reached behind and crushed the life from it with one hand, feeling the agony of its life juices running down my back, blistering the flesh. Meanwhile Mr Warts n’ all was raking me with his claws, opening up parts of my chest that had never been designed to see daylight. I pulled him in close overbalancing both of us. As we fell I plunged my hunting knife deep into its side and ripped it out. Must have stabbed it three times before we even hit the ground.

I really needed to stop falling over. Climbing back to my feet I found myself in the middle of a slaughter, a tiny spot of calm in the middle of chaos unleashed. The floor was slick, wet with blood and unidentifiable lumps of stuff that used to be people. For all the dozens that had died there seemed to be no shortage of fresh targets for the demons to tear to pieces, but the screams and cries of battle were a kind of music to me and this was a dance I knew well even if I was a little rusty. It was a place I’d always felt I belonged like no other until I’d found Joanna and the simple joy of just lying in her arms. The thought of her felt like I’d just been electrocuted and a cry of agony ripped loose from my lips. I plunged back into combat, losing myself to the bloody red reign of battle. Every move I made was as near perfection as it could be. Demons still poured through the windows, those with wings flying through while others climbed or slithered. I stamped on one that appeared to be nothing more than a foul, pulsating bag of pus, but whose touch I’d seen melt flesh like candle wax. It burst open splattering noisome innards all over. At this point though my reactions were all purely mechanical, the conscious part of my brain a mere spectator watching as I killed and saved and killed again. Part of me knew I could never defeat all this seemingly endless horde, but I’d die fighting and at one point in my life that was all that had ever been important to me.

From nowhere and everywhere all at once the church was filled with what I’d have to call a cleansing light. It felt like when the angel had came down earlier, but stronger. It brought me out of my bloodlust and I suddenly felt in a lot of pain, exhausted and old. I never felt like this after a fight when I was young. The light got brighter and a heavenly sound like a choir of angels filled the air.

Oh. f**k.

The demons had ceased their riotous massacre and gave voice to a mass howl of despair. With the opposite of an explosion a circular hole appeared in the roof as it was sucked upwards. A beam of painfully intense light shone down and a winged figure descended down. All eyes were fixed on the figure, human or demonic even though it was painful to look on. The angel reached not quite the ground and looked up. It’s movements were quick and sure, but not jerky. Much like the other angel it presented an image of physical perfection. It looked around at the demons and prostate refugees then slowly raised one arm so it had a clenched fist in front of its face. Then the fist was snapped off to the left and down causing a ring of silvered fire to sweep out, coruscating throughout the church. Where the fire touched demon it burned them hideously. Flesh popped and sizzled and the demons writhed in agony until the silver fire consumed them completely leaving only charred dust. Me and the other folks seemed unharmed by the fire and mighty glad of that I was.

The congregation looked at their saviour in adoration as it turned in a slow circle gazing at each and every person in the crowd.

“Know all ye that thou have worshipped at the house of a false prophet and shall all be called to account.”

The voice was pure and made every listener want to beg for forgiveness. A flaming sword, shaped like one of those bent swords he’d seen in old films set in the Middle East. Scimitars?

It raised its sword to deliver the final judgement.

“OY a***ole!”

The angel floated around until it was staring right at me, staring curiously and moving its head from side to side. Maybe it was trying to decide what my good side was?

“Thou does not belongst here. Thou are no follower of the false prophet.”
It cocked its head to the opposite side before continuing. “And yet you are no follower of the One True God either. Thoust must choose a side in the coming conflict and thoust must choose quickly. The time of thy judgement has come. Be either exalted in his eyes or cast down like offal. Bow down and through me thou canst receive his blessing and be saved.”
The words didn’t come from his mouth which stayed closed the entire time but seemed instead to emanate from everywhere around me.

I can’t deny that his words had power. He made a tempting offer, but here is the thing. All my life I’ve stood on my own two feet (well except for the times I’d fallen over I thought ruefully) and I had never bowed to any man or woman. Didn’t feel like the end of the world was the time to start. “How about I make you a counter offer. You pull some trousers on so you can die with some decency and then I take this sword and cut your holier-than-thou head off?”
For a moment or two the angel seemed puzzled.
“Foolish mortal. Which sword does thou speak of?”
“This... one... Oh bollocks!”
I reached for the sword only to discover it wasn’t there. My hand slapped my side a couple of times as if expecting to find it, but it stayed stubbornly where ever it had fallen out.
f**k it.
I spat on the floor and unlimbered the axe I’d strapped across my back. “This will do instead then.”
I leapt towards him swinging the axe in a powerful blow designed to cut its perfect head in two. It simply floated back and up into the air as the axe dig into the wooden floor embedding itself deeply. With a grunt I yanked it loose. Damn, I was in trouble now. I’d seen one of these things fight and even fresh and uninjured it would have been a challenge. As it was I was feeling exhausted, carried multiple wounds and as much as I had enjoyed the fight with the demons it had taken a lot out of me. Laughter drifted down from the rafters. “Thou hast done well to slay so many minions of the great adversary, but know this mortal, that they are amongst the lowliest of his servants. Doest thou truly seek to battle an Angel of the Lord?”

Oh hell yeah. Just his way of speaking made me want to hurt him badly. I briefly thought about running the hell away, but then I thought of Joanne’s face and how sad that would have made her if I left these people to the angels tender mercies. I was still filled with doubt. Could an angel ever be hurt or killed?

Then I remembered the one that had killed the preacher. It had been bleeding plenty. And if it could bleed then I could kill it. I set my face in a grim smile, gripped my fire axe tight on both hands and called out “Come and get it ya big shiny bawbag.”
Sometimes I can’t help my Scottish heritage from coming to the fore.
He floated down gently, his sword dancing as he swung it around in a impressive display. “Moan nen!” I said giving the traditional Glaswegian battlecry. Besides this guy was a prick and I wasn’t going to admit to him that he was good with a blade.

As he got closer I knew I was going to have to take the fight to him. A fire axe isn’t designed for fighting and I didn’t trust its wooden haft to block many blows from that sword. The other angel had cut right through several bodies with no problem. This one had killed dozens of demons with even less effort. As usual I figured my mouth had gotten me into slightly more trouble than I could handle. He came swooping down towards me swinging that blade in a way that would have cut me from my right shoulder to my hip. I threw myself to one side, spinning around and lashing out with my axe, hoping to catch him with a lucky blow, but no such luck. He sailed on through the air unscratched. It was actually quite disconcerting fighting a naked man with wings. Wonder if I could turn that to my advantage?
“Hey pal. How come if you guys are so perfect you’ve got such a tiny dick?” I called out as he swooped up into the rafter, preparing for his next attack run. “Let me guess, it’s just that it’s cold outside?”
I thought I saw the tiniest facial tick twitch the corner of his mouth. I hoped so. If I could get him angry then maybe he’d make a mistake. He started his attack run, coming down at me like a bird of prey.

Or should that be a bird of pray?

If he was going to be predictable then I could figure out how to bring this bird down. As he neared I got ready to dive to the side again, but at the last second he changed his course and I felt a line of fire draw along my back as the tip of the blade cut effortlessly through my jacket and the skin beneath. Holy crap that stung. Guess I should have thought a bit more about being less predictable myself.
Gritting my teeth I called out “I guess with a pecker like that you don’t get much action with the lady angels. Or are you more into boy angels?”
Oh that definitely got to him. I could see anger marring those oh so perfect features. The voice though was still smooth and calm. “To mock the perfect creation of our Lord is to mock our Lord Himself and that I shalt not abide! To suggest that I engage in an unnatural act forbidden by our Maker’s word hast made thou and abomination in mine eyes. I shalt cleanse these earth of your existence and consign you to the lowest pit!”

Oh yeah, I had him rattled now. He came diving down straight at me, sword pointed straight at me, looking to spear me through the chest. This much much easier to dodge than his swipes, and I sidestepped like a matador avoiding a bull. Instead of flying off this time he stopped a slashed out at me. By instinct I put up the haft of the axe to block the sword and as expected the blade cut straight through it. Figuring the axe was useless now I dropped both halves and grabbed onto the angels wing. He’d left himself dangerously exposed. I started swinging him round and sent him crashing against the church wall, scattering the surviving worshipers. The angel didn’t tumble to the ground, but picked himself up and hovered there in mid air. “Truly thou ars’t a troublesome mortal.”
My childish giggling interrupted him and in a voice that was starting to lose its cool edge asked “What does thou find so amusing, pray tell?”
“You said arse!”
Confusion and anger warred on that perfect face for a few moments and I took my chance. I picked up the top half of the axe and sent it spinning through the air using all my strength. My aim was perfect, but my grasp of the aerodynamics not so much. The axe smashed right into his face and the fight would have been over right there if it had been one of the sharp edges that had hit him. Still the impact of the top but unfortunately flat edge dazed him. I charged in bull rushing him back against the the wall, then grabbing him by the throat and groin (urgh! I felt his junk touch my hand! I’d been touched by angel dick), heaved him up over my head before slamming him hard down on the ground. I figure I must have hurt him badly there because the serene light that had filled the room suddenly went out. I pulled the semi conscious body upright, his eyes swimming and growled “Can yon Holy Ghost fellow sew? Cos you are gonna need tae get this stitched!”
And with that I slammed my forehead against the bridge of his nose feeling the satisfying crunch of his nose breaking. His face wasn’t quite so perfect looking now and that silvery blue blood flowed freely from his ruined face. I head butted him a second time for good measure, seeing a few stars swimming around this time from the impact. “You know what pal, I am not going to kill you after all. See I want you to go back upstairs and give the big man a warning. Let him know I am coming for him.”
I let the angels sagging body fall to the floor. He groaned and rolled onto his back. I picked up his sword. The fire had went out but it seemed sharp enough to be useful. I turned my back on him and went to head out through all the shocked onlookers. “You know pal, I’ve changed my mind again. I am not quite finished with you yet after all.”
I turned back around, took a good long run and kicked him square in the nuts. It couldn’t have been any better if I’d been scoring a penalty against England in a World Cup final. Pretty sure that howl of agony would have been heard in the heavens. “Tell the big man that is exactly what is going to happen to him if anyone has hurt my Joanna!”
Then looking around at the survivors who looked back at me totally shell shocked I figured I couldn’t just leave them here. “Look, you lot might want to leave before he gets back up or some of his pals arrive.”
They just stared at me like frightened rabbits caught in headlines. I raised my hands up and shouted “BOO!”
That broke the spell and they all ran outside screaming. I collected the rest of my weapons, packed them up a bit more carefully than I had before, gave the crowd outside a minute or two to disperse fully and then followed them out leaving the angel moaning in his own private world of hurt.

Where the hell was Jo and where would I even start looking for her? I wandered the streets. Bodies lay everywhere, but none of them looked like her. Dawn was coming and I figured I would need to find somewhere to rest up for a while, clean up my wounds. There was a hospital maybe ten kays. Seemed like as good a place as any to head.

I walked through the skeletal remains of the city. I’d loved there for what then years now? It wasn’t ever a place I thought of as home, it was just the place Jo was and that was where I wanted to be. Hardly a window was unbroken giving the place the feel of a tomb. We are all dead, the city seemed to say to me. Come join us. It would have been so easy to give in, peaceful even. It was the thought of her that kept me going. The red lit sky overhead, mercifully empty of the gathered hosts of the heavens hung threateningly above. Had I just imagined those heavenly ranks. Thinking back it seemed to be unreal and have all the qualities of a dream. Maybe I’d saw a few and with everything else going on my mind had played tricks on itself.

I’d to fight a few times on the way to the hospital for all everything looked desolate. A couple of packs of wingless demons attacked me. I tried out the angel sword against them. Worked like a charm. Nicely balanced, felt light in my hand. I wondered if the angel would have to explain losing it to some heavenly quartermaster and admit a human had kicked his ass? I certainly hoped so. When I’d been regular military I’d misplaced a rifle. My sergeant had found it before me and he tore a strip off me. No idea the punishments he’ll gave out, but if the bible was anything to go by it would be a doozy.

I regularly saw angels flying overhead, mostly in large groups. Sometimes the clashes with opposing flights of demons. I was pretty glad that they all seemed more concerned with each other than me. I hadn’t lost enough blood to kill me, but I was feeling a little woozy. One angel had been tough, a whole gang of them might be more than I could handle.

Damn but I wished I had a few grenades.

It seemed as if this was a war where the opening act was just open season on anything, but things had settled down and the two sides were busy with each other rather than humanity. Mind you, if the damage I could see was widespread it wouldn’t be long until we ran out of food. Maybe both sides were going to let starvation and in-fighting take care of us. I’d seen before what happens when people go crazy. Whoever said civilisation is one missed meal away from collapse was a smart man. Or woman.

Occasionally I stopped and watched one of the aerial battles, looking to learn as much as I could about the fighters. If it came to even numbers then the angels had the advantage, but the demons had strength in numbers and sought to overwhelm their enemies by sheer weight of numbers. From my viewpoint the victory of the angels hardly seemed guaranteed. Sometimes they won, sometimes the other guys. Neither side were much for running away while a single enemy was still standing, or being merciful to the wounded. Let me know what to expect if I was on the losing side. Fair enough, no reason to play nice myself.

I think it was evening when I reached the hospital. I’d stopped to watch the dog fights too many times. My watch said it was evening time, but the sky was still the same sodden dull red. I couldn’t remember the name of the hospital, it had always been nicknamed the suffering general hospital. The front had been all glass and although I had hoped it would be untouched by all the fighting, my heart sank when I saw barely an intact window. Unlike the rest of the city though, the lights were still on. Makes sense that they would have some kind of backup generator. I climbed through the shattered main doors. Bodies were strewn everywhere, living and dead both. I wonder which side had hit it? At this point I was still prepared to believe the angels weren’t total a***oles and it had been the other side.

The foyer had became a massive open treatment area. Doctors and nurses, too few for the seething mass of humanity pressed inside did their best to treat the worst of the injured.

As an experienced fighting man I could tell a losing battle quickly. One of the women, a pretty looking thing in scrubs and a smoke stained white coat stopped when she saw me and came over. “You? Your the man from the church aren’t you?”
“Might be. Might not. Depends on the church you are talking about.”
Felt silly saying that. Not many people look like me with my roadmap of scars or walk about festooned in weaponry. Then again these were changed days. Maybe they did now?

“It is you,” she exclaimed. “You saved my life and I never got the chance to say thanks.”
Her face dropped down slightly, and she smiled coyly at me.

“Your welcome. I am not sure I saved you though. Might have just been a temporary reprieve. Looks like this place got hit pretty hard”

“They hit everywhere hard and then forgot about us.” She shrugged her shoulders. Her face was smuggled with sweat and dirt. Brown hair tied back in a bun, maybe five six tall. I didn’t recall seeing her at the church, but then again I’d been busy. I shifted the load slung across my back, sending a fresh wave of pain coursing through me from wounds on my back reopening and blistered skin from that demon blood ripping open. I guess I must have winched a bit because the pretty girl said “Oh you’re injured! Come let me have a look.”
I tried to say no and searching for Jo, but she grabbed my hand and dragged me. I figured I might as well go along with her. I didn’t know what medical supplies would be like in the future and if my injuries got infected I’d be no use to Jo even if I could find her. Besides I was sure I’d need stitches in my back and they were impossible to do yourself.

Although maybe that hooker in Bangkok... She was pretty flexible. I chuckled at the memory. My companion looked at me quizzically but didn’t ask. Just as well really.

She took me to an office down one side corridor. The strip light hung down at one side but still cast a humming and flickering light. In a voice that reminded me of my mum she commanded me to strip to the waist. I’ve had drill instructors who would have been proud of that voice. I did as I was told, stacking my remaining weapons on a desk, noting that I’d have to strip and clean them next chance I got. My leather jacket had seen better days but was still wearable if barely. My tee shirt though was a blood soaked rag that I let fall on the floor. If you think the scars I’ve got on my face look bad, then you should see the network on my chest. Some places I can’t tell where one ends and the next begins never mind remembering how I got them. The woman was standing behind me and the sharp intake of breath told me all I needed to know about how that looked. I looked down at my chest myself and sucked in some oxygen myself. In some places was the jungle of scars I recognised, but in some places there is what I could only describe as splashes of red scaly skin. In other places the skin looked as perfect as a new born babies. Smooth and no signs that it had ever been damaged. He’ll, even the burn marks from the time I got set on fire down in South America were healed in those places.
“My back look the same as my chest?”
She walked around me looking at me critically. “Yes, and your arms too.”
I had been too preoccupied looking for Jo and avoiding angels to take that much notice of what was happening to me. My hands were a strange mixture of scrapes, wounds and perfectly healed skin. “When the demonic blood hit me, it burned like a son of a b***h. Maybe the angelic stuff healed me?”

“You could do with some more. The cut across your back isn’t deep enough to kill you, but it it isn’t healthy either. I can sew it up, give you some penicillin. The bites I’ll clean out. We are already running short of supplies though.”

I could detect the faint aroma of cigarettes from her. The slightly yellowed fingertips confirmed she was a smoker. Guess that was something else that wouldn’t be happening much any more.

“I want you to wait here while I go pick up a few things. I’ll stitch you up as best as I can. Can’t spare any anaesthetic, so you are just going to have to be a big boy for me. Can you do that?”

I felt like we were having two different conversations. I often felt this way when talking with other people. Like there was some hidden subtext I could sense but not figure out. I couldn’t help but feel like this was one of those situations.

“Not my first stitches lady. Sew away.”

I am pretty sure she deliberately stuck the needle in a little deeper than she needed to just to see if I could take the pain. She got a sharp intake of breath, but I sat like a rock, not budging and refusing to show any sign of pain.

Funny how men do stupid s**t like that in front of women. Idily I wondered if gay men did the same thing or if they’d only do it in front of other men?

Just one of those questions I supposed I’d never learn the answer to and wasn’t important anyway.

After she’d finished, she looked at her handiwork and told me that normally she’d tell me to do nothing strenuous, but in this case it didn’t seem to be an option. So she sewed a second set of stitches to give it some extra strength and less chance of tearing. She still dug the needle in further than I thought was needed though.
After she finished, she walked around and looked me in the eyes directly.
“So what now? You going to stick around?We could do with a man like you, help keep everyone safe.”
Her eyes were bright and hopeful and she bit her lower lip slightly as she waited for my answer. “I have someone I need to find. If she is here then here seems as good a place as any to survive.”
“Oh.”
She sounded a bit crestfallen at my reply. Normally women couldn’t wait to get away from me.
“Is this someone your wife?”
“Yeah. She’s been missing since all this started.”
My words went unheard as once again the same hellishly loud trumpet sounded. Long and mournful just as before. The woman threw herself into my arms and buried her head in my chest trying to hide from the noise. It couldn’t have lasted more than a few seconds but it felt like hours. “What was that?” she cried out.
“I don’t know, but if I find him, he is going to be blowing that trumpet out of his ass.”
“Look, I can stay here tonight. Make sure none of those bastards attack and find out if Joe took refuge here. If she isn’t though come tomorrow I’ll be off. I’ll try and check-in, make sure you are as safe as anyone can be right now.”
We went back to the foyer where she got lost in the mess of people trying to save each other or lying on the floor waiting to live or die. The later was going to seriously outnumber the former.

I helped out where I could. I’d had some medical training after all, although mostly what I did was taking out the bodies of those who had died. It was quickly obvious Jo wasn’t here and I had a horrible feeling I would never find her alive.

Once it got dark things seemed to calm down a bit. I wandered the hospital until I found an empty bed and climbed in. The smashed window let the cold night in but I’d slept in worse places. Before I’d drifted off to sleep I heard someone enter the room. A familiar fragrance of smoke told me who it was. I wasn’t surprised when she climbed into bed, completely naked beside me. I thought WWSD (what would Swayze do?), but somehow the advice that gave me didn’t seem the right kind. I just lay there and pretended to be asleep. She cuddled up against me and I was acutely aware of her breasts against my back as she held onto me. I just kept thinking about Jo and that I wasn’t going to cheat on my wife the day she had vanished.

A treacherous inner voice said, “But what about the next day?”

I knew in the future I’d wonder why I hadn’t taken advantage of the offer, but I was sure I’d feel good about not doing it.

A-Day +1.

I was gone in the morning long before she awoke. Couldn’t resist taking a long look at her naked body though. Never claimed to be a saint.

I left via the front door. The medics were busy with the injured. I heard several cries for various medicines, most often answered with “We’re all out!”

It occurred to me that I could do something to help there.

The only place I could think of now to check for Joanne was back at our home, and besides I’d need some supplies if I was going to carry out the plan I had in mind. The house was still empty with no sign anyone had been home since I had left. I had spent thousands on an elaborate home security system. Will one wall missing it was all useless. 100% of all intruders stopped guaranteed my ass. When all this was over I was going to get me a refund!

The house seemed like a dead thing, soulless now without Jo. I collected a few things from my secure basement and a backpack to carry most of them. I’d need to pick out the perfect spot and have a lot of luck if what I was planning was going to work. When I’d put all this stuff away I had hoped I’d never have to take it out again. I also grabbed a fresh shirt and a different leather jacket. I have a simple wardrobe. About 30 very similar outfits. Only the tee-shirts really changed. I left a few notes scattered around the house telling Jo to check the Suffering General if she was looking for me, then signed and dated the messages so she’d know how recent they were.

Outside I could hear a cacophonous wailing, getting louder as it got closer. I figured it had to be demons. You know what? Right then I felt like getting in a fight. I took my shotguns and angel sword and stood in the middle of the road waiting for whatever was coming to arrive.

Didn’t have long to wait either. When I first saw what was coming though... At first, I couldn’t tell if it was a small army of creatures or just the one thing. It was like a mass of roiling limbs. No body that I could see, just endless arms and legs reaching out and pulling itself along.

Boy, what I wouldn’t have given for a chainsaw right then and there. Mouths would form for a few seconds, give out some fingering scream before sinking back down into the noisome mass. I didn’t think my guns would do me much good here, so I pulled out the sword. Shame I didn’t have the trick of making it burst into flames. Wasn’t really one for selfies but damn a picture of me fighting with a sword with flames leaping from it would have been cool. That’s the kind of s**t they should make oil paintings of, not some boring f**ker no one remembers the name of twenty years ago, or some Dutch police wannabe’s on the night shift.

The mass kept on coming towards me. I wasn’t sure if it even knew I was there, but I stood there like a rock until it got close enough.

By the time I’d finished with it (and it turned out it was just the one creature), there were a lot less limbs attached. The sword felt like it weighed nothing in my hand and the thing's limbs offered no resistance to the blade as it cut through the mass. Every time I cut a part off it would fall to the ground and shrivel up, a stinking green gas would come pouring out. I don’t think I managed to kill the thing, but it looked a lot smaller. The air just got too hard to breath around it. I kicked open the door to a half-destroyed house and jumped inside. What ever it was I’d been fighting was still too big to follow, or maybe it couldn’t tell where I had went. I hadn’t seen any any eyes. It just continued rolling along the street just as it had before we fought. What the hell it was and what it’s purpose was I had no idea.

Well so much for a good old fashioned ass-kicking. I’d gotten a good workout though and my back was slathered in sweat. Time to get back to my original plan though.

I reached downtown and found it was intact enough for me to carry out my plan. I needed a couple of tall buildings and a flat roof on one of them. It took me the best part of the day to rig it all up, but when it was done all I had to do was sit and wait.

[ER]

You have yourself a good story going, Alex.

[Alex]

A-Day +2.

It was an uncomfortable night in the roof. We had a light rain which soaked me through and stunk like fresh blood. Copper dust my arse. I made a mental note to have a word with the weatherman if he’d survived and I ever came across him.

I drank sparingly from my canteen aware that I could be here for a long time waiting on the perfect conditions for my plan. Normally I’d have set up a collection point and lived off the rain water but even as savage as I am drinking blood just isn’t my type of thing. Did have an ex that liked to cut me while I was sleeping as lick the blood.

f**king psycho b***h.

Watched a few aerial fights, but none of them were close enough for me. Heard cries from the streets several times as people were caught by something. Maybe angels, maybe demons, maybe other people. Normally I’d have helped out one way or another but I decided what I was doing was too important. No signal on my phone. I figured sooner or later the power would go out and I wouldn’t be able to charge it again, so I plugged in my headphones and let the music drown out the occasional screams of the dying city. I kept myself from getting bored by thinking about Jo, and when I’d been over every memory of her I thought about the other women I’d been with. I’d went back as far as a one night stand called Tanya (man, I wished we’d had a few more nights to finish exploring each other’s bodies) and then I started wondering what they were doing now.

It got depressing though to think that every lay I’d ever had might be dead now so I stopped.

A-Day +3.

Only my watch tells me if it is day or night. Glad I have a digital watch. Behind the clouds I can see cold circles marking where the sun and moon both hang in the sky and they never move. Has the earth stopped spinning? Or is this just one more f**ked up thing about the apocalypse?

Drank too much water today. Been too long since I’ve did a stakeout and I’ve gotten rusty. Might have to pop downstairs, see if I can find some fresh water. Food I can go without for long enough. Sleep for a few days, but water not so much. Kept listening to my music. Battery was down to 60% so I stuck to the classics. Highway to hell made me laugh out loud. The mood was spoiled by the deafeningly trumpet noise sounded again. My ears were ringing after that so I switched the phone off to save power.

I had one thought that was kinda disconcerting. What the hell had done all the damage to the city? I mean it looked like it had been the target of a major bombing campaign and nothing I’d seen looked like it could cause that kind of damage. Not even the angels. What was out there that I hadn’t seen yet?

A-Day +4.

Took three days before I found what I was looking for. A lone angel flying low over the city. Another day and I’d have been out of water. I could only tell the passing of time by my watch, the sky cast its unyielding ruddy glow over the landscape. A few times I heard refugees making their way through the city below. Some even noticed my trap, but none cared enough to investigate it. Good thing too, I might have ended up having to kill them if they had. Less screams than yesterday. That’s could be a good or bad sign.

I stayed hidden under a piece of tarp, lasso’d rope held loosely in one hand. When the angel flew overhead I jumped up like a fuel bunker suddenly blowing up, spun the rope around and caught the bugger by the ankle, then pulled hard on the rope as I tried to reel in my fish. Caught by surprise and travelling at a fair pace the angels trajectory started to arc downwards. I felt the rope go slack as he hit the net I’d strung between the buildings and moving before he could recover I ran to the edge of the building and threw myself over the edge.

I had hoped to land on top of the angel as he started to recover his wits and take him by surprise. As it was I figure I was lucky to hit the net at all. He was shakily getting to his feet as I landed. The shock of the impact at least knocked him back down and he tumbled off the edge, falling the twenty odd feet to the ground below. I heard the thump of impact and figured, well I had hoped to take one alive but I could still use a dead angel. I tied the rope it used to catch the angel to the net I’d made and climbed down it to street level. I’d be leaving a lot of good rope behind, but that s**t was heavy to carry anyway. And besides I had enough left for the last part of my plan. I checked the angel, it was bloodied and bruised but breathing. Bonus. Dragging him by the lasso’d ankle (which I was fairly sure was dislocated and going to hurt like a b***h when he woke up) I took him inside.

When he woke up the world must have looked damned funny hanging upside down like that. I noticed him struggling and walked into his field of view and crouched down a bit so we were sort of looking at each other eye to eye.

“Well hello there. I figure I’ve got a whole lot of questions to ask and you look just like the kind of fellow who can do some answering. Now you can either answer willingly or I can see if I can find out how much torture an angel can take. I already know you boys can feel pain and die so don’t try lying to me.”

“How art thou who wouldst interfere with a messenger of the Lord?”

“Glad you asked. The answer comes in two parts really. The first part is that I am one of the motherf**kers caught in the middle of your war going on out there and I am kinda p**sed off about that which incidentally leads us on to the second part. I am the man with a very large, very sharp knife. Now are you going to answer my questions or do I start cutting things off? And I want you to know I really do not want to cut a single part of your body off. I’d much rather leave you in one piece.”

“What knowledge dost thou seek?”
“Well first off just what the hell is going on?”
“Thou hadst answered thine own question. Hell. It has come to pass as was prophesied. Yay the false prince has arisen and then end of days has arrived. We have come to smite the forces of darkness, save the worthy and punish the guilty. Surely thoust knows enough of thy bible to see this already.”
“Yeah about that. I’ve been killing folks all my adult life and maybe a few before that and yet one of you guys went to slaughter a whole bunch of church going folks for being impure, but told me I had to choose a side. What gives with that?”
“Not all who dwell in Gods house are holy. To put it in a fashion thou mightst understand, if your house we’re plague’d with rats and vermin wouldst thou not have such creatures exterminated as being unclean in thine eyes? The angel you saw was simply cleansing His fathers house of the unclean and untrue.”
“Ok, I can get that but why bother killing them? I mean a bunch of demons were going to do that. Why not let them do the dirty work for them?”

The angel looked genuinely surprised and confused. “But this is the way the universe works. How can thou not know this?”
“Yeah, well just imagine I skipped that day in Sunday school. In fact let’s just pretend for the sake of argument I skipped every day.”

“If a demon kills a servant of Heaven his soul is denied to us. Likewise if one of us shouldst destroy a follower of the Fallen One then his soul cannot then enter hell and become a demon. Both sides hath been harvesting each other’s chosen souls to prevent them becoming soldiers for the other side. Indeed, it was the opening day of the war.”

“So one of you f**kers came down and took Jo to stop her being recruited and kicking some arse.”

“I know not this Jo of which thou spake.”

“Uh huh. Well you just lost a reason for me to keep you around. Might want to make sure you don’t run out of those. Ok then if you can’t tell me about Jo then I surely do hope you can tell me about the next most important person to me. How about Patrick?”

“Saint Patrick, he who did chase the snakes from Ireland and brought the word of Our Father unto the heathen therein?”

“No you twat! Patrick f**king Swayze. He who brought ‘Steel Dawn’ and ‘Ghost’ forth into our world and did provide us with the finest in entertainment.”

“I doest not knowth of this Patrick.”

“Well in that case I guess I am all out of reasons to talk to you.”

“In that case thou must release me and sendeth me on my way as thou promises.”

“Now just hold on there one second. I don’t recall saying I would let you go. I told you I wanted you in one piece and that is true. See if I’d had to cut you, well you’d have bled and I just happen to know some people who desperately need the kind of help your blood can give them so I didn’t want to waste a single drop of that precious stuff. See while you’ve been hanging upside down, all that pure blood of yours has been running to your head. Makes it easier to collect it when I do this.”

With that I dragged the sharp edge of the blade along the perfect skin of his throat cutting it open from ear to ear. The shining blue blood poured out running down his face and dripped into the bucket I’d placed beneath him. That blood could heal people and a lot of folks back at the hospital could get better than that. Some folks might have thought it was just plain bad gutting and angel like that but the way I saw it, they had brought this war to us and this was just helping to fix the damage they had caused. I left the body hanging and dripping gore while I went to find something to eat and drink. After that I’d get some sleep. I’d been awake a long time now and if I made a mistake and got killed, well that precious healing blood wouldn’t be helping anyone.

[ER]

Good story, Alex.

[Alex]

A-Day +5.

I had expected to get more than one bucket of blood from the angel. Guess the bastards ran light. I’d dipped my hands in and gone over my wounds, then carefully scraped as much as I could back off my hands. I’d gotten lucky getting one angel as easily as I had. I wasn’t sure I would get another with as little fuss.

On the walk back to the hospital various scenarios kept playing out in my head where I’d get back there and find everyone dead. That last angel had really gotten to me and cracks were appearing in my belief that Joanne was still alive. If she wasn’t... well I’d make whoever was responsible pay even harder. And I was already planning on making them pay pretty damn hard. I’d had plans for this weekend and these selfish bastards had really messed them up for me. It was distracting me and that was dangerous. I had to concentrate, avoid any fights. Not that I was scared of a ruckus but I had a cargo that might get spilt.

I wondered about the two angels I’d encountered. That first one had been a right hard bastard. The second, a walkover. Were there different types of angels? I recalled the second mentioning he (or was it an ‘it’?) was a messenger. I might not be able to take the fight head on against an army of angels, and for some reason my head swam here, unwelcome images my mind was trying to reject wanted to break through. I staggered a bit and only just managed to put the bucket down before I threw up the little I’d eaten recently. Took me a few minutes to get my s**t back together and get back on my train of thought about a guerrilla war against the angels, hitting their messengers, and if they had supply lines taking them out.

Jo had been great at that kind of planning. She still is I corrected myself and tried to insist was what I believed. She’d also been (IS dammit!) a fantastic tracker. Surely she’d have been able to track me down. Of course she’d be tracking me down, it just had to be that something was stopping her. Maybe she was looking after a bunch of injured kids. Or, a treacherous voice in my head insisted, she is too badly injured, or dead. Some angel would have her pretty head mounted on his wall.

Remember that old Superman movie where he fights his evil side? If I could have ripped that other part of me out and fought it I would have right there and then and to damnation with anything else hearing the fight. My brain has always been like that, putting thoughts in that I hated and right now I’d had all of it I could stand. I pushed the thoughts out of my head and kept on towards the hospital.

But would anyone be alive there, once again came an unwelcome intrusion into my thoughts.

It was going to be one long ass day.

It was late in the day when the remains of the hospital came into view. It looked no better or worse than the last time I’d seen it. Entering it, things looked much the same, although it smelt a whole load worse. I knew from dozens of battlefield hospitals what those smells meant, infected wounds, dysentery, gangrene... each had its own particular odour and none were good.

Figured this was going to be a tough sell, persuading a bunch of doctors that I had a bucket of a magic elixir that could heal all wounds. Words really weren’t my thing. Then again given everything going on, maybe they’d be willing to believe in miracles.

I stood there like a dummy trying to figure out what to say. She saw me first though, the woman who is saved and who’d tried to sleep with me. Ok, well she had slept with me, but nothing else had happened even if she had wanted more. I really had to remember to ask people’s names more. She looked haggard and exhausted, but her blue eyes were bright enough to almost be glowing. I guessed she needed a good meal and two weeks r&r before she collapsed from exhaustion. Not much chance of a rest for anyone. These guys and girls looked like they’d been on campaign for months and it hadn’t even been a week yet.
“I thought you’d abandoned us!”
She ran over, throwing her arms around me and planted kisses all over my face. I blushed, unsure of what to do but enjoying the feel of her body against me. I thought of Jo and gently put her down. “No, I just went out to get something I thought might help. Didn’t want anyone else coming with me, hard enough to survive on my own never mind watching out for anyone else. And I didn’t want anyone trying to put me off. I’d have went and did it anyway so it would just have been wasted breath.”

“Did you find it? The thing that would help us?”

With a smile I tapped the bucket with my foot. “This here stuff will cure any injury you put it on.”

She looked doubtfully at the sparkling blue liquid. “What is it?” She asked me, confusion warring with doubt in her eyes.

Damn but those eyes were nice. She must have had her pick of men with those peepers. Normally a woman like that wouldn’t look at me twice. All it took to get them to come running was the end of the world.

If only teenage me had known that, hah! I’d have brought on the end of the world aged fourteen and a half.

“It’s something I, uhm stole from the angels. Keeps them alive. Just put it on the wounded and see what happens, but use it carefully.”

I hadn’t exactly lied there. Didn’t want to have to explain how I’d gotten it, at least not until after they’d seen it in action.

“Can you get any more?”

The question was asked hesitantly. I had no idea why and was sure there was something in the question I was missing.

“Maybe, but it isn’t easy. Take it, go start healing people.”

She still stood there just looking at me so I shucked my jacket and peeled my tee-shirt off and showed her the healed wounds on my back that she’d tended just a few days ago. “No way those could have healed up this quickly normally right? That blue stuff did it in a flash.”

She picked up the bucket and struggling a bit with the weight carried it over to the nearest beds. I watched as she dipped an almost clean cloth in and started rubbing it gently on what looked like a burns victim. The flesh started to heal up pretty much instantly and a whole crowd of medics gathered around excitedly. Other patients who saw what was happening started shouting for then to get healed as well while others clamoured wanting to know what was happening. I got worried someone would knock the bucket over so I quietened things down by firing a couple of rounds from one of my shotguns into the ceiling. That cowed them some. I roared a bit telling them to behave and they’d all get seen to. I hadn’t taken ten minutes since this whole thing kicked off to sort out what was happening or what I should be doing. I’d been keeping thoughts and feelings at bay and all of a sudden it all overwhelmed me in a rush and I shouted at the gathered crowd, taking it all out on them until I felt out of anger. After I’d let it all out I felt exhausted, drained and empty. My legs started shaking and I’d to grab onto a nearby desk to stay upright.

And I knew with an absolute certainty that my Jo was dead and with that I stumbled and fell, collapsing into unconsciousness.

[Alex]

A-Day +6.

I think it was the next day when I awoke. With that damn red sky though it could have been night, a week or a month later. The stubble on my face told me it was around a week since I last shaved. I hated being unshaven. A real man doesn’t need a beard to be a man.

She was sitting on a chair beside me, fast asleep. I figured she needed the rest and let her sleep on. I chuckled and thought she’d be mortified if she ever found out she’d had a bit of drool running out her mouth while she slept. I’d seen her naked and she looked good that way but dressed up in a doctors outfit like that, wow she was even hotter. I quietly got up and slipped out of bed. My clothes were nearby. There were several other occupied beds in this room, a variety of snores making an unpleasant mix, but as far as I could tell, no wounded. I guessed this room was where the medics crashed when they needed sleep. Moving carefully as so not to awaken anyone I crept out into the hall. Plenty of people were up and moving around. I guess the angel blood worked as advertised. I just hoped if it was needed (and I had no doubt that it would be), that I could get more just as easily. I hadn’t pulled on my jacket or weapons. I felt naked without them. Everyone stopped and clutched their ears as the impossibly loud trumpet sounded once again, strident and demanding this time.

I was really going to go to town on whoever the hell was blowing that. Next angel, I catch I am going to ask about it. If it tells me how to get the bastard, I might even let it live.

Big emphasis on might. Wouldn’t want anyone to start thinking I was going soft on them. They were more useful to me than the demons, but that wasn’t saying much since they were only useful dead, while so far the demons weren’t even that.

Maybe I’d find a use for them later though. If their blood hurt other creatures then maybe I could make some kind of weapon out of it although the angels didn’t seem the type to obligingly line up so I could dip them one at a time in a big ol’ vat of demon blood.

I guessed I should try and find the entranceway since that seemed to have become the hub of everything. It hadn’t occurred to me as being odd before that they had abandoned the wards are were treating people in the main hall. I mean from a military point of view it made sense, and even though it was packed with people, it was no where near capacity. Were there really that few of us left that only a few dozen people had came here for help? It was a good choice of place to come first. Surprising really that there hadn’t been gangs of looters hitting it for medicines. From the sounds I’d heard when I’d been waiting on the roof I knew we’d started preying on each other.

Typical really. Whole damn race is swirling around the pan ready to get flushed and rather than coming together and working to survive we just try to grab whatever we can off whoever else has got it. He who dies with the most toys still dies.

It occurred to me that instead of just randomly wandering around, that I could just follow the signs and get to the entranceway that way. That didn’t help stop me feeling like I’d been taking stupid pills. Maybe it was just the shock of everything that had happened finally taking its toil. A couple of more minutes and I got to where I wanted. One thing my wandering had shown me was that some of the areas of the hospital had collapsed. I guess that explained why everyone was clustered near the doorway. Easy to get out if the place was attacked again. Also said to me that someone wasn’t playing by the Geneva rules. Fair enough, I found they got in my way more than anything. The place was still a mess, but very few people were in bed. They looked hungry and dirty, but alive and well. My appearance caused a bit of a stir, everyone crowding around me, thanking me like I was some kind of messiah. I wondered what they’d have said if they’d known what had healed them. Looked like there had been enough to go around though and certainly deal with the worst injuries. Of course she was front and centre in the crowd. I let this go on for a couple of minutes, everyone shouting questions over each other, then put my hands out and said “Whoa folks, I am just a regular guy like the rest of you let’s calm things down a bit. I’m sure you’ve all got plenty of things to do so how about I talk to whoever is in charge and they can pass on the info.”

Took a bit of work to clear the crowd a bit but eventually, we got there and half a dozen of us went off to a large room together. Of course she made sure she was part of that group, clinging onto my arm like a homesick turd. That was maybe an unkind way of putting it, but I wasn’t used to dealing with people and they were starting to get to me. Hanging around them made my skin feel itchy and my brain irritable. I decided to try and get things over and done with as quickly as possible. I had a plan and I wanted to get working on it. All these people were just in my way at the moment, stopping me from getting things sorted and that irritated me too.

“Ok, I got some idea about what you’re going to ask me, so let me try and cut through all of that and answer what I can. The stuff in the bucket was 100% pure angel blood. I found out by accident that it heals one, so I caught one and bled it dry. Sounds nasty but it saved a lot of people. I reckon I can get more but it isn’t easy. As far as I can tell we are having the whole biblical apocalypse. God is p**sed at us and decided to clear the board. Or maybe him and old Scratch declared war on each other. The angels are clowns, the devils are jokers and here I am stuck in the middle with you.”

No one got that reference. What followed was exactly what I’d tried to avoid. Fifteen minutes of being asked questions that all I could reply to was “I don’t know.”

Stuff like why were we being attacked, cries that they had been good people, why had God abandoned them?

f**ked if I know, now what was the question?

One older guy told them God hadn’t abandoned them and that they were just surely being tested. From his garb, I took him to be the hospital Chaplin (did they even still have those?). I was glad he was there ‘cos he took the focus off me and the small group paid him more attention. The others turned on him, the conversation getting louder and shoutier. Fair play to the old guy, he held his ground not too bad. Seemed a bit crazy to me under the circumstances, but not only had the guy held onto his faith, but he claimed recent events had only strengthened it. I did find out from the argument that it had actually been angels that had hit the hospital. Sick and healthy alike had seemingly randomly been cut down while others had been ignored. I thought about telling them what the angel had told me, but didn’t want to become the focus of conversation again.

Besides the shouting was getting on my nerves than I could tolerate.

“ENOUGH!” I yelled, smashing my fists down on a metal trolley. The sudden harsh noise quietened everyone down. “Look, none of this is going to get us anywhere, and no offence preacher but ain’t none of us really knows jack s**t about what is happening. So how about we concentrate a little more on what we do know and how we keep on surviving. Once we get out of this mess then you can debate endlessly on what the hell is happening. Right now it seems to me that you got a whole building full of folks relying on us to help keep them alive and that raises a whole load of questions about the practicalities.”

You know, I think I’ve spoken more words in the week since the world went to s**t than I have in the previous six months. Jo was the social butterfly out of the pair of us.

Heh, if she heard me calling her a butterfly I’d get kicked right in the nuts.

Everyone was standing around staring at me. f**k, are they expecting me to lead them now? Bollocks to that idea. “Look, just concentrate on the important stuff. For the moment I guess you are ok medicine-wise. Shelter is sorted, so you look at water and food. You make plans for the stuff you can. The rest... Well you just sort of deal with that as it happens.”

That was the best speech I could give for inspiring someone else to lead.

One of the medics, an older man who for some reason I figured was a surgeon replied: “And what are you going to do?”

“Me?” Suddenly, the vague plans I’d been making to do something came into sharp focus, crystallising in my mind. “I am going to go out, find some weapons and train you lot how to survive. You’ve got the beginnings of an army here and that is what we are going to have to become if any of us are going to make it out of here alive. And by us I mean the human f**king race.”

If by some chance Jo was still alive out there I bet she’d be doing the exact same thing. In fact one of the things my inner voice kept tormenting me with was that if she was alive I’d have seen signs of the fightback by now. I was starting to hate sleeping because I’d dream about what might have happened to her.

Damn, but I wanted to get drunk and get laid.

I looked at the group in the room. Her eyes were on me and I thought well, no problems on the second part I thought. Pretty sure she wants a piece of me. Yup and I knew exactly what piece too.

She spoke up. “You are missing a weapon,” she said. Her voice was husky from a lifetime smoking, but I was pretty sure she was deliberately making it sound more so. She disappeared out of the room, the doors swinging in her wake.

The older man spoke up again. “The kitchens and cafeteria were well stocked to feed a few thousand people for days. We have no problem with tinned food and the like. As long as the power keeps up, we have frozen food. Without fresh produce though people’s health will start to suffer in the medium to long term. The faucets are still working, so we have water.”

“Right ok. So is there somewhere nearby we could get seeds and such from? You must have like a hospital garden or something you could plant... plants in. Work on things like that. Gather up anything you can use as weapons, guns, knives, whatever. Get inventive. You’ll need to defend yourselves until I can get back. Not expecting to be gone more than a few hours so you should be fine.”

As I finished talking she came swaying back into the room, holding something behind her. “The first time I saw you, you had one of these. Seems strange to see you now without one.”

And with that, she revealed a fire axe she’d kept hidden behind her. I took it with a smile and told her “Thanks em, ur...”

“Amanda. Amanda Price.”

“Well, I guess I should go grab my gear and get started. You people have some organising to do and I don’t want to be getting in your way.”

My throat was feeling dry from all this damn jawing. “See you back in the lobby.”

With that I walked out the room. I expected Amanda to follow me but she didn’t. Despite everything I felt a little sad that she didn’t. Someone did follow me out though, the old preacher. Old, he’ll the guy looked no more than twenty years ahead of me. Before I could tell him that I really didn’t need a sermon right now he jumped right in. “I am sorry you find it impossible to have faith right now, but I have enough for both of us. I won’t ask you to share my beliefs but I hope you don’t mind if I pray for you. I can’t explain why I still have faith in God, I just do.”

Right now I figured I could do with all the help I could get. “Sure padre. Go ahead.” Thinking about the angel I’d killed and the one whose arse I kicked I wasn’t sure if getting skyward was even an option for me anymore. If it all went (even more) tits up, someone putting a good word for me with the guy upstairs might be desperately needed. “What’s your name? Can’t keep calling you padre all the time.”

“Call me Lewis. Guessing you are ex-military since you called me padre.”

“Good guess. Army.”

“Ex-Navy man myself.”

I knew how these conversations went. We’d start swapping war stories. “Look pad... Lewis. I hate to be rude and if we get a chance later I’d love to talk more but I need to get moving. The more time I waste the bigger the chance someone else will get the stuff I am looking for.”

With that, I smiled an awkward smile and walked away. Maybe Lewis was a bit crazy, but if holding onto his god helped him get through then I wasn’t going to try and take that away from him. Finding my way back to the communal room I’d woken up in wasn’t easy, but I got there. I made sure I picked up my jacket and loaded myself with weapons, being careful to pack them so that either I could drop them easily or they wouldn’t get in my way in a fight. Funny how little slip-ups like getting caught in my webbing showed me I was too out of practise when I needed to be razor-sharp. Figured I’d be nice to Amanda and be carrying the axe she’d gifted me when I entered the lobby. If it came to a fight, chances are I’d be using the angel sword but she didn’t need to know that. I might be an a***ole, but I at least had manners.

I opened the door to the large entrance hall, great big smile plastered over my face and being all Mr Nice Guy, axe in one hand, shotgun in the other. Just a second after someone kicked open the main door and a bunch of what looked like Hells Angels came pouring in, all of them festooned with weapons. The first guy in screamed “Everyone one of you muthaf**kers get down on the floor. We want your drugs, food, weapons and most importantly your women! If you do exactly as we say we might just.”

Whatever he was going to say, the words were lost as my fire axe came spinning through the air. My throw was better than last time and split his dirty bearded face in two. Before he even knew he was dead, my pump action roared. At a short-range like this my gunfire was very democratic. Everyone got an even share. The bikers might be carrying for a fight but they sure as shut weren’t expecting someone to bring one to them. Hell, I’d reacted before I even knew what I was doing. Dropping the shotgun I barrelled into the group grabbing the axe handle as I did so. It made a sick 'sluck' type noise as my momentum tore it free. I had to try to keep them surprised and off-balance. I grabbed my knife and from then on in it was bloody butcher work. I kept thrusting out with the blade of the knife in one hand and slashing with the axe, feeling the impacts as they cut into the living meat. Must have taken me less than a minute to carve my way through the gang, somewhere around a dozen men. I got up on my feet, looking at the bodies at my feet, one man his leg twitched like the rest of his body hadn’t told him he was dead. I must have looked like some ancient, primeval god of war standing there, blood-soaked. The room was almost completely quiet, with just the drip of blood from my weapons breaking the silence. I’d fought Hells Angels before and they could be pretty hardy guys. Some of my favourite bar fights had been with them. These losers had to be wannabes. They should be grateful it was me they met and not the real thing. I at least made it quick. Looking through the glass doors I could see the bikers had one man left. An enormously fat guy who must have seriously strained the suspension of any bike he’d ever ridden on. Guess he was the lookout. I opened the door and stepped outside. He stood there, sweat pouring down his face. I noticed a dark patch forming at his groin and spreading downwards. At first, I thought he was unarmed but with a shink noise a blade popped out of the toe of his boot. That thing had to be eight inches long. How the f**k was he supposed to walk with something that impractical. Unless you took out your opponent with the first kick you’d be f**ked. Damn thing would get in your way every step and forget trying to run away. I gripped my knife and stride towards him and his nerve broke. Can’t say I blamed him. He’d just seen me take apart all his buddies and while I was breathing heavily I was sure I could take him. He tried running away, limping as the stupid boot knife got in his way every step. He had the weirdest most f**ked up back patch I’d ever seen on a denim jacket. His name was picked out in silver studs between his shoulder blades and read “Sven”. Below that was a picture of a guy with a bag filled with monkeys while other monkeys ran about his feet. The guy was reaching out to grab one of the wild monkeys.

No idea why anyone would collect the monkeys, but there you go.

I watched, bemused as he limped off down the street every second footstep marked by a trail of metallic tink, tink, tink noises as the blade tapped against the ground. Yeah, I could have taken him out with a throw of my blade, but it seemed like a total waste of effort. Pretty sure something out there would take care of him for me.

Looking back at the pile of bodies inside I figured that was a good start for my arsenal of weapons I needed to turn these refugees into warriors. By the time I got this mess sorted out, cleaned up and so on, I’d need to rest up. Finding weapons would have to wait until tomorrow now, but a good start had been made.

[chefzombie]

working on something that entered my head while walking this evening where i'm not supposed to walk at night, being night blind...my "bat senses" still work, but what if the bats decided to take them away?  ...hhhmmm....

[Alex]

A-Day +7.

I woke up with a three second existential crisis wondering where the hell I was and what was going on. The events of the last week came back to me in a rush. Man had it really only been a week?

Yeah, well when I get my hands on God he is going to put everything back exactly the way things were.

Well maybe with one change. Trash cans would be emptying themselves. f**k doing that s**t anymore. Ok, wait one second. Two changes. I’d get Swayze resurrected and we’d have a sequel to Steel Dawn.

The man was robbed of an Oscar for his performance in that one.

I ran over a mental list of our store of firearms and other weapons that we’d looted off the bikers. It had been a little surprising just how little panic there had been over the pile of dead bodies. Maybe people were still in shock. I had a funny feeling that more than one person would pay for this s**t later. Combat stress hits people in funny ways, sometimes immediately, sometimes years down the line but once that bug had bit you it never really let go. Some folks learned to live with it, others got all broken up inside.

Anyway, we had half a dozen shotguns, all sawn off double barrels and maybe a dozen shells for each. One handgun, a generic automatic that I wasn’t familiar with the make or model, enough ammo four full clips on fast loaders and an assortment of knives, some combat style ones, others some of the heavier types of kitchen knives. It wasn’t much but it was a start. I didn’t want to strip my home arsenal, but as uncomfortable as it made me I was starting to think I’d need to. We had enough to fend off an attack I guessed, but if a second one came... it would be down to hand to hand. I reckoned the demons, despite their blood would have to be taken with the blades. The angels were much more dangerous close up so the shotguns would be saved for them and since they didn’t have much of a range they’d have to be fired when the angels were as close as possible, like a second or two before they could gut you with one of those swords.

I really hoped I had some people with military experience in the group. Fire discipline would be vital if they were going to survive. We were fine for food for a while, but water might be a problem especially if blood kept raining from the sky.

I got up and made my way to the foyer. Most of the survivors were all in there including her, I mean Amanda. Lewis was sitting at a strangers bedside no doubt spreading the word of God. I asked if I could speak to them and got everyone gathered around in a wide circle. It felt incredibly uncomfortable standing there as the focus of attention, but it had to be done.

“I just wanted to chat to everyone. The world is in the crapper, been flushed as we are just swirling around. We have a pretty good base here, one we can defend from and maybe even grow our numbers and take our country, maybe even the world back. What I’d like to do is train you all up to fight back. We’ve got a few weapons and I can get us more, teach you how to use them. Maybe others can sort out stuff like growing our own food.”

That was as far as my pitch went. Someone shouted out “So you want to train us to be your private army and expect us to go out to fight for you!”

Another voice, a woman’s this time called out “What if we don’t want to learn how to fight, who the hell do you think you are?”

I was taken a bit aback. I had thought everyone would want to learn how to fight, if only to be able to defend themselves. A few people shouted out in support of my idea, but the majority seemed to be against me. Some of them very pretty ferocious about it too. How dare I expect them to fight for themselves I guess.

f**k ‘em then. If I’d had an HMG on me at that point I might just have sprayed it into the crowd. I turned my back on them and walked back to my room, the sound of their jeers ringing in my ears. f**k this for a game of soldiers. I’d leave them the stuff I’d taken off the bikers and let them figure it out on their own. Anyone who wanted to could come with me, but the first time anyone rolled through here I figured it was game over for the rest. Didn’t matter if it was demons, angels or raiders. I’d never been overly troubled by a conscience and wouldn’t have even a twinge of guilt about leaving them.

About half way to my room Amanda caught up with me. “You are leaving aren’t you?”

“Sweetheart, I can’t protect everyone here myself. Group is too large. And I am not going to train a few to defend the rest who are too damn stupid to learn to fight their own battles. You can come with me if you want. Anyone else who wants a fighting chance can come with me too.”

Her eyes lit up as I mentioned coming with me. Crap, she might have taken that the wrong way. Well that was something I’d have to deal with when it came to it. It was either that or leave her here to die with the rest.

“Go pack anything you can’t live without, meet me in my room and we’ll be on our way.”

She smiled and practically skipped off. I watched her go thinking that damn but she had a cute butt. Then I chuckled and continued to my room. It wouldn’t take me long, I didn’t like taking more than ten minutes to pack and be ready to go when on ops. You just never knew when you’d have to evac in a hurry. I figured though Amanda would take longer than me so I forced myself to slow down and relax. Well I suppose they hadn’t asked me to save them. Everything I’d done for them had been off my own bat, so they didn’t owe me anything.

Gratitude would have been nice though.

I was only half way through sorting out my kit when there was a soft knock at my door. I was shocked that Amanda could have got ready before me, but when I shouted come in, it was Lewis the preacher who entered. “So you are off then?”

“No point in staying for people who are lining up to become sushi. I’m leaving them in a much better state than I found them. Guess that is all the chance you want. You can come with us you know.@

“Thanks but I am going to stay with them. God will provide. My place is here with them.”

I shrugged as I pulled my backpack on. “If that’s what you think is best padre then it’s what you need to do. The way I heard it told though your god says he help those who help themselves. I wish you the best of luck though and hopefully we’ll meet again someday down the line. I don’t know you well but I get the impression you are a good man. I hope you make it through this.”

“You too my friend. I’d try and persuade you to stay but...”

He let his words drift off into nothingness. We shook hands and with a regretful look left my room. I just couldn’t understand how he could keep his faith. I mean ok it was pretty much proof that God existed, and I guess Satan for that matter, but it also said to me that one was as big a bastard as the other.

I waited for about an hour before Amanda arrived. If there had been a side exit I’d have left that way, but as it was I was going to have to leave by the front doors. I guess Lewis had spread the word about me leaving. Everyone was gathered in silence and stared at us as we walked into the foyer. I looked at them and said “Anyone wants to come with me is welcome but you’ll been to keep up and learn how to pull your weight.”

There were a whole mix of different expressions on the faces gathered around. I wasn’t any good at reading people in situations like this and couldn’t tell if anyone was wavering or not, but none of them, even those who had supported my plan broke ranks.

f**k ‘em.

I headed to the door, holding it open for Amanda to go through. Someone in the crowd yelled “Coward”, then threw a flattened tin can at me. It bounced off my left shoulder and clattered onto the floor. I felt my anger rising and I grubbed my shotgun tighter, but Amanda put her hand in my free one and pulled me outside whispering to me to just walk away.

We headed off into the ruddy lit streets, hand in hand like that.

“It just occurred to me that other than you are a mad axe man I know nothing about you. What is your name?”

“Jackson,” I replied, “but everyone usually calls me Jacks.”

“Mad Axe Jacks,” she mused. “Well it rhymes.”

Well I guess I’ve been called worse things.

[Alex]

A-Day +8.

We had ended up spending the night in the ruins of my old house. We slept separately, although both in the same room. I slept on the floor while she was in the spare bed. I think Amanda had wanted sex still but I still wasn’t ready for that, especially not in the bed I’d shared with Jo. My mind kept swinging between believing that Jo was out there looking for me and accepting that she was gone.

I wasn’t ready to move onto another woman though which was funny because both me and Jo had hardly been totally exclusive. We both accepted that things happen in combat zones but we also left those things there and didn’t take them any further and hell, sometimes things happened when you kicked back on R&R and we’d both been fine about that too. That brought back memories of the two weeks we’d spent blowing a years wages in an Eastern European brothel. Jo could match any man for debauchery. Getting involved with Amanda though, that felt like something different and while I might have been fine with bringing a third person into our bed (or as I recalled six extra people for one particular orgy that had broken the bed. Afterwards we’d given the bed a fitting send off with a drunken Viking funeral. As fine a see off as any bed could hope to have and I have no doubt it was witness to much shagging up in Valhalla even now), that felt like I’d be bringing a third person into our marriage. The only way I’d ever have been fine with that would have been if me and Jo had, had any kids. Not that her body pressed against me wasn’t all kinds of tempting.

f**k, maybe I’d get put up for a sainthood for saying no. Pretty sure no one ever had the last words “I wish I’d had less sex.” Then I thought of the fleeing biker,with the name Sven on the back of his denims. Maybe his parents were the exception. They should definitely had sex at least one time less. I blamed the Catholic Church and it’s anti contraception stance for the existence of a lot of a***oles out there.

Then again maybe God agreed with me and that’s why the whole s**t storm we were engulfed in was just him cleaning up the mess. I’d had the same dream again, the one about all those people I had known waiting for me. It was a bit disturbing that most of them were dead or were people I hadn’t seen in years, nor since I’d stopped working regularly as a merc. A lot of guys liked to call themselves independent military contracted. Seriously what kind of f**ked up p***y calls them self that? Meat Loaf never sung a song about Rock & Roll independent f**king military bastard contractors. Deadpool wasn’t know as the independent military contractor with the mouth y’know.
Bunch of jumped up pretentious twats. f**king sounds like they provide office supplies to second line soldiers. A man shouldn’t be afraid to call himself what he really is. Unless he is a kiddy fiddler or a rapist. Then he ought to be terrified. Especially if I got my hands on him. Never could stand those types. Spoils of war my arse. Any grunt I caught pulling that s**t never got a second chance.

I slipped out of bed silently. For a big guy I’ve always been quiet on my feet, even as a kid. I replenished my ammo and picked out a few lighter guns I figured would be suitable for Amanda to learn how to shoot with. I figured maybe I could work up to something she could spray and pray with like an Uzi. I stripped all the weapons down, cleaned them and rebuilt them. Always paid to keep everything in working order. Unless you are given a piece of s**t weapon of course. All you can do when you are issued one of them is hope.

I heard someone moving around upstairs and figured Amanda was up and I should go see her, and if it wasn’t her moving around then I really needed to get up there. I almost charged the basement door, worried that I was going to lose two women in two weeks.

She isn’t your woman though. Not unless you decide you want her. If Jo was alive she’d have been back here for weapons, you’d have seen her taking the fight to those bastards. People would have listened to her if she had offered to train them how to fight.

And if they hadn’t she’d have punched a few of them out until the rest fell in line.

Damn those treacherous inner thoughts. They never seemed to stop p**sing me off. And people wonder why I am always so angry.

It was just Amanda moving around. I’d known it wouldn’t have been Jo. She’d never have made that much noise walking around, but hope had still built itself up in my chest that she’d be standing there, her sexy, wicked grin on her face. Of course, I’d have had to explain why Amanda was here. I hid my disappointment, set a smile on my face and explained to her that we’d have breakfast and then I’d teach her how to shoot a bit. Enough of the kitchen was left for me to put something together. I set a camp fire in the middle of the floor and boiled up some ration packs. They weren’t exactly tasty but we could survive on them for as long as we needed.

We were both distracted by a roar from the skies about. For several moments I wondered what fresh hell was coming and then I saw them. Three jets, soaring through the skies, long contrails forming behind them. Hot damn, the human race was still in the fight. We watched as a pair of angels flew out of the clouds to meet them. They fired off a couple of missiles but they avoided them easily enough and then closed on each other. I could see the tracer rounds, a bright fiery red against the dull red of the sky as they opened up with their cannons. One of the angels came tumbling out of the sky, ripped apart by the heavy rounds. The other angel dived at one of the aircraft and I watched in amazement as it’s flaming sword cut along the side of the plane, separating one wing completely. The remaining two aircraft flew on and soon disappeared from my sight, while the surviving angel plunged earthwards presumably in search of his fallen companion. Well I guess they had one thing going for them over the hellspawn. Couldn’t imagine one of them looking for a fallen friend. Well I’d seen them crawl over the dead and dying from their own side trying to get to me.

Well soon enough I was pretty sure I’d have them crawling over their dead and dying to get away from me. I was going to teach them to fear me.

Anyway it was good to know someone else was fighting back. Hell if they could get jet fighters in the air that meant they had supplies, fuel and all sorts of organisation. Not to mention a permanent base. It cheered me up inside no end.

Just then the loud trumpet type noise sounded. I wished I’d asked the angel or even Lewis what the f**k was making that noise. It was angry and strident this time and filled me with rage until it faded away leaving our ears ringing. I could see Amanda was similarly affected, and I roared defiantly at the uncaring red sky, joined by her unholy scream.

There we were howling at a moon we couldn’t even see (and hadn’t seen since this whole thing started). My anger drained away like a bath of water with a hole blown in the side and was replaced by uncontrollable laughter at the ridiculousness of it all. Amanda looked at me quizzically at first and then joined me in a wild abandon. We rolled on the ground, clutching at each other’s arms and giggled like school kids.

As our laughter subsided she looked right at me, her eyes staring deep into mine. Then she leaned forward and kissed me deeply. My first instinct was to shove her away, but I didn’t, returning her kiss with equal passion. I don’t know how long we kissed each other for, but when it finished we stood up, brushed ourselves off and I spent the rest of day teaching her how to use and care for a variety of guns. She was a quick learner but then again she was a doctor so had to have some brains about her. I kept wondering if the kiss had been a mistake and if it had out an end to whatever it was that had the potential to happen between us, but when I was heading through to bed she took me by the hand and led me to the bed, stripped off and climbed into bed and lay there invitingly. She pulled the cover up so it was just covering her nipples and no more, all the while smiling at me coyly. I shucked my jacket off and practically tore my tee shirt in two getting it off. My boots (black Doc Martins with steel toe caps, sadly not easy to get for the past few years), were a bit harder to get off. In my excitement, my fingers fumbled with the knots like an overeager teenager getting laid for the first time, but eventually I got there.

Hardly the most romantic moment in history.

I stood up, letting her see my muscled chest and the network of scars across it. For some reason women liked to see them, running their fingers along them like they were tracing some route on a map. It looked odd though now where angel blood had healed parts up, leaving new skin that felt baby soft.

I slowly unbuttoned my trousers, doing my best to look sexy while doing it. This stuff is a lot harder for men than women. A woman wearing nothing but tights is sexy as hell. A man wearing just socks and suspenders (or garters as they call them in the US. Seriously what is with that? Garters are something women wear), ridiculous looking. Pretty sure even Fabio on his best day couldn’t carry that look off, so ladies if your man makes an effort there, remember he is trying and be kind. Or at least try not to snort with laughter. Real buzz kill that one.

I peeled my jeans down my legs, but left my boxers on. I was acutely aware that I could do with a good clean, but then Amanda was in the same state. I climbed into bed and she wrapped her slender arms around me bringing me in for another kiss, deeper and longer than our first one. My hands wandered over her body, stroking her softly. I disengaged my mouth from hers and moved my lips down to embrace her nipple, teasing it lightly with my tongue and teeth and enjoying the feeling of it hardening in my mouth. Then placing kisses from her breast up to and along her neck I found her mouth again, our tongues searching each other out. Part of me was surprised we hadn’t just torn our clothes off and went straight for it, but we both seemed content to just go more slowly. I moved slightly away from her and whispered to her to lie face down then cracked my knuckles, getting my fingers ready. I placed my hands at the base of her neck and started massaging her gently. I kneaded the hard, tense knoted muscles feeling them melt. It surprised many people how good I’ve always been at doing them. Never had any training or anything, just a natural talent. Anyway, from there I worked my way out to the shoulders and in again.

I could tell Amanda just wanted me right now, but I’ve always liked a bit of foreplay, teasing out the moment.

After easing her arms I worked my way down her spine, my fingertips darting in and out of the lumps that marked the spine and was rewarded with her moan of pleasure at the feeling. I’d learned that particular trick from an ex who had been otherwise a total b***h and a waste of space but I did at least learn that trick from her. I worked on her back, side and hips, my hands working in circles. Shame I didn’t have some skin cream to rub in. Or scented candles come to think of it.

Hey, no one ever said I couldn’t be romantic.

Must have rubbed her back for at least two hours before I decided she was ready.

What happened next? Well that’s between me and her. Did you think you were going to get your jollies reading about my sex life did you? I don’t bloody think so! Let’s just say it was better than anything you’ve ever had and it went on for several hours.

[Alex]

Realised I'd written a couple of days worth of stuff without posting them.

[Alex]

A-Day +9.

I suddenly sat bolt upright in bed as the bedroom door was kicked open. There was Jo standing and boy did she look p**sed.

Kinda understandable really.

Still what held my attention wasn’t the return of my beloved from the dead, but the flame thrower she had in her hands and pointing in my direction. My mouth flapped open and shut as I tried to think of something to say, but I’d never been great with words as I tried to cover Amanda with the quilt as if it would either hide her from Joanna’s view or shield her from Jo’s vengeance.

With a completely blank expression she pulled the trigger and time seemed to slow right down as I watched the gout of flame emerge from the nozzle, growing and spreading. It was terrible and terrifying but as the same time strangely beautiful. I tried to roll to the side, grab Amanda and throw us both clear of the oncoming wave of death about to wash over us but I just couldn’t move fast enough and I felt the heat start to blister and burn the skin from my back, spreading and enveloping me in its deadly embrace. Amanda began to shriek and scream and the flames reached her oh so soft skin, causing it to blister and blacken and her hair caught fire. My vision went as my eyeballs popped or melted. All I knew then was screams and pain.

I awoke with a start, sitting bolt upright in bed. My torso was bathed in sweat. A sense of deja vu came over me and my heart raced in my chest as I looked over at the bedroom door, fully expecting my nightmare to be a prophesy, but the door stayed obstinately closed with no revenge seeking wife out for my blood.

A semi awake Amanda murmured “What’s up?” Her voice sounded strangely childlike when she was sleepy. “Nothing baby, just thought I heard a noise, but it was nothing.”

“Make love to me again” she said and pulled me down to her soft, warm body.

Despite my nightmare it seemed rude to refuse. I couldn’t sleep afterwards though. Thoughts of what I would do if I was wrong and it turned out Jo was still alive raced through my mind as Amanda’s nude form lay curled up beside me, her head on my chest.

We spent the night like that. She would wake up a bit, we’d make love. It would start off slow and gentle and end up a wild thrashing of limbs and screams of passion. Then she’d sleep some more. In the end it took an urgent need for the toilet to get us out of bed. I let her go first, watching her bum as she walked out of the room. I once had a girlfriend who came in and used the toilet while I was in a bath. Never known anything to kill the passion in a relationship as quickly as seeing someone take a pee.

Mind you, I’ve heard some people get turned on by that kind of thing. Seriously, when the hell does that become sexy or erotic? Urgh! And don’t get me started on two girls one cup. I’ve always tried to be open minded about trying new things, but no way in hell... Although these days hell seemed to be exactly where we are.

I tried to spend the rest of the day in weapons training but given the choice between shooting guns and sex, well sex won out every time. It was as if all the pressure and tenseness of the past days were all being released in a bout of frenetic love making.

Gee, I hoped we still had running water for the shower or bath.

I had the best nights sleep that night since this whole thing had kicked off. None of the previous nights lying awake plagued by internal monologues. Possibly I was just too damn worn out for anything else.

[Alex]

A-Day +10.

I dreamed of Jo again, burning us both as we lay together.

My eyes shot open and I sat bolt upright in bed again. The room door was shut and no avenging angel stood there ready to kill us. I’d seen some pretty bad ways to die and being burnt alive seemed to me to be one of the worst. Amanda was still sleep, curled up beside me, snoring gentlyMy body was covered in a light sheen of sweat. I wiped my forehead, sighed and lay back down. My heart was hammering in my chest as if I’d been through a hard fight, or speaking in public. I knew there was no way I was getting back to sleep but I put my arms around Amanda, cupping my hands over her breasts and her still hard nipples. We just lay like that, me holding her. I could feel myself getting hard again with the closeness of her nude body but decided against waking her up for more sex as tempting as the thought was. I’d have to guess that we lay like that for a couple more hours before she awoke.

And then we had more sex.

I lay in the afterglow and wondered how long we could survive just on my stores at the house. I had months worth of rations for two people. We’d bought them just in case without ever really expecting to have to use them. Of course the sensible thing to do would be to figure out where those planes had came from and make our way there. I however was thinking about another idea. Back when I’d been on the building, looking for an angel to ambush I’d noticed they were all flying in from the same direction. What if we were to head off that way and find out where the angels were coming from. Hit them back. Then find the demons base and hit that too. Teach them we could hurt them and badly. Maybe they’d take their war elsewhere? It was a slum hope but I could think of anything better. I figured I would need a few more days to make plans and either decide on leaving Amanda secure here, or actually get her trained up and take her with me where I could protect her better.

Of course the day didn’t quite work out that way. She’d been leaning over the table making breakfast and I couldn’t resist tearing her pants down, taking her bent over the table. No sooner had we finished when I heard a roaring outside. A couple of demons were out on the street. One had two faces on the front of its head and flesh that roiled and ran like boiling wax. Other than that it looked fairly humanoid, although no one I’ve ever seen had quite this many muscles or bright red skin. At a guess I’d say it weighed in somewhere around 300 pounds. The other one was stuck figure thin and half the height of its companion. Jagged spikes grew out of its head and joints. It moved in a jerky, marionette like way. The noise came from the big one. I pulled my jeans up and quickly buttoned them, grabbed the angel sword then went outside bare chested and letting out a roar of my own as a challenge to them. The big one came lopping straight at me, while the smaller one moved in a semi-circle, looking to outflank me. I got the impression despite the size difference that the smaller one was the greater threat. Big red came in swinging and I dodged a punch that broke the paving slab it hit instead. A single punch like that would take my head off at the shoulders. My sword lashed out like the flame of a candle in a sudden sharp wind, cutting through Satanic flesh, muscle and bone. I hadn’t quite severed the arm, but it hung there useless by the remains of a few tendons. It roared again, all four eyes staring with a hate filled gaze at me. It grabbed the crippled arm with its good one and tore it off, swiping at me with its own arm.

I was not going to be beaten to death with the soggy end of someone’s arm.

Ducking under the improvised weapon and feeling the burn of a thousand drops of burning blood splashing on my chest and back. I rise up like a tsunami nearing the coast, the tip of my sword straight up and took the thing between its two chins, digging deep into its head. With a grunt of effort I shoved the sword up again and with a noise that was oddly reminiscent of the sound of someone biting into a crisp apple the sword punched through the top of its skull, a chunk of it falling loose with a clump of black matted hair attached. I put my foot to its chest and pulled the sword back to be, separating the two faces. A cry of pain escaped me as a feeling like a thousand fish hooks being raked across my back exploded. Damn, that second demon was fast and wiley.

I jumped forward away from its reach, turning around and almost stumbling on the rubble. My blade swung out, more to keep the demon back than any serious attempt to hit it. It looked at me curiously with thin slitted eyes on its triangular head and made a dry rattling noise. It took me a few seconds to realise it was laughing. My back burned hellishly and I could feel the blood running freely down my back.

What did these thing have about ripping my back open? I feinted left and slashed right, but the creature dodged avoiding my blow adroitly as I watched my blood drip from its raking fingertips. It moved to my side and those fingertips inscribed four lines of agony down my side.

Damnation, this thing was just toying with me. I switched tactics, going on the defensive and hoping to fend it off. I couldn’t believe it when faster than I could react it stepped inside my guard, stood right beside me and with one outstretched finger tore a gash in my forehead. Blood would run down from that and blind me. Was it going to take me apart piece by piece? I staggered backwards, trying to wipe the blood from my face with my free hand, but with its incredible speed the thing barrelled into me. I felt it’s protrusions pierce me in more places than I could count and fell backwards. Breathing was hurting now. From the jagged, stabbing pains it was clear some ribs were badly broken. I had enough presence of mind to keep a grip on the sword although with bits of me that were never designed to see daylight poking through to the wrong side of my skin already I wasn’t sure how much good it would do me. Grit dug into the already lacerated skin of my back, just one of what felt like hundreds of pains assaulting my body. One thought seared it’s way into my pain soaked brain, undeniable and unchangeable. I was losing this fight. I could hear his dry rasping laughter. “Did you really think you could beat a Duke of Hell mortal? You have cost me my favourite servant and for that you are going to pay.”

Well at least he didn’t speak like one of those damn angels with the thee’s and thou’s. I vaguely wondered why that was. Maybe they met more humans than the other side. Yeah, that sounded about right. My leg exploded in pain as what felt like ten thousand soldier ants bit into it. I arched by body and swung my foot around hoping to catch my tormentor but finding only air.

What would Swayze do now? Kicks rained down on me, and stamped on my chest. I coughed up blood. My stomach exploded in pain as I felt a hand sink into my guts and rip a handful of innards out. I tried to move but my beaten and broken body wouldn’t, or just plain couldn’t obey me any longer. I’d lost fights before, but I’d always made sure the other guy knew he’d been in a fight. This one was shredding me and I hadn’t been able to even lay a finger on him.

It finally got through even my thick skull that I might not get up from this fight. Something grabbed my other foot and wrenched it violently to the side popping it right out of the socket. Then my entire body was dragged to the side as I heard a wet, tearing sound. Fresh pain overwhelmed me and I finally went into a numb shock as I realised my right arm had just been ripped off. As I sank rapidly into blackness my last thought was “Gonna need more than a bucket of angel blood to fix this.”

The end?