What happens when the most badass demon in Hell tries to take it over? What happens when that same demon becomes teacher of a freshmen class that is supposedly more badass than he is? This is the story of Malice, the mob boss/demon/pervert/drunk/exotic dancer/teacher from Hell...literally.
The snow gently fell, like tissue gliding from heaven. The sight of it could only be described as pure beauty. The white flakes rested on my nose as I sat on the hill top, gazing at the vast amount of snow covered trees that stood ahead of me. Some were withering, reaching the end of their lifespan, while others were only beginning to grow, ready to take on new challenges for the rest of their lives. It was the first time snow had met these ancient giants in many, many years.
It looked as if the trees were thanking the heavens for it, for the branches were raised up high, while fewer drooped wearily, awaiting there peaceful, cold death. The trees were drenched in snow as if they were coffins, which gave me a feeling of bliss.
It was a serene way to die: seeing something as gorgeous as the snow falling. It was too bad I wouldn’t be able to experience such a calm death as the spruces and ferns that populated the forest. It all comes with my territory.
I rose to my feet as the soft, numbing, pure snow fell off the rear of my jeans. I looked towards the east and saw in the crimson lit sky that the sun was rising. I crouched down and leaped into the white abyss of snow that rested peacefully beneath my feet, waiting for me to join it, wanting me to finally lay at rest as it had, but I knew that rest was for the weak, and if you join the weak, then you would become weak, it was one of the basic principles of life. And being weak was the absolute last thing I needed during an eerily harsh winter such as this.
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As I trudged through the heartless icy desert that relentlessly shoved me on my back numerous times, I knew that I could not lower my pace, for time would not let me. The only thing that my brown eyes gazed at was the infinite shroud of snow that obstructed my path to my destination. The numbing cold bit at my body every second. It started at my toes, feeling like a lick from an animal primarily, but grew to the arms, feeling more like chomps than licks, until finally, it got to my head, literally slowing my thoughts by the minute.
Trees were becoming less and less prominent every couple of miles, so I knew I was getting close, but every single step I took felt like an eternity. As the cold gradually ate away at my consciousness, my vision became decreasingly accurate. I now faced the obvious fact that I was dying. Maybe I could die peacefully, I thought, like the trees. Deep down though, I knew that a calm death for me couldn’t be. This death in the heartless clutches of the freezing winter blizzard would be agonizingly long. Peace was not meant to be in my life, but my life was meant to bring peace, ironically. I silently said goodbye to my life, my love, and my mission. My vision faded to black as my thoughts danced away in the wind with my last words, “My redemption has been… broken.”
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I fluttered my eyes open, my vision slowly returning to my retinas with figures coming back first being followed my colors. I sat straight up, leaning against a tree, still numb from the bitter cold. My whole body was covered in tiny shards of ice, which decorated my clothing like a pharaoh’s jewels glinting in the sunlight.
A red liquid steadily raced won my upper lip, starting at my nostrils, resting near my facial hair. The warm feeling of the liquid was ironically comforting, and let me know that I was still a mortal. With the little strength had left, I rose my arm, wiping the blood off of my lightly trimmed moustache, my arm weighing a ton. I attempted to make my legs move, but it was, unfortunately, to no avail. The mortal body that I was trapped in still had a ways to go before it got back into tip top shape. Surely I should have died by now, I thought. My heart was pounding, so I damn sure was alive. When I blacked out I could feel my heart stopping, my thoughts slowing, hell, I could even feel my blood freezing over from the extremely low temperature in this hell-hole. I didn’t understand how I was still here, but it didn’t matter.
Snow still surrounded me like darkness during the night, but patches of grass melted in the shroud, like stars in the midnight sky as I observed the ice encompassing me. I banged my head against the tree, in frustration, as I sat there trying to reminisce on my journey as a once distant question came to mind: How did I get here? My memories were a little fuzzy due to the removing of my halo but I still could remember the fact that I wasn’t sitting under a tree when I blacked out. I could practically feel myself gripping the sloshed snow, my head feeling like it was just hit with an axe and then… nothing.
After minutes of deep thought, I subconsciously put my hand on my head and felt something. I knew how I got here. A barrette fell out of my hair as I thought, It was her. It had to be, for she was the only one who would care enough to go on a dangerous journey such as this, especially after I specifically told her not to. Hell’s Angel is what I called her hehehe, I thought. She would never stop trying to save me, and I loved her for it, but I hated it too.
The sun glimmered brilliantly, giving light to all that was in The Void. I prayed for the brave little girl who saved me, hoping she would make it back safely, and stood feebly on my two feet, as they shook like toothpicks supporting books. I inhaled deeply and walked towards the sun, knowing that I was not too far away from the gate. This gate would not only decide the future of my life, but the rest of the world, Midas and Earth included. Who knew that you could get kicked out of Hell for something so trivial. I turned towards the sun, leaving my regrets behind me, while putting a foot one at a time in front of me.
I had finally made it. The swirling vortex that held discoveries of the past and the mysteries of the future lay suspended in mid air directly in front of me. Lightning cackled as the sphere spun in front of me at a vicious rate, mesmerizing me. Various colors turned rapidly. The sight of the gate to my destiny comforted me and gave me a feeling of success. I laughed, I cried, I bled, and I lived through it all. The prequel of my mission ended indefinitely.
I took a step not more than half a foot towards the gate. “The ones who go through world gates regularly make this looks so easy.” I thought. As I stepped closer, I felt my back tense up, feeling the closeness pf regaining one of the many things that I had lost due to my treachery. In my mind I could still feel the flames warming my backside as I glided through the hellish atmosphere seeing the faces of the tortured. It felt like reality but it sadly wasn’t. It soon would be though after I completed my mission on the world that lay beyond this gate. All I had to do was take another step or two and Earth would be my new domain. Finally, I took those agonizingly long two steps, waiting to be engulfed by the collage of colors when the worst had happened. A shadowy aura stood not but two feet behind me. It was instantly recognizable. As I turned, I gazed at the black wings with white on the tips of each individual feather; I saw the jet black hair and eyes full of malice. I smelled the hellfire and smoke stemming from his skin. I heard the screams of the thousands he and I killed together. I felt the sting of his fist impale my hip. And as my body leaned into the loud portal I tasted the bitter blood in my mouth, but mostly the taste of failure.
Thunder struck the Earth with a great force as I lay curled up in the alley like a baby in the womb. Pouring rain drenched my hair and my clothes were a couple of sheds darker than they normally were, not to mention a couple of pounds heavier. As I awoke, I ignored the searing pain in my side, and realized that I had made it. The portal carried me to Earth but where on earth was I?
. I crawled towards a close by garbage dumpster as my arms forced myself to sit upright once I leaned against it. The area near my right kidney was throbbing as it felt like I was stabbed in the side. Then I remembered: Novus. He caught me off guard, but I was gonna damn sure make sure that he wouldn’t do that again. IT would not only cost me my new life if he did, but his as well. But a question still lingered in the pits off my mind: “Why didn’t he kill me?” This question would have to wait for another time for I first had to figure out where the Hell I was.
My legs were weary but they had just enough strength in them to get me to a local diner where I could get my head straight. Then, as I rose up, I smelled something. I hadn’t been on Earth in awhile but I would always know the smell of its food. I walked out of the alley, using the wall for support. Limping across the traffic strewn road, I moved swiftly for a crippled person. The horns from the automobiles that littered the streets blasted my ear with a force that could’ve ruined my ears permanently. I wanted to just kill them all but that would put my mission in jeopardy. Furthermore, I couldn’t kill them if I tried for my power was weak.
After what seemed like monotonous hours, I stepped into the yellow and black palleted diner. A gust of cold air raised the hair on my skin as soon as I walked in. The sound of country music filling the diner to the point that I noticed the music more than the smell of the delicious food that was cooking. I wasn’t a fan of country but I dealt with it as I sat down in a booth, taking in the smell of the food, remembering Earth’s perks.
The feeling of Earth was a great one to feel, especially after all the shit I just went through. My thoughts were interrupted by an old red-headed female, wrinkles sprinkling over her face.
The old hag spoke with a Southern American dialect as I picked up a menu and quickly surveyed the list of food they had. “What’cha eatin’ hun?”
I tried to crack a false smile and lowly replied, “I’ll have the Baseball Special with bacon and hash browns. Oh, and coffee please. Black.”
She put on a giant smile and replied, “We don’t have anymore hash browns cutie so what else would you like?”
“Oh… strange, I’ll have grits then.”
She repeated part of her earlier statement, “We don’t have grits.” What kind of diner didn’t have half the food they sold? Earth people were so juvenile sometimes. “I’ll have toast then.” She nodded her head, wrote my order down, and hollered the orders to the chefs and came back to give me company in the late night. She patted her fiery red hair and began our conversation with a simple question. “So what’s your name, stranger? You don’t look like you’re from around here, New York maybe?”
“The name is Malus.” As I finished my statement an idea came to mind. I should make my name seem more Earthly. “But I go by Denzel… Denzel Jacobs. I’m from…” I struggled to remember earth cities so I just blurted one out. “I am from Tokyo!” Judging from the look on her face I said something wrong. She couldn’t blame me though; I had been in Hell forever.
“Ma’am, where exactly am I? I’ve been traveling and… Uhhhh… forgot.”
She looked at me with abnormality and said, your in the United States of America, Georgia specifically, The Peach State.” I chuckled as she mentioned where I was.
“Home sweet home… hehhehheh… Home sweet home.” I grabbed a newspaper as I waited for my food searching for three things: a cover-up job, a house, and any strange sightings. As I searched, an article caught the corner of my eye. It was titled “Teaching job available, Dogwood High School.” My search for my Hell Shards had now begun.
Chapter 2
Rain drenched my worn out clothing as I exited the diner, thinking of where to start. So many options were in the air of my new life: I could become an astronaut , flying with the stars and comets or become the president of a country. But I dismissed these dreams for I knew that they would take time and be overbearingly boring. In effect, I chose the option that was in the palm of my hands. I firmly gripped the newspaper, the ink slowly dripping down my smooth and delicate fingers reminding me of the blood that not too long ago dripped down my hands, the crimson color being forever etched into my skin and my past. If only I had stopped there, I thought.
I walked not too far from the diner, searching for the address that I saw in the newspaper for a cheap apartment, until I finally gave up. Everything on Earth is so complicated. Soon as I gazed into the golden sky, I concluded that there was a much easier way to get a nice looking place to live. In the distance I saw a huge building, with a sign labeled “Milton Hotel”. My emerald eyes watched the top of the large building also known as The Penthouse of the Milton Hotel. Life was good.
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A scarlet liquid substance stained the finely manufactured carpet as I paced on the soft floor, blood trickling down my fingers once again. The room was silent as it felt like my thoughts were amplified due to the lack of sound. Then the silence was broken with a faint noise, not recognizable by the human ear. It was the sound of dripping blood, from my fingers. It was soothing, and only increased my hunger and urge for more. I walked towards the window that gave a view of the marvelous city and gazed at the insignificant whelps who roamed the town, living their lives care-free, not knowing what risks that people took to insure that they lived happy lives. They had no idea what true pain was, but they would soon find out.
I turned towards the half naked corpse that lay behind me, void of any signs of life, or happiness for that matter. Pacing towards the figure, I snapped my fingers and a window opened, an unearthly air flushing into the suite with a gentle force at first. The once peaceful gust of wind swirled around my opened palm, dancing to the sweet sound and rhythm of my abnormal heartbeat, periodically swaying while whispering into my ears. Its voice soothed me and calmed my lust down. The air then left my hand as I practically pitched it towards the dead man who rested in the floor. The wind, at first, moved around the body gently, as it did around my hand, but then danced faster and faster until the air was a visible vortex that disintegrated the flesh and bones of the body until there was nothing left to see but a purple glint of light hovering where the body formerly was.
The violet light hovered towards me and soon landed in the palm of my hand- my first Hell shard was now in my possession. Already, I could feel my power being restored to me as I dug the shard into my skin, with the devils blood that flowed through my veins feeding off of its power, slowly eating at it until my skin closed up and it looked good as new, wit no blemishes whatsoever.
After I cleaned the room spotless, free of blood, and any other stains the former resident left behind, and showered to cleanse my body of the blood that raced down my skin, I stepped out onto the balcony with only a towel on and admired the night sky, full of wonder and magic that only it could possess. I breathed in the frigid night air in deeply, and released the cold wind out of my mouth, flowing over my coarse lips like river water. I reached into my back pocket and pulled out a wallet that I had taken earlier- it was the dead mans. He obviously had some money due to the fact that he lived as extravagant as this- pool, theatre, plasma TV’s, stereos, artwork. Hell, he even had a phone that costs 600 American dollars that I snagged from him. He was living large until I came along.
I pulled various things out of the water such as pictures of his family, the key to this suite, a couple dollar bills until I found what I was looking for: credit cards and cash. I slid those and a pack of condoms from his wallet just in case, into my pocket and threw the wallet over the banister, disappearing from my hands reach after only seconds.
A slight breeze of a wind licked my face as I turned towards the main room of my new home. I thought nothing of it until a drop of blood fell off of my cheek. “You caught up very quickly”, I whispered. It was the Aerants, the only capable of such undetectable stealth. The mercenaries of the race were personally hired by Satan himself at often times, whether to protect or kill, I couldn’t tell at this time.
“Well done, Malice. You made it safely. We suspected that you would.” The wispy bodies were invisible to even the sharpest eye. They spoke with a slight slur and practically whispered every word they said. As quiet as these beings were, they were not one to toy with and I had unfortunately experienced this firsthand before.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I smirked, “Cut with the flattery crap, why are you here? Don’t tell me you two are here to spy on me while I’m naked.” A brisk wind ran through the area behind my towel.
One of the duo sighed, “Foolish hybrid, you always think we are trying to start trouble.”
“That’s what most of you murderers are hired for, isn’t it?” It was a widely known fact in Midas that 87 of Aerants were mercs, the other 13 being of federal status, so it all worked out for both groups.
“How can you call us killer’s you incompetent hypocritical fool. Murder is your middle name and you know it. We are here merely to check up on you.” They weren’t lying, murder was my middle name literally and I was known for having a couple of charges on me, that’s why I was here in the first place.
They were basically spying on me. “I knew crabby old Luci would do something so childish like this.” I guess that what I get for my transgressions.
“Think of it what you will, we will sp-… check up on you with every ounce of Lucifer’s Blood Feathers that you consume. Sometimes you shall know we are there, others you shall not…” With that, the duo left, licking my ace once again, with the blood from my cheek dripping down to my tattoo on my chest which read “665”.
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The quiet alleyways of the downtown area raised hairs on most that had passed through her in the night. Occasionally I would hear a cat shriek or a dog whimper, but not much. Every second felt like an eternity as I walked down the jagged side walks that were stained with the blood of many pasts. The area reeked of smog and struggle. All who lived here unhappily were going to die here unhappily, and likewise, all who lived here happily would unfortunately die here unhappily. Out here there wasn’t “a way out” like there was in the movies; there never has been a legitimate smile to walk through this part of town ever since it was conceived by the corrupt government. Many houses here were torn apart, as were the abundant families that had to survive in this place that they called home. Theft, drug distribution, and prostitution were common around this place that was truly a desert, barren of joy, but bountiful of pain. This place was where many lives ended as soon as they begin for they are cursed with the sad fact that they reside in the one place on Earth that could worthily be compared to Hell- the ghetto.
I scoured the rundown area, practically feeling depressed after being here for only a couple of minutes. I sensed a shard close by so I decided before I start my new job at the school that I’d try to regain my strength. I had a week until the school interview, until then, I would use this time to collect feathers. So far I had one from a serial killer who plagued little children, and another two from these twin brothers. None of the three showed any signs of power, so I knew I had been collecting low level feathers. All the big game was back in Midas. I remembered Lucifer’s last words saying how I could not come back to Midas until I collected 333 feathers and Hell until I collected 666. Things could’ve been so different if I had just listened to my father. Now because of my sins, I had to follow the same path he did.
I must’ve kicked down at least 50 doors before I found the source of the Hell shard in… a dog. As I began to summon the Winds of Hell into my palm, I vaulted backwards into the middle of the street, landing on all fours. I lifted my body up and saw a gun being pointed towards my head. And my back. And my gut. And both my legs. And both my arms. “Fuck!”, was all I could say. I gazed at the half dozen figures whose fingers begged to pull a trigger. They all wore similar attire with a patch on the right side with an insignia on it.
Suddenly, the one who pointed the gun towards my head spoke. “What did you do with Mr. Black? Answer me know or you’ll have your head splattered on the grounds of this hellhole.”
I was stuck. I had no weapons on me since the gun store wasn’t open on Sundays, and I didn’t have enough feathers to unleash my power. All I could do in this complex situation was answer. “Who the hell is Mr. Black?” I heard one of the hammers of the guns draw back.
“You know who Mr. Black is. The top Merc Boss in the city. One of our scouts saw you entering his apartment days ago. And he hasn’t exited his hotel room since, but you have been going in it like you live there. We know you did something. Now tell us where he is!”
These guys obviously weren’t playing around. So I orchestrated a plan with the few seconds of my life that I had left. My powers weren’t in top shape, but my fighting skills were damn sure top notch. “He hasn’t told you!”
“Told us about what?” the gunman replied. He was slightly off guard. It was all the time I needed.
“He hasn’t told you that I was gonna kick all of your asses if you ever fucked with me!” I reached towards the gun that stroked my head, and twisted it, releasing it from his grip, doing the same with the gunman behind me. I now had two firearms in my hand as I vaulted high into the sky, the barrels of my guns aiming towards each of the men’s heads. At the peak of my jump, as they looked at the sky, stunned at such a feat of physical prowess, I dived down, emptying the clips of the guns at each one of them. I let loose a volley of bullets on them, bullets protruding through their skin like a pencil through paper. My adrenaline was at its highest point as half a dozen bodies hit the floor, five of them dead, one of them critical. As the other corpses lay on the ground, I grabbed the one still clinging on to his life with force and asked him one simple question. “Where is the headquarters?”
He stumbled over his words as blood trickled out of his worthless mouth. “1570 Weaver Lane in Atlanta, Georgia. Please don’t kill me!!!”
I chuckled, “I’m afraid you should’ve valued your life more before you tried to kill me you wannabe son of a bitch. What kind if gang member are you, crying for his mommy when he faces death. So worthless…” I smacked him with the nose of my gun and shoved the barrel into his mouth not allowing him to speak. “Ya see, your boss is dead. I killed him, but his death was much faster than yours.” I clicked the hammer on the gun and continued, “Tell your boss in Hell that his merc gang has just now found a new boss. Remember the name- Malice.” He screamed in sight of my Hellish face, as I pulled the trigger on the gun. “Don’t burn up too quickly in Hell” BANG!!! Birds in trees flew, and dogs barked.
I brushed the dust off of my black suit jacket, and took in the view of all the people who lived in this desolate excuse for a neighborhood staring me down, mixed with eyes full of fear, hatred, and nonchalant ness. The people who lived here saw stuff like this every day, so they were not surprised. I threw the guns in the nearby dumpster, and took the dog that I was going to kill not too long ago. I took him by his leash and walked him to his new home- my house. We walked into the sunset, a whole hood staring behind us, watching like it was a normal in day in their lives.
