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A harsh breath, a sharp intake. Jagged teeth worming their way out of rotted and slick gums as it shambled forwards on cruelly bent and twisted legs, baring its yellowed and pointed daggers to its crowd. Nothing. Nothing had prepared anyone for the uprising of the Angels or the demons that followed like loyal and devoted, brainless dogs after them.
The twisted and contorted soul trampled forwards, clattering through people like dolls In its own fantasy playground as it scrambled over to him. His legs trembled, twitching in the icy, hellish cold that washed over him, mimicking the fragile fold of the leaves skittering across the pavement. The Cacodemon rose, hands and arms dripping with melted skin and viscera as its throat gurgled with a garbled groan and screech. It sounded beyond pain and most of all, beyond saving. Nothing Atticus could do would ease what little life it still had coursing through those twitching veins. He tried, lifting a scratched and bloodied palm, whispering those familiar words in his head as he begged and pleaded for all the carnage to stop, or maybe for it to crescendo into a haunting symphony and finally fizzle to a quiet stop after a few agonising moments. It was here now, drool trickling down its split open face, grey matter colliding with blood mottled and teary peeled open cheeks and muscle as it hunched over his body. Atticus's hand twitched, fingers scraping across leathery skin as they searched for his target. Once that all too sickeningly familiar carved-out chest met his blistered fingertips, he dove in. Ear splitting screeches and cries filling the air as he dug deeper; the Cacodemon wrapped around his fingers as it mewled in pathetic helplessness above Atticus's crumpled form. He hated this, despised that the only way he could make it better was to make it worse, Despised the power that flooded his body, infecting every last limb. clenching his fist he pushed in further to the enveloping sheath of blistering heat, wrapping an almost tentative hand around the whimpering creatures heart as he murmured hesitant words beneath his breath, "you're alright, I am not here to harm".
Grimacing at the wet and sludgy warmth that trickled down his forearm, Atticus slowly retracted it from the ghouls chest with a gentle tug.
Sparing a wary glance over its shoulder he stumbled back, face horror stricken as an Angel ever so slowly trailed towards them, lifting its rifle with a cruel grin and a satisfied gleam in its eyes. "Go" Atticus hissed, placing his hand on the creatures melded together form of limbs that certainly weren't all its own. Stepping out into the light again after being huddled behind the Cacodemon for so long, Atticus squints as his face twists into a frown. smearing a bead of sweat away from his furrowed brow before it could get the chance to dribble down his flushed face, he takes another step towards the Angel. Pausing, as if to register the display of pure, vile, holy violence before him, Atticus's breath hitches. An optic nerve greets him in holy appraisal as the Angel takes a deliberate step closer to his frozen form; their eye hangs, snuggling closely to its cheek as it blows gently in the wind. His heart stops, spine curling forwards as his stomach churns, eventually emptying its contents onto the dusty and blood stained pavement with a sob. water swims in his vision, blurring the ghastly view of another beings fucking eye detached and idly dangling precariously from its previous seating. Just thinking of it causes another wave of burning, yellowed acid to crawl its way out of his throat and land on the pavement with a splat. Pressing his grazed palms to the ground as tears freefall past his own--and thankfully still in their rightful places, eyes, Atticus stands on quivering legs and scuttles backwards. An eery smile creeps its way across the split and scarred cheeks of the angel, its hand stretching out in a beckoning motion. All he can seem to look at is that eye, the one so free from its socket as grey matter and blood well around it and make a desperate heading for the floor; the pupil shrunken and shrivelled yet somehow trained on his own. As if the sight wasn't enough, the sound of the angels voice deftly curling through the wind was. Screeching, squawking chirps and hums intended to guide him forwards, escape from parted lips as wheezes claw their way from his own throat in desperation for a single real dose of oxygen. Another step. Its form gets closer; closer still as it keeps humming and chanting those low bird like noises at him. Once its Angelic, white robed figure gets close enough, Atticus is sure he fully stops breathing. The Angels face splits further, its smile twisting upwards, a river of sinew and muscle etching its way into the creatures face as it leans close enough for its wet, putrid breath to spill against his neck in a sickening caress. A throbbing, equally mutilated hand, brushes over his shoulder before gripping onto the bones, squeezing and grasping painfully. His skin breaks beneath the drag of the Angels scraping nails, blood weeping out from little stretched clouds of white as he squirms. Glancing down, he sees skin peeled back from the creatures fingers, exposing the raw, pink flesh beneath as its veins pulsate and twitch beneath a think layer of remaining meshy tissue, the exposed nail beds thick with cling ons and smudges of dust from their destroyed and crumbling surroundings as they slip into the torn sleeve of his T-shirt. It wasn't the hauntingly gruesome sight that led to Atticus's heart picking up in its disjointed beats, nor was it the feeling of those eerily cold peeled bananas for fingers, it was the tormenting whistle against the soft cartilage of his ear of a song he'd thought he'd broken away from; pressed tight into his unwilling mind as he scrambled to get away. A song he'd had to pray to back in the conclave as he pressed his knees to the harsh stone in the Grand Achirus Church, the place he'd sought to get rid of when he'd fled and crossed that bridge. One they'd sung and danced to back in those beautifully etched halls of holy grace and marble, back in the place he'd once called home. A macabre of death, a macabre of all those souls the Angels had culled for being unholy as they danced about in the fluttering white robes they dawned to show their devotion to the lord. The tune continued, burrowing itself unceremoniously into his mind until he found his hand bawling into fists and lifting threateningly to his chest. Flinging one thoughtlessly through the air, Atticus doesn't so much as feel the pain as the outraged howl and a stomach wrenching crack as his knuckles collide with the wet and swollen muscle exposed in a now vanishing smile on the Holy's face. The Angels messy, searing grasp on him wavers as he yanks himself away and throws another, harder, crueller punch. The unadulterated hatred of Azazel sloshing around in his organs driving each swing as they messily grapple to the ground. He hits faster, using both fists now as the wails and cries of the Angel beneath him do nothing but fuel Azazel's satisfaction, and maybe a little of his own? panting harshly and sitting himself comfortably down on the twisted neck beneath him, Atticus grabs at the torn face and smashes it into the concrete over and over. screams of his own bubbling from his throat in painful and sorrow stricken gulps as his throat gurgles with Azazel's poison. He hadn't asked for any of this, hadn't asked to be held down as he hiccupped and begged for it to stop as the needle pushed into his spine and infected him with that disgusting black sludge. His thumb pushes into the empty eye socket, cutting off the connection between the Angels once free hanging eye and its rightful place; pressing down on a thin, stretched nerve as the back of the Holy's skull caves in, mush and brain matter smearing over the greyed ground as he continues to scream his throat raw; The Angels wails fading off to whimpers before ceasing completely as It sinks, boneless into a pool of its own blessed insides. The boy doesn't register the thick, black tears streaming down his face until they're blurring his haze filled vision, the figure beneath his swimming in a pond of Gods agony as he throws himself away from it. He feels sick, turning his body away Atticus gags, a thick piece of flesh catching in his throat as he curls over and sobs. Reaching a trembling hand upwards, he digs his fingers into his mouth and down his throat drawing up the rotted, necrose, and tainted piece of moist tissue as he sobs pathetically; cradling himself in his own arms for an ounce of cold comfort. The Holy's infection was spreading too fast for his liking, worming its way into his weak mind and wreaking havoc on it until he would finally go insane and turn into the Demon he was idolised to be. He had the rest of the summer; a few more months to figure this out and get away for good before his limbs swelled and dripped like the wax from a candle. Before wings ripped through his back, shredding his skin like paper in an uncareful child's hands, and his face became unrecognisable...