The Assassin and the Knight

by Rick Bonogofsky

  “More tea?” a waitress asked, snapping Vincent out of his thoughts.

  “Oh, um… no thanks, I still have half a cup left,” he stammered quietly. He chided himself for not noticing the girl approach. He wasn’t paying attention to his warrior instincts. What if she had been an assailant coming after him? He shook the notion away, silently berating himself. This human barista was just a girl, no older than twenty, he figured. Her red hair fell behind her in a ponytail, and her amber eyes seemed to examine the man in front of her.

  “Well if you need anything, my name is Ariel,” she smiled.

  “Thank you,” Vincent mumbled as she walked away. She seemed to be a curiosity to him, which caused him to wonder if he had seen her before. She looked familiar somehow. He pushed thoughts of the human girl away and went back to his tea.

  Jake shifted in his seat, once again sitting across from his current doctor. Their session had gone back to the day he set the fire and the discussion was becoming uncomfortable for him.

  “Tell me again why you believe you are immortal,” the doctor said. He adjusted his glasses and folded his hands on his desk, looking at Jake expectantly.

  Jake scratched his head, trying to figure out a way to word his response. “Well, I suppose it’s because my dad wasn’t human,” he replied slowly.

  “Not human?” the doctor asked. “How is that possible?”

  “You remember the big war that destroyed everything?”

  The doctor nodded.

  “Demons started it.”

  “That’s just the favorite urban legend,” the doctor countered.

  “That’s what humanity thinks, anyway,” Jake stated. “I was there at the beginning. My mother found out the truth from the demon in our basement, with some help from Dad.”

  “I can imagine that the war was indeed terrible, and many people did many horrible things, which I’m sure some would attribute to a demonic nature, but demons don’t exist, Jake. It was simply the work of evil men with too much power.”

  Jake shook his head. “That’s what we would have thought, too, but we learned differently. I mean, look at the second half of the war. Our history books show angels fighting alongside humans to beat the demons.”

  “And paintings from the medieval era show dragons and unicorns, but no evidence has been found stating they exist either.”

  “Which just brings us to why I’m here, doctor,” Jake sighed. “The world would believe I’m crazy because humanity has forgotten about what it once feared, and not because it was unknown. Humans used to fear the night, knowing that werewolves and vampires were out there, waiting to kill and eat lost travelers. Humans used to fear dragons and devils. They used to pray for angels and fairies, and they longed to see a unicorn in the forest. All because they believed. Then humans began to covet those creatures, so they all went into hiding. Because of the greed of humanity, these other beings hid from them. Eventually, humanity started to believe they never existed in the first place, just some fanciful tale of the supernatural. So people think I’m crazy for my beliefs, and since I can’t find any evidence, I start to feel that they’re all right, that I am actually crazy.” Jake realized he was now standing and his breathing had grown heavy. He returned to his seat and calmed himself down.

  The doctor took a deep breath and said, “Well, it is clear that you know exactly what is wrong with you. Many people with mental conditions are not as self-aware as you seem to be. I believe with the progress we have made, we can help you much faster than before.”

  Jake shook his head, saying, “I hope you’re right. As good as the doctors here have been, and as much as I like the food, I’m not so certain the help will stick. I’ve been here too many times over the years to have hope for a cured mind.”

  The doctor leaned forward, a hopeful smile on his face. “Have faith, Jake. You will feel better in time.”

  Ibsen went the basement level of his building and went through the decontamination process to enter the labs. He walked with his hands clasped behind his back, manicured fingernails scraping gently across his palms. The recent developments made by his teams of scientists were increasingly promising, with more and more reports of breakthroughs every week. When the vampires had stumbled upon one of the weapon caches belonging to Hell, they simply thought they gained archaic weapons from a bygone era. It was not until a vampire got a lucky strike on a demon guard that they realized the potential. For eons, demons were immensely more powerful than vampires, largely due to the fact that the vampires were woefully ill equipped. Basic weapons were virtually useless against the hell spawns, but angelic weapons had an effect that the vampires never had. The weapons could actually wound the demons, which meant they could also kill them. Ibsen found out about this and quickly devised a plan to weaken the demons’ hold on Hell, while steadily researching ways to replicate the effects of the angelic weapons. He had samples examined to reveal the chemical makeup of the rare metal. Once he had the information, Ibsen ordered mass production of the new weapons to properly outfit his armies. With the few invasions into Hell, Ibsen’s men were able to kill several demons and take their weapons, in hopes that the demonic metals would prove just as useful. He was glad to find the weapons given to demons had properties similar to the angelic weapons, leading him to believe they could be used against angels. Unfortunately, there was no easy way to get into Heaven, and no angels could be found on Earth. Until very recently, with the banishing of Vincent. Finally, there was an angel on Earth that Ibsen could get his hands on, and he could finally test out the demonic weapons on him. The vampire lord smiled with the promise of advancement, knowing that he would eventually control more than just the Earth.

  Lab technicians went about their tasks, keeping the flow of progress going. Many of them looked up and noticed their vampire leader entering the room. They nodded deferentially, but never strayed from their work. Ibsen was glad for this. These intelligent men and women knew that continuing was more important than pausing to greet the boss. One scientist, however, broke away from his computer to approach Ibsen.

  “How are the specimens, doctor?” the vampire asked cordially.

  The scientist wiped his brow and shrugged, saying, “Well, sir, they’re still unstable. We’re unable to properly bond the DNA together.”

  “So no change, then?” Ibsen asked, mildly disappointed that all this time spent amounted to nothing.

  “Not yet, sir. You see, the problem we’re facing is that the different strains of DNA that we have seem to be insufficient,” the man explained.

  “You’re telling me the blood we collected from that demon isn’t enough?”

  “Well,” the doctor sighed, “It was a great boon, really, until we realized that it was actually too strong. It completely takes over the other traits. The demon DNA simply refuses to share its traits with anything else. It appears that even on the cellular level, there are no partial demons. Every demon, no matter its parentage, is fully demon. Which actually came as an amazing discovery to all of us here.”

  “Why is that? That doesn‘t seem to make any biological sense, even considering the supernatural nature of demons.” Ibsen implored. His curiosity was piqued now. He had never known that about demons; he just figured being part demon instantly made a creature many times more powerful.

  “Think of it as a sort of parasite that eventually takes over the host, but does so incredibly fast. It means that as long as we hold a single cell of demon blood, we can always make more any time we need it. And, when demon DNA takes over a new host, it completely rewrites the existing DNA into that of a demon.”

  “A new host, you say? As in-“

  “Yes, sir, we are able to create our own demons. Completely loyal to you. The only problem is, whichever embryo you inject with demon DNA becomes fully demon. So if you breed all of your new soldiers as demons, you’ll no longer have any vampires. That’s the downside.”

  Ibsen considered this for a moment. Certainly, it would be a great b
oon to have an army of demons at his command, but at the cost of his own people? That was far beyond what he was willing to do. “Keep the information safe, doctor,” he said at length. “We will only create small batches, and even then, only at those facilities approved by me. There’s no sense in accidentally unleashing feral demons if our control fails. How are the other experiments coming along? How are my hybrids?”

  The doctor led Ibsen to another area of the lab to an observation cell. Behind the thick glass were several grotesque creatures, bent and misshapen from physical defects, leaving them in constant pain and unable to move or act. Ibsen looked at the creatures with a mixture of pity and revulsion.

  “These are the latest test subjects. They were cloned from the other DNA we’ve been splicing. We were finally able to successfully bond DNA from vampire, werewolf, and human blood. On the cellular level, the different strands of DNA bonded much more easily than we anticipated, but when it came to actually growing them, the physical traits seemed to all try to dominate the others all at once. Unfortunately, all of the dominant traits won that battle, giving us what you see here. We thought that the demon blood would give them the strength to form healthy bodies, but once we realized what the demon DNA was doing to the host, we decided to wait for your approval before we simply grow demon clones.”

  “A wise decision,” Ibsen nodded, falling deep into thought. “Go ahead and begin the process. I wouldn’t mind having a few demons under my command. They could be useful. Just do one batch, and we’ll see what they’re able to do. We’ll test them here, then we’ll see which of the other facilities can accommodate them.”

  “Yes, sir. I’ll dispose of these subjects as well, now that you’ve seen them. Also, I’ll have my team continue experiments to strengthen the bond in our current hybrids.”

  “Very good, doctor. Send word to the outlying facilities and have them issue a report to me regarding their progress. I wish to see what else might work in the bonding process.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Anything, yet?” came the electronic voice in Zhun’s headset. She sat atop a building in New York, invisible to the humans below, and carefully watched Vincent as he wandered the city.

  “Nothing useful,” she responded. Her constant vigil was beginning to wear on her nerves. The cat-like demoness was used to lengthy stakeouts, but this one bored her. The angel did nothing of any interest. He just sat in a café once or twice a day and continued wandering. He had no direction or goal, leaving Zhun to uncomfortably camp out on top of tall buildings. “He got a smile from a pretty girl earlier. That’s literally the most interesting thing that’s happened lately.”

  The voice on the other end sighed heavily. “Damn… I’d have thought he would make contact with someone by now.”

  “Me too, Berron,” Zhun muttered. “Have you uncovered anything on the man he spoke with the other day?”

  “Not much. Looks like he’s just a drifter, but he has ties to the big tech corporation here on Earth.”

  “A drifter with connections at Globe Tech? That didn’t strike you as odd?”

  “Of course it did,” Berron replied indignantly. “But that was all I could find out. I’m still digging, though. Should have more soon.”

  “Good. I need something interesting before I go insane from boredom.”

  “Same here… I’ll let you know what I find.”

  “Thanks, Berron. Be safe.”

  “You be safe. You’re the one spying on a demon-killing angel.”

  That brought a wry grin from Zhun, and she leaned on the low wall on top of the building overlooking the café. A light breeze picked up the smell of coffee, leaving the demoness wanting a cup. She rationalized that it would help her keep a closer eye on the angel if she went down for a drink. Needing no other motivation, she carefully slipped down the side of the building, catching herself on the windows and small ledges along the way. With her cat-like reflexes, she gracefully landed on the sidewalk and shifted her appearance to that of a beautiful young woman with long black hair and inviting blue eyes. She looked around to make sure no one was watching, and let her invisibility fade. Several heads turned to watch her walk by as she entered the café, making her smile to herself. Men were so easy to impress. She ordered a latte and sat across the room from Vincent, who had no idea he was being watched.

  A faint scent wafted to Zhun’s nose, causing her to briefly glance at the young angel. She smelled feathers and armor, and worst of all, angelic self-righteousness. It made her nose wrinkle, but what made it even more suspicious was she realized the smell was not coming from Vincent. It was coming from somewhere else, somewhere nearby.

  CHAPTER NINE

  The smell of fish and wet fur caused the wounded man to stir on his cot. He slowly and painfully propped himself up on his elbows to survey the area around him. The other people in the small hut looked at him as he moved, one of them, an old woman, rushed to help the man sit upright. She said something to him in a language he couldn’t understand, then began checking the wrapping on his chest wound. Blood had soaked through the bandages, and the wound itself looked as if it had been caused by a blade coated in a white hot fire. Blackened flesh ringed the deep wound, with more charred muscle tissue visible further in. The old woman replaced the soiled bandages with new ones, being careful to not bring any more pain than necessary to the wounded man. She asked him a question again, this time using what sounded like a different language, but the man still did not understand. He shook his head and looked at her in confusion. She pursed her wrinkled lips and tried again. Her faded brown eyes looked into his crimson orbs and, in broken Latin, she asked, “How are you feeling?”

  The man finally understood, and smiled. “I’m… I think I’m okay,” he replied in Latin. He looked down at his wounded chest and grimaced. “What happened?”

  The old woman looked at him in amazement. “You don’t know?” she asked. “This should be something you’d remember.”

  The man shrugged, then grunted in pain as the movement caused the wound on his chest to reopen in several places. More blood seeped into the previously clean bandages. The old woman tried pushing on his shoulder to get him to lay down again, but he resisted.

  “Do not move,” she admonished. “You need to rest.”

  “I will,” the man winced, clutching his chest. “What the hell happened to me?”

  The old woman sighed, shaking her head. “It looks like you were stabbed. The wound is partially cauterized, which almost explains how you survived. I don’t know any more than that.”

  “Great… Well, where am I, then?”

  “You’re in my home near El’gygytgyn Lake,” she replied.

  “El-ja-ge-tin…” he tried slowly, rolling the word around in his mouth for a moment. “Good lord, woman, how does that word even exist? And where is that?” the wounded man implored.

  The old woman looked at him in confusion again. “You must be suffering from amnesia. You’re in Siberia, young man. Do you not remember anything?”

  The man shrugged again, once more eliciting a pained grunt. “Maybe I at least have short term memory loss,” he rasped. “I keep forgetting that hurts.”

  “Then stop doing it. You won’t heal if you keep reopening your wound. Can you tell me your name?”

  “Adrian,” the man said offhandedly. “Can’t you sew it shut? Isn’t that how you people heal?”

  The old woman’s stern visage shifted to irritable surprise. “What do you mean by ‘you people?’?”

  Adrian nearly shrugged again, but remembered the pain associated with the motion and decided against it. “You people. Humans. Sew me shut, human.”

  “Human? You speak like someone who doesn’t believe himself to be human.”

  “Because I’m not,” Adrian muttered. “Now go get a needle and some thread, and sew this hole shut, please. And find some glue, I think my sternum needs to be put back together.”

  The old woman shook her head and went to find t
he needed supplies. She figured this man was delirious from pain and had likely suffered a head injury as well. Plus, he was found nearly frozen on the shore of the lake. There was no telling just how long he had been out there.

  Adrian slowly leaned back against the wall of the hut and looked around again, taking note of the three men sitting at the only table in the tiny hovel. He nodded to them, wincing at the pain in his chest. They nodded back, but continued to eye him warily. He could not blame them, after all. He did make himself out to be a crazy person in their eyes. It was not his fault the humans no longer believed in the existence of his kind. He sat on the cot, contemplating what he should do next. The last thing he remembered was being stabbed through the heart by his brother. The memory brought feelings of anger and confusion to him, and he felt his heart sink. He was killed by his own brother. Admittedly, Adrian had killed Anna, the demon that Vincent was in love with, but there was a reasonable explanation for that. She was guilty of high treason, after all. Adrian felt a great deal of shame for what he had done, justified or not, and he knew he had hurt his brother deeply with his actions. But the angel could have had a better reaction. Adrian felt he did not deserve to be killed over the whole ordeal. He smiled at the thought of finally being beaten. He always figured he would die in combat, not stabbed through the heart by his own brother. The notion both amused and saddened him. Most likely, his father would have simply banished the angel instead of executing him. Dante always had a relatively kind heart, but banishment usually meant eventual death anyway. Adrian shook his head at the thought of Vincent dying alone and scared. It simply did not fit the angel’s personality. What would probably end up happening is Vincent would seek out a contact on Earth, find a way to live fairly well while also finding a way to make himself useful. The angel would likely find a settlement to protect and watch over, as his biological father had done in the past.