The Devil's Gift/The Bloody Handed

6

Love Me Again- John Newman is suggested 🎶

I breathe in as I wait for a response. I feel my head grow heavy and my ears start to pound with pressure.

Don't be a coward now. You were so full of yourself not too long ago. You want me so bad? I am right here. Fresh bait, bitch. The field is yours, so play in it.

I suddenly see myself in the same room that I was introduced first to months ago. I look around. It must have worked. I look around and see something slowly emerge from the corner of my eye. I turn and see a familiar figure slowly approach me, except charred and worn.

"Looks like they did a number on you." I cross my arms.

"Shut up. You're supposed to be dead. You and your boyfriend both."

"Yeah, well you obviously didn't try hard enough."

"You do understand it takes only the snap of my fingers to kill you. All of you."

"Not true. You would have done it by now. I've been seeing your little creations try and make
their way into Hawkins. We found your motivation. The oak trees." I needed to stalk for as long as possible.

"You're not as dumb as I originally thought, my niece." He extends him long and creepy arm and I lean back.

"Don't touch me. You're a murderer."

He laughs a low laugh and walks closer to me. "If I'm a murderer, then you are too Clary Gregerson- or, should I say Absinthe Kreel."

"That's not my name." I spit.

"Oh, my dear sissy- your mommy never told you?" He laughs again, gaining in on distance. "Your birth name is Absinthe Kreel. She changed it as soon as she found out I was still walking and alive, thinking that would keep me away. I know it all. Still powerful, ready to kill. You really are pathetic and clueless aren't you? I could have changed that, but you chose those idiotic twits." My brain suddenly started to cloud. Absinthe? Why was I never told? Was that why I was never able to "find" my birth certificate every time I needed it?

"I chose to not become like you." I retort.

"Oh, but you are like me Absinthe. We share the same blood, the same family line. You're destined to be like me."

"No. I'm. Not." I grind my teeth, walking backwards.

"You're The Damned for a reason. You're supposed to serve under me! And you've seen what happens when you don't."

My back hits a wall and I turn around, trying to bang onto it. Shit. I turn around and we are face to face. "I'm sensing a little morality. You could have killed me by now."

"Oh, maybe not you.." he laughs and my heart starts to race. "Leave my friends alone!" He laughs more. I close my eyes and hold out my hand, the anger in my veins flowing to my head. I hear him scream in pain, and I feel sucked back into reality. I open my eyes to fire and screaming.

"Clary!" Dustin screams as he swings at Demobats.

"Where's Eddie?!" I yell. Dustin points to the corner. I run over and Eddie is swinging rapidly. "We need to get out of here!" Eddie looks at me and we go over and join Dustin.

"Fuck! We're trapped." I look down at the attic to see Demobats flooding the ladder. I pull up the trap door, and look to the attic window. "We need to jump!"

"That's like twenty feet up!" Eddie yells.

"What else do we do?!" Dustin asks.

"There's nothing. I'd rather break a few bones than deal with these fucks again." I run over to the window and try to pull it up and open. It doesn't budge. I feel the fire smoke travel into my lungs as I struggle to find oxygen.

"We're fucked!" Eddie says holding his head.

"Just- help me!" I choke out as I pull up. Eddie and Dustin run over to me and start to pull up with me. Nothing.

"Stand back!" Eddie yells. We all stand back and Eddie takes a swift step back with his right leg. He swings it at the window, the glass shattering. The smoke darts to the oxygen and I stick my head out trying to get some myself. Dustin starts to break away at the glass with his hat, chiseling it away.

The attic door starts to pound heavily.

"Go, go, go!" I motion to the window and Dustin starts to crawl out.

The attic door finally gives in, the bats squealing. I grab Eddie's hand, tugging him out of the window with me. I put my foot out, coughing. Eddie steps right behind me, but then is tugged back immediately.

"Eddie!" I yell. His body starts to lay horizontally on the ground as the bats bite and tug at his boots with their death grip tails. He kicks them, but they don't give in. I reach my other hand out onto his arms, and try not to slide off of the roof. "Don't let go!"

He screams at they impale his flesh and bones. I see blood spurt and I start to hysterically cry. "Please, Eddie! Pull harder!" He screams more as bats start to lunge at his sides.

"Dustin, I need a weapon! Hurry!" Dustin throws me up a pole and I start to smack the bats with it. Eddie looks at up me and smiles. "Eddie.." he looks at me, blood starting to come from the side of his lips. "Eddie." I look at his hands then to him. His smile grows, and his teeth are covered in red. "Eddie.. please! Fight this, damnit!"

"Clary Gregerson.. the girl that never gives up."

I shake my head at him. "No, no, no, no, no. You're NOT giving up on me, Munson!" Tears start to spill down my face and my throat closes. I hear Dustin yell at me from the ground. "You said forever!" I yell, trying not to choke.

"Get the fuck away from him!" I yell at the bats and start to smack them even harder. They start to bite into him more, his screams now becoming more antagonizing. I grip my nails into the unsteady roof, my nail beds coming off. I needed back up, I needed to get to him-

"Clary." I look up and he unties his handkerchief from his head. Spitting out a fountain of blood, he tucks the handkerchief into my hand and folds it over.

No. No. Not now, not here. We were fine, we had this.

"I love you, Clary Gregerson." And just like that, I fell several feet down. It all felt in slow motion. I teach my arm up as he smiles at me looking down, his screaming becoming even more blood curdling than before.

I love you too, Eddie Munson.