Nemesis of Hell and Evil

Chapter 4: Out of Commission

I step off the transport ship and find myself in an entirely new location that shares nothing with my last destination. My squad has arrived with me, and we're currently aboard a space station.

That's right, a space station. Many once considered this to be a mere fantasy, but this is an actual space station. A fully functional one, too, and unfortunately one of few. The name it's been given is rather symbolic, the International Space Station—ISS abbreviated, high above the Earth in its atmosphere where thankfully demons don't reside, although some have tried to break our position before.

The reality is that humanity once upon a time commanded massive armies, one would expect more, but this is all that's left besides local pockets of resistance. Almost everyone fights for themselves, rarely do they fight together side by side.

There are a few exceptions, some of which are not good. Some people just want to see the world burn, even abetting our invaders to quicken the whole process. I'd like to consider us to be an exception in this crude world as well, for many countries and hopes fight within our ranks. No—Countries or nations don't matter here. What unites them is our determination to see this world returned to a state of peace, and that just happens to require the death of demons and their allies alike.

We call ourselves the UHC—United Humanity Coalition. I don't use that name to describe myself, not anymore, but some of the people here deserve to use it, or at least I'd like to think so. There are several thousand of us here, and that should put into perspective just how little of humanity has persisted through disasters. Of course, supposedly millions are out there, still holding on to their dear life.

The doors open as I walk near them, making my way through the metal corridors inwards. There are some plants around which confirm life prevails even here. I've been called by our leader of operations, one of the few people I know up here. Eventually, I make it to the very room where he resides, along with several other high-ranking members of our resistance, most of them former members of an army.

We're not all fighters, though, and those of us who aren't are important as well, or so they say. I guess to win a battle of time, you need to have the means to keep on fighting.

A man I know too well stands before me overlooking the table, expectant that I'd arrive at any moment. His hair is short and brown just like his eyes and he's tall in stature.

"You're all right, Nemesis!" he says.

I grunt. "To my surprise this time."

He nods to everyone else, and they leave the room to give us two some privacy.

"You look exhausted, Grant," I note.

"Every second you were down there was a battle, so of course I'd be somewhat tired. We're lucky to have intercepted a few demons of our own to ease the potential encounter," he responds.

That's Theodore Grant, as resourceful as always. To hear he was having my back this entire time is oddly comforting, especially when there are so few you can trust. However, my mood quickly plummets.

"In the end, it was for nought, though. Astaroth escaped and Abaddon did what he set out to do. We couldn't—No, I couldn't—"

"Hold on a moment. It wasn't for nought, was it? Now we know that Astaroth is indeed very much real. More than that, I hear you wounded the angel. Is that true?" he asks curiously.

"It'd be more accurate to say he clipped his wing, for reasons beyond me. Most likely to escape my grasp."

"That's amazing! And the blow you caused; our fingers were crossed that function would work how we intended it to. It's only to be expected they'd flee, it would be far too good, almost too good if we managed to finish one of them off," he says almost as if in a trance.