Abaddon (Demonology III)

V

FINN

With the Needle safely stored in Heaven for the time being, I decided to wander about the mortal world, getting a good look at the people I was preparing to fight for, before I met back up with Lilith.

  I strode through the streets of Paris, a city I had been in earlier in the year. It was once a thriving megacity, full of art and culture was now 40 square miles of slums. In an act of childish destruction, Abaddon and Lucifer had bathed the city in fire and brimstone. It was almost unrecognizable, aside from the Eiffel Tower - which stood in shambles - and the sealed off Louvre. 

  Still covered in my hood and moving in the shadows, I searched for any glimmer of hope, any sign of resistance amongst these poor people. I found what I was looking for, but I wasn't too thrilled about it. 

  Chalked onto a brick wall on the side of a run-down apartment building was a buckler shield with the flower of life in the center. The emblem of the Holy Shield. While, in origin, was a force for good, I had very few good memories of the Shield. The name only brought to mind corpses and betrayal. Though the Shield did introduce me to Lilith, too many lives were lost while I was with them for me to revel in the memory.

  I approached the graffiti with caution. It could have been a magic circle of sorts, like the ones used for summoning and teleporting. I had never seen the Holy Shield's symbol used as nothing more than an insignia, but I still was wary about the motif. 

  "What do you know about the Holy Shield?" A childlike voice sounded quietly. I turned around to see a girl who couldn't have been any older than twelve. She had a round face, which I could see was pale under all the dirt covering her, and had a pair of bent bifocals sitting on the bridge of her nose. Her clothes were equally decayed, and she gripped a small blade in her hand. 

  "More than I'd like to." I leaned against the wall and slid to the ground with a sigh. She kept her dark eyes locked on me, her fist trembling from how hard she gripped her knife. Judging from her silence, she expected more out of me.

  "Shit, where do I begin?" I sighed again. "The Holy Shield was an army of poor, gullible souls. Their leader was a lying megalomaniac named Clay. He's responsible for the deaths of a couple of old friends of mine, but I happily put an end to him not too long ago. Now, they're done." A painful silence hung in between the girl and I for what felt like an eternity.

  "My friend says she was a member. She said she wants to find them and start a new army. She thinks she can beat the King."

  "Hmm. What's her name? Hell, I might know her." I gave a chuckle. I knew there was merely a slim chance of me actually being familiar with the girl's friend, as all my close acquaintances in the Shield were now dead aside from Lilith.

  "Luna."