Killer From Purgatory || BBS

Chapter 1

EDIT: just fixed a minor inconsistency, sorry for the notification
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The grandfather clock stood next to the counter he leaned on as he looked around the empty store, many of the items inside had been gathering dust for quite a while. It was an hour away from closing time, the cashier yawned as he pulled out his phone, checking the time and frowning at his lack of notifications.

Craig groans, pushing his phone back into his pocket and resting his head against the cool glass counter, wanting to go home already. He grasps the ring on his hand, slipping it off and admiring it, smiling at the thought of his engagement with Tyler before growing sad that his brother won't be there to witness his wedding.

A bell goes off as the front door opens, and the demon immediately perks up and smiles at who entered. "Hello, welcome!" The customer flashes a smile before ducking their head down and beginning to browse the store, meanwhile Craig pretends to be busy doing something at the counter, slipping the ring back onto his finger. A few minutes later, another person enters, the bell ringing once again. "Hello, welcome!" Craig smiles once again, which the customer gladly returns.

The first customer approaches the counter, an item held in the palm of his hand is carefully placed in front of Craig. It's a necklace, made of leather with two metal charms, one was of some kind of bird skull while the other was a butcher knife. A unique find. "Is this all?" Craig asks as he checks the small price tag and using the calculator next to him to figure out the tax. The customer nods, Craig smiles again. "That'll be four eighty-two." A ten is placed on the counter.

"Keep the change." The customer says as Craig takes the bill, his eyes fly to the ring on the cashier's finger. "Congratulations."

Craig's brows furrow with confusion. "Excuse me?"

The customer gestures to his hand. "You're wearing an engagement ring, I congratulated you on your engagement. I don't often see men wearing rings, is your fiancé wearing one too?"

"Well I certainly hope he's wearing his, otherwise that's kinda of rude." The customer produces a small smile at Craig's comment, his eyes on the glass surface of the counter, scanning the items that were protected by the display case. Something about the way he stood seemed familiar to Craig as the customer pulled the necklace over his head carefully, the dark silver contrasting against the dark red shirt he wore-flecks of a darker shade of red showered it in no particular order-a hooded black leather jacket completing the top half of his look.

"Young love is a precious thing, Craig, may you feel blessed for having it." He says as he smiles, his dark blue eyes locking with Craig's dark green eyes for a few heartbeats before he disappears through the doors of the antique shop. The cashier blinks in shock as the second customer comes up to the counter, greeting him with a friendly smile.

Snapping out of it, he greets the customer back, quickly apologizing for spacing out as he calculates the woman's total, allowing her to finish her transaction on the iPad they had for people who paid with cards. Her payment went by quickly as Craig placed her items into paper bags and handed them to her as she signed. They exchanged smiles and farewells as she left the shop, leaving Craig alone once again.

"It can't be." He thought aloud, looking down to make sure his name tag was pinned to the upper left chest area of his shirt. It was. "He just read my name tag, so what if he looked like Scott?" A few more people walk into the store, he greets them with a smile, brushing off the eerie encounter as he began to instead countdown the minutes leading to the end of his shift.

Scott died, Craig, it wasn't Scott, he just read your name tag and saw your ring. Nothing creepy about that, don't worry about it. Scott is dead.

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"Hey, I'm Mason, you must be Jonathan. I mean, of course you're Jonathan, I met you a couple of days ago, not online- actually, let me start over. Hi, nice to see you again." The flustered boy sits down in his chair opposite of Jonathan, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose so the lenses were centered over his pupils. "Sorry, I get nervous on first dates."

Jonathan smiles. "Me too, actually, I wanted to start off this date with something. I figured it would be best to let you know before we actually start the meal and the date goes well and all that." He pauses, dropping his gaze from Mason's as he tried to find the words to start it. "So, I'm not very good at relationships, to be blunt. I have a problem with cheating, but you should know that I'm really trying to fix that, and I understand if that's like a negative trait you don't want to risk or something-"

"Everyone deserves a second chance," Mason interrupts, "even if it's not your second chance, I'll let you pretend. I don't judge people based off their past, there's always room for improvement. Besides," he smiles at him, "you're at least trying to change, so let's just have a nice dinner, yeah?"

Jonathan nods, praying that it isn't going to end up as badly as his relationships have before.

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He pops the cherry lollipop into his mouth with a smirk as he enters the building, the bodyguard stood outside letting him in once he knew who he was. The demon adjusts his grip on the box as he walks past countless tables of demons sipping on glasses of various types of alcohol. He ignores the strong scent and continues to the backroom where another demon waits for him at a desk, the guard outside the door nods at him as he enters.

"Ah, right on time, as usual." He stands up from behind the desk and smiles as the demon enters the room, approaching the desk and depositing the box. "Is this what I think it is?"

The demon nods, taking the lollipop out of his mouth so he can reply. "Sure is, you can even check if you want." A cherry taste fills his mouth once more as the candy re-enters his mouth.

"Oh, I have no doubts about your work, but I can't wait to see it for myself. One of you," he turns to the small group of henchmen in the room, "go get his payment." They scramble to obey his orders as he pulls the box towards him and opens the lid, gasping. "Magnificent." He exclaims, picking up the severed head by its ginger hair. "A pristine cut across the neck, completely splitting the spinal chord, oh and you've left the tongue in-look at those stunning green eyes! Freshly killed and unpreserved, truly a prized specimen." He says, turning the head every which way as one of the henchmen came back with a duffel bag, handing it to the awaiting boy who sucked on his lollipop.

The demon unzipped the bag, quickly skimming over the money that was inside and finding the amount that they had discussed. "Pleasure doing business with you, sir." He nods respectfully and waits to be dismissed.

"Oh, Scott, this is the reason you're my favorite bounty hunter, you take pride in your work and always get it done. Anything you put your mind to, you do. Now go on, I'm sure you're dying to go spend that money of yours."

Scott nods, swinging the bag onto one of his shoulders and leaving, the dark silver pendants of his necklace reflecting the neon lights hung above the bar. His blood-stained dark red t-shirt bunched up near his underarms as the duffel bag swayed from where it hung on his shoulder. The other demons in the bar downed their glasses of alcohol without paying the bounty hunter much mind as he slipped out of the building, nodding once again at the guard stood outside.

After leaving the bar, he walked through the streets of hell in order to get home.