Black and Blue

1 - Apparently, I Am One Lucky Son of a Bitch

It would be impossible for me to say where I encountered him first. He could have been anyone; my first roommate, some rude person at a convenience store, that guy on the street who complimented my shirt once. But I do know when I first really met him.

Keep in mind, up until this point I had no connections whatsoever to this weird, con-arty world of demons and occultists and whatever else there is he forgot to tell me about. I was a random, ordinary student at a random, ordinary, if not crazy prestigious school. I just happened to have what some might call a stroke of bad luck, others might call a creep-magnet, and even a few others out there might call some sort of great destiny. I say bullshit to all but number one. I not only had a stroke of bad luck, but an ongoing chain of the stuff. One thing kept leading to another, and before you know it I'm standing in front of a mirror with two white streaks around my eyes and demon blood on my hands...my parents would've had a fit. But more on that later.

This is the point where I'd normally say something like, "meet is a real kind word for what actually happened," so that's what I'm going to say: meet is a real kind word for what actually happened. You don't "meet" somebody in the middle of the night during a break-in of your own house, you bash their head in and call the police. You don't have a nice, polite chat over coffee and chocolate chip muffins, in fact, you'd feel lucky if you didn't end up learning anything about this person. That's how my night should have gone.

I was having some sort of dream then—really, a series of dreams that came to mentally assault me every night starting in late July. It doesn't matter in the slightest what they were about, but let's say it had to do with school. Holy shit, the stress I was under that year; I never realized how unbearable university could be. But I asked for it, so what was I going to do but lay there. Dreaming. In my house. Alone.

Except I wasn't alone, and I woke up just in time to notice that.

The weight around and under me shifted. My eyes snapped open. Ordinarily I would've had trouble getting awake right then, at this hour, but for some reason my body was able to respond in time. And what I woke up to was a figure completely engulfed in shadow, kneeling over me with a rusty scalpel to my side. Without thinking about what it might do beyond my immediate future, I bolted up and swatted the blade out of their hand, cutting my palm open but at least keeping myself alive. I winced and curled my hand into a fist while the person shifted back, thrown off guard.

"Ah. Shit," they muttered. From a single stream of moonlight coming in between the window slats, I saw that their face was...blue?

No, that can't be right. I can't even see properly.

I silently chastised myself for focusing on anything other than the fact that someone—or something—had broken into my room in the dead of night, and reached for the water bottle on my desk. But before I could take it, they lunged forward and grabbed my hand, making a point to cover my mouth as well. I kicked and thrashed underneath their weight, but that didn't seem to discourage them. I felt something drip onto my neck as they brought their face level to mine. It was like melted wax, or tar. Didn't burn any less than it, anyways. I flinched, trying to move my arms, but the more I struggled the more frustrated and determined they became.

"Hey. Hey, i-it's okay. None of this is going to hurt, just close your eyes and—"

I took one last chance and bit the hand covering my mouth. Hard. The blue-faced cretin jerked its hand away, almost hissing. I wound up my arm and punched where I assumed (well, hoped) their stomach would be, causing them to fall back onto the foot of the bed.

"I don't think so," I breathed, eyes darting around the room as they adjusted to the dark. I quickly remembered the bottle and grabbed it before they could stop me again, stumbling off of the bed to get a better look at them. They followed suit, hands raised and the scalpel back in their possession.