Chosa came home in a peeved mood. She stayed out all night, looking forward to catching a few winks of sleep, only to find a hair-drunk man spread-eagled on her bed and T'balt knocked out on the couch. "Who the hell's idea was this?" She kicked T'Balt's lifeless body only to be ignored and greeted with snores.
The place was a mess, and someone had eaten her lasagna. To say she was pissed off was an understatement. But she didn't have the energy to yell or raise hell. She just wanted her bed. She peeked in on the stranger, muttering to herself about how rude it is to make T'balt sleep on the couch in his own home. The man's eyes were wide open, staring at the ceiling.
He noticed her, and the two locked eyes in silence. Without saying anything, he rose, still fully clothed, and stretched his way to the bathroom. Then he had the nerve to start undressing himself right in front of her. Her eyes cracked like eggs in pure shock at what was happening. She rushed to close the bathroom door and give him some privacy.
At the sound of the shower running, she scurried to wake T'balt, this time not hesitating to slap him in the face until he woke.
"Huh? What?"
"T'balt… There's a man in our bathroom. There's beer everywhere. And the fridge is raided. You're supposed to be boring. What the hell is this?" she angrily whispered, as if someone would overhear.
"Oh Chosa." T'balt forced himself awake. "What time is it?"
"8am. Now answer my question. What's happening?"
His tiredness prevented him from thinking of a lie that might work here. "Sorry about all this. It just happened."
"Well, I hope you're gonna clean this up and buy me the dinner you guys ate."
"Of course… but hey. You okay?"
"Yeah. Why?"
"Nothing. I uhh… just wanted to say that... I love you."
T'balt looked at her full cheeks and her pristine brown eyes with the cute way she made edged off her eyeliner. Like sharp edges. Even with her baggy eyes and frantic expression, she was still the cutest girl that T'balt had ever seen and the only one he had ever been with.
He didn't know if he had ever said those words to her before. Only when he was holding her lifeless in his arms did he feel the need to say them. He was thankful he had another chance.
Chosa looked more confused than reciprocating in the sentiment. "I'm too tired and pissed off to know what to do with you right now." Not the reaction he was hoping for.
It wasn't long before Monan had pulled out the shower, donning one of T'balt's black crew necks and the same pair of jeans he passed out drunk in. He looked annoyed and placated himself with another beer.
"Chosa uh.. this is Monan. He's a friend from out of town," T'balt said, seeing the anger growing in her. The answer didn't satisfy her in the slightest. "Listen, I.."
"Don't even bother, T." Monan interrupted. "The props aren't worth the trouble this early on. Let them see everything go down, and then they'll believe anything you say."
"Props?" T'balt asked.
"T'balt, I think your friend is broken," Chosa said.
Monan smiled. "You this rude to everybody or just strangers?"
"Strangers," Chosa said in defiance. "Especially ones without a clear sense of boundaries."
"I've got boundaries, sweetheart. But there isn't a woman on this earth that's ever crossed them."
"Is that a good thing?"
"I'll leave you to figure that out." He took another sip of his beer and fell on the sofa.
T'balt was starting to wonder whether he was actually going to save him or just blow through his hospitality. But he wanted to talk to Monan without Chosa in the room. He wanted to see about the plan the man had. He also needed to tell him about the Crimson Deer King that attacked the house. They had to come up with a plan to defeat it. He was sure that together they could kill it without all the Looney Tunes traps set up around the house.
"Chosa, don't you have a class this morning?" he asked.
"Yeah. But I think I'll skip it today. I'm way too tired to go anywhere."
He was a bit annoyed at Chosa's natural defiance. She never liked being told what to do, even by friendly suggestion. And now of all times, she had to let that side of her out. Usually, she had left by now after the conversation about paying the electric bill. But he supposed Monan was a pretty big wrench in the usual continuum.
And he seemed cool as a cucumber. By the look of him, no one ever could've guessed that he knew the end of the world was coming in less than a few hours.
A while passed. Chosa slept a few winks after throwing the bedsheets in the wash, while Monan sat idly, watching whatever he could find on TV. T'balt impatiently paced around the room.
"Will you calm down?" Monan said.
"I can't help it. The explosion…" T'balt lowered his voice, noticing Chosa sleeping on the end of the couch. "The explosion is going to happen soon. Aren't we going to do something?"
Monan groaned, checking the time on his watch. 11:45. "Fine," he said. "What do you usually do around this time?"
"Oh, I usually hide under the bed. That's the safest spot in the house."
"Are you always this much of a bitch? Why don't we go sit on the balcony instead? That way we can watch it all happen." Monan moseyed up the stairs. T'balt grabbed the gun and followed, leaving Chosa alone on the couch. Before he could catch up, Monan had already made himself comfortable, lighting the incense up there and kicking his feet over the wooden railing. He closed his eyes, finding a strange vacancy in his mind.
"How can you be so calm about this?" T'balt stood next to him.
"After a few go-rounds, Zero Day becomes no different than taking a piss in the morning. You'll see."
Monan leaned his head, exposing the number tattooed on his neck. 11667. "The best spot to see it is from up there." He pointed to the top of a skyscraper in the city. The spot must've been at least 300 feet in the air. "Not a soul around with a full scope of the beauty."
"What is it?"
"God's landing."
It was then that the explosion sounded and the shockwave sent the vibrations through the earth. T'balt struggled to stay upright, and even the calm, collected Monan managed to drop his beer. It was time, but T'balt knew that this go around would be different. He had help. He grew anxious to see what Monan would do, only to see him yawn.
Chosa was in a frenzy downstairs, and the usual moments came: the fire, the screaming, the deer beast roaming the streets, and the man who'd been amputated to death. A pit fell in T'balt's stomach. "Wait, no damn it."
"Friend of yours?" Monan asked.
"I forgot to save him. Damn it! How could I be so short-sighted?"
Monan chuckled, continuing to passively observe until the deer beast laid eyes on the house. Monan's interest was piqued. "Oh, you want a dance partner, don't you. Well, I usually prefer disco to tango, but I'll oblige just this once." Without a second thought, he was over the balcony, dropping to the ground. He landed fleet of foot, following through on his landing with a roll.
T'balt couldn't believe his eyes. He was going to challenge that thing with no weapon and no powers. What could he possibly hope to do?
"T'balt, was that an earthquake?" he heard from down the stairs.
"Uhh, yeah. I think so, Chosa." He didn't take his eyes off the man in his yard.
Monan let the beast come to him, unflinching at the swing of its flaming sword. It swung wide overhead, but Monan was quicker. He closed in and planted a heavy fist right in its side.
"He punched it?"
The attack didn't seem to do a thing but make Monan shake the pain out of his hand. The Deer King kicked at him, but Monan swept the hoof and yanked at it. The beast fell over. The black smoke swirled as Monan dug out a combat knife from his waist.
"Did he have that on him this whole time?"
The question didn't matter. The beast swung back in desperation, but Monan knew it was coming like he had fought the beast already in a thousand battles. And just like that, it was over. The knife was pinned into the Deer King's heart.
In a matter of seconds, Monan had defeated what had taken T'balt thirty lives to beat. And he only used a simple combat knife and pure reflex. Not to mention he should've been at least halfway drunk.
T'balt fumbled down the stairs and out the front door to greet him. A still confused Chosa followed. Monan was down, plucking the loot from the beast's neck.
"You're taking its loot?" T'balt was a bit disappointed. He had worked so hard to kill that beast, and it felt like he was the only one who was never going to get a chance to use its flame sword.
"Yeah, it'll have to do. To be honest, it's a little low bar for me. Monan watched the coin sprout legs and crawl over his hand. "They're frisky. They can't stand being without a host for too long? So don't let 'em roam free unless you don't give a shit about who it attaches to."
"That makes sense," T'balt said.
Monan put the thing on his shoulder and let it roam to the back of his neck. A few seconds later, the coin tattoo of the flame sword appeared in black, right underneath the ouroboros.
"Can everyone stop and tell me what the fuck is going on?" Chosa was wide-eyed and utterly out of her element.
Monan looked around, ignoring her question. "You guys got a car?"
Monan took the wheel, driving them both to some destination past the streets flooded with people and beasts. While in the back, T'balt did his best to explain everything to his girlfriend, who, despite what she was seeing out the window, couldn't comprehend a word he was saying.
"I know it doesn't make sense. Just bear with us for now."
"I need a fucking Xanax," she dragged her hand down her face.
Monan laughed.
"And you, what do you have to do with this?" She pointed at him.
"I am your prophet, here to show you the way." He smirked.
"You both are out of your minds. Why am I the only one acting like this is all insane?"
T'balt shrugged. "Where are we going anyway, Monan?"
"We're going to church, of course," Monan said. "Thought you both could use a sermon."
"The only thing in this direction is Akron, right?"
"Isn't that out in bumhell nowhere, where all the country people go?" Chosa asked.
"It is pretty remote," T'balt remembered. "Why are we going there?"
Monan looked at him. "Because I wanna show you something that will blow you to hell and back."
He drove them down the long, twisting roads that led to the isolated church. It was a mansion of a place far out of the city. It was centered at the top of a hill, the next closest building a mile away.
When they got there, it looked like it was already swarmed with cars and traffic. People were rushing inside seeking shelter from the sundering world outside. But it seemed safe so far, no beasts around, and parts of the church were already boarded up and sheltered in.
They pulled over on the street and walked to the front door. They shuffled into the line of people being corralled inside, all of them panicking. The normal reaction, as Chosa pointed out. The place looked like it was being packed to the brim to shelter as many people as possible. But even as big as the church was, they were still squished in like sardines.
When they made it into the main hall, a man was on top of the stage trying to calm the masses, but failing miserably. A mic was being hastily hooked to his shirt as he had to shoo away people asking for answers. The man had the mannerisms of a priest, but he was hardly dressed like a man of the church, almost like he had just woken up and rushed to throw on some presentable attire.
"Please, everyone. Keep calm," he pleaded. "We are in God's house. We need to maintain his order. Trust that under his roof, you are protected from the vile beasts that are hunting us down. Salvation he will deliver to those who heed his word and pray. We will get through this together."
The words stopped most people in their panic, and the stir quieted just for a moment.
"Abbot Kilgrove. What's happening?" a voice asked.
"I do not know, truthfully. This is nothing I have ever seen before…" His voice trailed off.
"They're demons!" someone shouted.
"The devil has come!" another said.
"DO NOT FEAR!" the abbot shouted. "You've been brought here to be protected. Under this roof, no harm will come to any of you. We don't know what's going on. But the church has rations enough to feed us all until we can figure out what's happening here. Until then, you are safe. God has not forsaken you."
T'balt and Chosa watched on, neither of them high believers but finding themselves calmed by his words. That must be why Monan brought them here. A place where they could be safe for a while. But then they realized they had lost track of him, only to find him hopping onto the stage. Casually, as if he were one of the man's advisors, Monan whispered something in the speaker's ear.
The abbot's eyes widened and then shut. He listened to Monan's words for a long time before taking a couple of steps back. Monan then had the floor and spoke to the crowd with nothing but the bass in his voice. "Welcome all. This… is the end of days. The rapture. The moment the church has been too afraid to preach has come for us all. The end of the world. An ending by fire. The great cleansing."
This led to a chorus of hysterics. "Who is this man?" "There's no way." "It's a lie."
"Take a look with your own eyes. Explain to me what you see. Demons roam the streets. Fire fills the skies. Angels descend from heaven, and man has become the hunted… And it performed great signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to the earth in full view of the people," he quoted.
The people were listening.
"Revelations," Chosa said, latching on to his words. The quote flew over T'balt's head.
"This judgment is what our entire lives have been leading up to, but humanity has failed God. Now I am here to pick up the pieces." He held his hand up as black smoke filled the air above him, swirling around his hand until it formed the material of a great flaming sword. The collective gasps overtook the room at the sight of it.
T'balt rolled his eyes, realizing what Monan was doing. This was his great trick, getting them to think he was some kind of prophet but showing off powers that anyone could've gotten. He crossed his arms, disappointed as to the point of this demonstration. But then he looked to his left.
Chosa's eyes were lit up by the flame. "He's been given powers by god," she said.
"Don't tell me you're buying this. You've done the same thing." But he remembered that that was a different Chosa, from a different life. This one had never seen the powers the loot gives people, let alone wielded them.
She was never a Christian before that day. But she was suddenly filled with hope as if all her confusion had been answered. Explain the unexplained, and you quickly rise to the status of savior.
"Now bow your heads," Monan said. The crowd collectively bowed and clasped their hands. Though he did not say to pray. But even the non-believers had closed their eyes as he asked.
Meanwhile, the smoke began to swell around his devious smile.