On to the Valley of Death

The key felt heavy in my pocket, Chris was driving while I stared silently at the window, buried deep in my thoughts. When we got to my home, we stopped dead in our tracks, sitting on my sofa was Annie, the child Annie. She smiled at us, I was on guard, Chris became pale. "It's me Robin." she said, yet somehow I couldn't let my guard down.

"Not fooled I see", the voice changed into a distorted kind and her eyes turned to slits, the room trembled, the lights went haywire and the smell of blood and rotten eggs reeked in the air, it was the demon.

I clutched the salt in my pocket, as Chris stared at the demon, scared, yet he stood his ground.

"It's against the rules for me to involve him", he sneered at Chris.

"Why?" I found myself asking.

"This body has no clue who he is, and it prevents me from hurting him", he laughed looking at Chris , "convenient eh? "But the next time not so much."

Before I could even make my move he was already in front of my face, sneering, he spat out his words, "You will die by my hands and she and her family will be Satan's."

When he vanished, Chris fell to his knees shaking. Actually I was surprised he didn't faint, or vomited, or had a heart attack for that matter, he was strong. When he got back to his senses, he looked me in the eye and said, "you dealt with this kind of shit for years? Damn!" He wasn't amused. The next day we had all our guns and all of bullets that we can legally acquire l, which is not a lot, then got it blessed by a local priest who gave us questioning looks, and as precautionary measure I had my father's old hunting knife thrown into the pile.

April. Almost twenty-one years when the accident happened, Chris and myself were in full battle armament, wearing our special operations coveralls, two service firearm on their holsters, and a row of magazines strapped on every place of our bodies; just the two of us, no backup, no escape plan, a suicide mission. We stood in front of Sta. Isabel Mansion, all it was now was a shadow of its former grandeur. With its broken down jalousie windows, paint peeling off the walls, the roof which seemed like it would cave in any moment, the whole place gave a feeling of decay and death all over it, a possible result of the curse and the accursed being living inside.

"On to the valley of death rode the three hundred", I said to him.

"Forward the light brigade", he responded.

We smiled at each other and walked on in. I was nervous, no, I was scared, I knew Chris was too, and as the door burst open all hell broke loose.

One after another they came charging, demons and spirits sprang at us with blood lust. Numerous and murderous, evil emanated from every corner of the house. Chris was pale yet he fired at them, every bullet at perfect aim, he was great. We continued with our assault, fought each one with our lives on the line. Smoke, blood, flesh, horns, tentacles, you name it, littered the walls, the ground, and the ceiling. By the time we cleared the living room and arrived at the foyer, no creature dared to follow us. For a moment we breathed, not paying attention to our surroundings, we heard a snarl. Slowly we looked behind us, a three-headed canine being, a Cerberus was towering over us. My knees buckled, fuck, I cursed under my breath, don't they ever end? To my great surprise Chris shot at the damn thing. The bullet grazed one of its hideous heads, it whimpered while Chris pushed me out of the way. "I'll take care of this, go find her, and in God's name come back alive", he shouted as he started to fire a stream of bullets against the behemoth.