Devilish Desires

The warm light of dusk was slowly dimming to let the night creep back in. The train passed through a tunnel and the darkness took over, shadows dancing in the faint illumination of the tunnel lamps. They blended in with the cabin and enveloped everything inside with their formless performance.

Soundless vibrations shifted through the room before the lights were turned on. Thomas was now standing near the entrance of the cabin.

"Let's get some sleep, tomorrow starts at three hundred hours." Said John, taking the lead once more. They all agreed.

A figure was standing motionless, shrouded in the cold veil of the night, and holding a small dagger that shined silver in the soft moonlight. Alexander was asleep on the bunk bed unaware of the danger that was upon him. A strong, fast swing and he could be free, Thomas thought. He would kill Alexander without letting any sound escape him, he could escape from John and Isabella easily after that. Steadily with one step after the other, he approached the bunk bed while he lifted his one arm and prepared the other for a strong grip.

As if overtaken by the sense of this slow tempo he froze in place mere centimeters away from the target of his focus. The image of a brown-haired teenager smiling vibrantly invaded his mind. 'A mere three years and you managed to crawl inside me so deeply, Alexander. I wonder.. What would you think if you saw this?' his thoughts echoed in his mind so loudly one might have been able to hear them. After a moment that felt like an eternity, he returned to his own bed.

2 am on the next day,

Isabella sluggishly woke up and stretched her arms and torso, letting a soft and quiet sound escape her throat. Alexander woke up and looked at his watch that was hanging from the upper bunk. "What an amazing internal clock", he said while he directed a smile as bright as the sun at Isabella.

Calmly they started to get up one by one, to get dressed and gather their belongings.

As John motioned to stand he was pushed down by Isabella. They were both practically naked, he had just managed to put his pants on and she was still in her underwear. She got on top of him and ran her fingers through his abs while she whispered seductively.

"We still have some time...", she bit her lip as she put her hands on his broad shoulders and leaned in. But before this could go any further John got himself together and held her in place.

"No Isabella, I'm not making the same mistake again, neither should you." He said to her displeasure. But she wouldn't let this go so easily, toying with him was way too fun for her to stop simply because he asked her too. She reached back and touched a part of his pants that had been elevated in the past few seconds. "Little John seems to disagree.", she replied with a devious smile.

Thomas stood up and exited the cabin, he doubted they would have noticed him anyway, but he didn't like watching.

He opened the door to head to the toilet. Alexander was just returning from wherever he had wandered to. He stopped as they passed by each other

"Stop pulling stunts like that", he said.

Thomas was taken aback by this, he didn't expect Alexander to have noticed what transpired last night. He opened his mouth, but only a small "I-" managed to be heard before he saw the face Alexander was making, filled with disgust and anger.

"Listen, I've been playing along for some time, but you should know your place."

Feeling pressure on his windpipe Thomas lifted his hands to try to obstruct whatever might be causing this, but he couldn't put even the slightest dent into this invisible force as he was pushed with his back on the wall. What a fool he was to think that Alexander, a blessed mortal, could simply be taken by surprise by someone like him.

Alexander's enraged expression dissipated as soon as it came and was replaced with a bright, perfect smile. "Don't worry, I won't report any of this". He released the pressure on the other man's throat, who just slumped to the floor now gasping for air.

Alexander continued walking, but now his face was empty, with a slight tint of sadness.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The train was about to come to a stop, the rails were shrieking as the breaks slowed down the wheels. The passengers exited in an orderly fashion and headed towards the exits of the station. This was a central station in between two villages and a minor city, thus even though the distance from the cities of the mainland was big, people still headed here in quite a number.

Of course, this was convenient because it made blending in much easier, they wouldn't meet a lot of people who could question their coming here, one would simply assume they were heading to one of the three major destinations in the region. Additionally, there was a cultural festival held in the nearest city so they would go even more unnoticed.

The importance of this secrecy was of course due to the nature of their current assignment. They were supposed to investigate an old church that was deleted from the maps since before the Administration was in power. Apparently there was some sort of secret regarding this ruin that the Church didn't want to reveal, it smelled fishy. Even Alexander was perplexed by the circumstances of this mission, his usual talkative behavior had ceased, he was deep in thought throughout the whole hike to the designated location.

When they were still almost four kilometers away from the ruins Alexander, who was the one currently leading using a map held up his hand to tell the rest to stop. "It might be best to stop for a bit..", he said in a low tone.

"Finally! We've been walking for so long!" Isabella said as she sat on a large rock. She was tired, reasonably so, they had been traveling for five hours on uneven terrain. There hadn't been a road in use in this place for five decades now. They were thankful that the church wasn't positioned on one of the higher mountains, it was on a lower elevation than them right now, even if slightly.

But the reason for them stopping wasn't to take a break, Thomas suspected the answer hid behind the reason why Alexander hadn't spoken this whole time. His rank in the church was high, he might have had information that was connected to this place. Even if he didn't, Thomas knew that Alexander was very 'perceptive'. - He must have felt something -, Thomas thought.

Alexander took out his phone and dialed a number, not even thinking about letting the rest of them know what was going on beforehand. "This is brother Alexander, currently on assignment and approaching the target location. Raise the Evtania region to Protos response scenario"

None of them could hide their surprise to hearing this. Threat levels were counted from higher to lower numbers as the danger and probability of death rose. Protos was the lowest number on the scale, it meant almost certain death.

"Hey, what the fuck? What do-", said Isabella as the tone of her voice became completely cold.

"Quiet," John interrupted her. "How do we proceed?" He directed his gaze at Alexander.

"We will take action immediately until reinforcements arrive"

This was absurd, they were supposed to take on something like that with mere semi-automatic handguns and some grenades? All of them wondered at that moment.

But they had no choice.

From afar the old Church looked pretty normal, jut an old, half-collapsed building in a clearing in the forest. The area around it was denser than the forest they had crossed until now, it was majestic. Trees so high they almost completely blocked out the sun, letting only small lines of light penetrate their foliage and the sounds of a water stream enchanted the atmosphere of this forgotten place. But there was no way they could admire the environment, one moment of carelessness could spell their ends.

As they approached even closer the air around them appeared to become distorted, the smell of the trees and the ground was replaced by the smell of ash, a strong feeling of dizziness begun to overcome them the more they closed the distance to the ruins.

All of a sudden, the sight in front of them changed completely, to be replaced by something nightmarish. A giant spire made of some sort of black material that twisted and pulsed with sinister energy was protruding from the ground, surrounded by fires, cloaked figures were circling it and chanting in an ancient tongue. "ElΛα, ElΛα, ΑΝΟΙkscHε Πylη", dark red energy was gathering around and going towards the spire in spiraling movements.

"Find the sources and kill them.", whispered Alexander.

Studying the ritual, Thomas concentrated his sight trying to find a pattern in the frantic dance of the cultists. "IH Πylη ΑΝΟΙγεΙ, ElΛα, ElΛα, ΡöμBoΚιμπoΚtaάΕΔro!", once again energy started to float upwards. Thomas saw that the biggest streams of the red energy were gathered in four points of the inner circle.

He narrowed his eyes. "Found them."