Chapter sixty-three - NULL

Inside the building, the BPD agents and the church clerics suffered setback after setback, it seemed they could not take a single step without encountering more monsters or traps, the situation was so difficult that with each encounter their numbers diminished.

Durand was worried, she had already expended almost all of her strength and could no longer use almost any sacred power without first stopping to rest, many of her soldiers were also close to be out of ammunition, and on the way to be forced to fight with hand-to-hand weapons, they really underestimated the threat from the cultists.

With no choice but to keep going, Alexis Durand guided her men further into that death trap, taking the lead and leading them into the building, wielding her combat knife and rifle, she was determined to face whatever she found along the way. After wandering for some time and facing more and more challenges, Durand finally found herself with one of the two other groups.

The Tamar group, or what's left of them, Tamar had lost almost all her men, only three of her soldiers were still standing, they had found a high-level apparition and had to escape, being forced to abandon those that weren't fast enough.

Tamar surrendered the control of what was left of her unit without even flinching, the panther woman was on the verge of fainting from exhaustion, she had used her body in every fight.

With no choice, Durand was forced to secure a place inside the building to set up a makeshift camp, so the soldiers could at least regain their own stamina, she also needed to rest for a while before she could use her powers again.

To defend the camp, the agents set up a rotating guard system, a group of four soldiers would stand guard for an hour, yielding the point to the other group that had rested when the time limit was reached.

Tamar was one of the first to offer to keep watch, Durand entrusted her with this role and sat against a wall, it wasn't long before the Nephilim fell asleep, accompanied by the surrounding soldiers. Durand slept soundly, her tired body not allowing her any dreams, and she almost cursed when Tamar woke her up so she could take her post on the lookout.

Durand reluctantly crawled and positioned herself at the entrance to the room they turned into their camp, the room was wide and empty, all the walls were smooth, and it had only a single entrance that led straight into a hallway that joined the absurd number of corridors that existed in the building, she and three more soldiers positioned themselves watching the corridor, ready to act if any enemy showed their presence.

As she watched, Alexis found herself thinking of her father, from the day Alexis Durand was born she had a potent spirit bond with her father, as she grew up that bond never disappeared, there wasn't a moment in her life that she didn't feel her bond, it was on an irritating level, she can never have a single minute of privacy, it was as if her father's eyes were always on her and she felt like her life was a peepshow.

The bond was useful, she couldn't deny it, due to her nature she was always a target for monsters since she was a child and her father manifested his powers through the bond to protect the girl, even as an adult she was often saved from dangerous situations thanks to intervention of her father.

But she never managed to have a relationship, every time she tried to be with someone she could feel her father's presence increases as if he was ready to intervene, her father seems to interpret her attempts to be intimate with others as a threat, and once she almost killed a person with a kiss.

All her life Durand had wished that link would go away, but now that it was finally gone she felt strange, it was like having a limb ripped off, and she found herself wanting to go back to feeling the uncomfortable sensation she had grown used to.

Alexis sighed, she wondered if her father would even have noticed if the connection had been severed, her father was the archangel Barachiel, and she wasn't the only one of his children, she had met at least twelve other people with whom she shared ties of blood, they all had a similar bond with her father.

Alexis concentrated, she decided to stop thinking about her father and her brothers, she carefully analyzed her situation, as long as she got some rest she could use her angelic form three times in one day, she had already used it once in the first fight so she needed to choose the right moment to use again, after that, she would become unprotected, she hoped to find the way out of this hell before it was too late.

She was also worried about her partner, Garrard was a powerful voodoo priest, but even he would be at a disadvantage in a situation like this, his briefcase could be full of powerful religious gadgets, but with each use he needed to sacrifice something, if things bexame too ugly, she was afraid her friend would choose to sacrifice something that there was no going back.

"Movement!" A soldier warned, he pointed his rifle, whose ammunition was almost gone, towards the entrance to the corridor, Durand turned with the other soldiers to notice a strange figure.

As soon as her eyes hit the figure Alexis Durand felt her stomach twist like a furious beast, it was a strange image, it was fingers, long, skeletal blackened fingers that gripped the side of the entrance wall tightly, marking the surface of the wall with a pungent black liquid.

Alexis motioned for the men to be silent, with another signal one of the men entered the room where his companions were sheltering, ready to wake everyone up if necessary, the remaining three stood stay facing the entrance to the hallway, then a figure began to show itself.

The figure was extremely strange, his whole body was thin and had the appearance of a black corpse in the process of decomposition, the skin was stretched over the dry muscles and was covered in the same pungent liquid he spread through his fingers, his arms were absurdly long and full of impossible joints, bending over and over again in an unnatural way.

His whole head was wrapped in a bandage, torn in his mouth, showing a huge, gaping mouth, full of rotten teeth, a fetid liquid escaped his lips, dripping onto the floor, every drop that touched the ground made a furious hiss rise and the place dissolved.

"What the hell is this?" One of the soldiers asked in an almost inaudible whisper, the creature seemed totally incapable of seeing or hearing, its huge twisted arms groping everywhere as if it were looking for something.

"It looks like an apparition!" Durand responded, also speaking quietly, even though the monster seemed to have difficulty hearing they didn't want to take the risk. "I've never seen an apparition like this, it looks like the cultists have been doing some experiments!"

"What do we do? Attack?" Another soldier questioned, pointing her rifle at the creature.

"No, we have to save as much remaining ammo as possible!" Alexis replied. "Besides starting a fight against it can attract more of it here! If it comes near you have my permission to open fire, but if it stays at the entrance leave him there!"

The soldiers continued to aim their weapons, the tension was so great that the air could be cut with a knife, the creature continued to feel the walls like a madman, looking for something unknown, marking everything it could touch with that pungent black liquid while making sporadic grunts. After a while the creature seemed to lose interest, he continued to walk down the corridor he had come from, still feeling his way.

Durand and his soldiers sighed with relief, one of them even sat down as he leaned against the wall behind him, the number of bullets that could affect spirit beings was already almost zero, and if the creature attacked them there were sure to be more sacrifices.

The hour passed without another happening, soon another four arrived to take their turns, and Durand and the other three retired to rest. The new four were warned about the creatures, the order was that they avoid contact as much as possible, only opening fire if really necessary.

The group that took her place was made up of Sister Sandra, the nun leader of the squadron sent by the church and three other surviving clerics, they were the last surviving members of the church who entered the building along with the BPD agents.

They were also the group with the most 'advantage', they continued to pray whenever they had the chance, accumulating their sacred powers for the hour of need, Sister Sandra took the lead without showing the slightest fear, the nun stood in front of the entrance to the room standing like a pillar, her eyes fixed on the other end of the aisle as her lips murmured prayers and biblical texts. The other three clerics accompanied her in prayer, repeating the exact same words under their breath, all of them looking more than ready in case things went south.

Another hour passed without the situation changing, the cleric's were replaced by four BPD agents who had already rested for a long time. The agents imitated their predecessors, they did their best not to attract attention while maintaining constant surveillance at the entrance to the corridor, they had their weapons ready, but the lack of action began to make the atmosphere boring.

It was then that one of the soldiers noticed something very strange.

There was a new figure standing at the entrance to the corridor, the figure was small and slight, barely four feet tall, and walked half-crouched as if trying to remain unnoticed. The soldier was horrified when he understood what he was watching, it was a child.

The child did not look abnormal in any single way, he was dressed in children's pajamas and carrying a large orange plush giraffe, he cried softly as he walked, his bare feet were dirty from so much walking.

"Help me!" The little boy spoke, his voice sweet and childish, though it showed clear traces of fear. "I can't find my mommy!"

"FREEZE!" The soldier pointed his gun at the boy without even thinking twice, this was not the first that a monstrous creature tried to approach him taking on a harmless appearance, and if he depended on him, it wouldn't be the last either.

He motioned to the other soldiers, who locked their own sights on the creature, he slowly approached the boy, after all there was always a chance to really be a child, luckily the scanners on his helmet were more than capable of show the true nature of the creature.

Sensors in his helmet swept the infant figure, just as he imagines the scanners confirmed his suspicion, warning him that the creature in front of him was an apparition, the software then began to calculate the creature's danger level.

The soldier was surprised when the software reported that the danger level of that apparition was 'NULL', he smiled as he imagined the reason in his mind, but eventually he decided it was because the boy's danger level was so low that the system had no form to classify him, The boy didn't seem capable to offer any more danger than a puppy, apparitions that used tricks like these to attract prey tended to be weak, unable to hunt by any other means than traps, he decided he would give a got through this at once, and withdrew a rune-marked blade from his waistband.

"Hey, are you sure this is a good idea?" One of the other soldiers questioned. "What if this thing is dangerous?"

"Use your sensors!" The soldier with the knife replied. "His danger level is so low that the system has classified him as null!" he went towards the boy with the knife ready.

"Argh, this is horrible! I don't even want to see it!" Another soldier responded. "I know it's a monster, but this childish form... It gives me a bad taste in my mouth to have to watch you kill it!"

"Stop being a girl, Johnson!" A female agent commented. "Sometimes I think the one who has a uterus is you! Get rid of this disgusting thing, Carlos!"

Private Johnson shrugged and turned away, not at all interested in witnessing the creature's death, Private Carlos continued forward, as he approached the boy's mouth opened abnormally, the child grunted low and jumped over him, but Carlos grabbed the creature by the neck and threw it to the ground, he pushed the blade into the creature's chest, which began to bleed dirty brown blood.

Johnson walked a bit to get away from the action, his three companions seemed to be busy dealing with the little creature, but he didn't have the stomach for it, that's when a memory crossed his mind, a conversation he had with Dr. Sarah Ragdear , a conversation about the capabilities of helmet sensors.

The conversation had been long and full of details, Johnson had started talking to Dr. Because he had a hidden interest in her, so he was more interested in looking at her lips than hearing what the good doctor said at the end, but a certain point was made in his mind, he clearly remembered the Doctor's words.

"...These sensors are one of my greatest creations! I'm very proud of them, they can classify the level of danger apparitions and spirits of all known levels! I had to work hard to create this algorithm! If you ever find something these sensors don't work on, it's because its danger level is higher than anything that's been catalogued!"