Seeing the open desert night was unusual to him.  He had never been outside anywhere so freely, not with James nor anywhere.  Now however, he had free roam of the world upon his feet, his blades, his very senses now upon him.  In a past life he had only but one mansion to roam in, isolated far away from society.  Even with James' rare moments of weakness enough to rob him of his heart and mind he had little opportunity to be in anyplace so free.  He relished it more than anything he had ever known.
	"Hhhhhhhh...ohhhhhhhh.  What...what beautiful sound the wind makes.  Such...dry desolate howling, nowhere near the cold mistral that curled its flesh around the clock tower I once knew.  One so empty that I can almost taste the tears of despair upon the wind.  Hmph...sentimental, words speak nothing.  How long must I have been marching?  I haven't been this alone since......hmmmm......no, my memory is not important, far more concerned with harvest more than anything."
As he tried walking further, he felt something start to resist.  The twitching left synthetic limb that now struggled to comprehend this terrible dilemma.  The raptor struggled with it, grabbing with the other arm desperately to try to control it, a hot spasming of nerve endings fighting against his will.  Strangely it hurt him, violent sparks of electricity trying to resist against the cold clinically-dead body it now became part of.  The painful reminder of his host's weaknesses came burning up from inside him.
	"GRAH!  Stupid excuse for a limb, cooperate!  I COMMAND YOU TO-...rrrrrRRRRARGH!"
He only managed to stop it by channelling a dark potent energy through it, pumping a cold burst of deep fatal aura throughout the entire limb as it struggled and spasmed like a dying creature.  Softly it ceased, claws twitching before he could bring it back to his control, his entire body now emanating a strange black-lighted presence as he cracked his neck slightly.
	"There, that should do it...you are under my control limb, like every other part of this wretched body.  Wretched but useful, makes me so much more efficient at my purpose than some wounded child abortion like I once was...to think I even appreciated that body when I could have had something like THIS, not some infantile worthless degenerate!  ...speaking of degenerates, that Roy...his words must err caution for me concerning this body's weaknesses.  Hmph.  What a tragic fate it must be to have weaknesses.
	"My only condolence is that I will never feel it...hmmmm...what a shame that your luck kept you going through that galaxy we passed through, I almost expected you to pass on finally in that cold isolated warehouse...all by yourself...and yet...you just had to keep on living a few more days before the rescue came.  No matter.  There are plenty more ways for you to die yet, James.  I wasn't going to let your body be repaired by my greatness in your pitiful state.  But I have time.  I have eternity to know your flesh..."

The wasteland gave nothing to him but the weak and pitiful, creatures struggling to survive out on the torrential winds, hiding in burrows or trying to fight out their prey.  All creatures kept away from him, both strange and terrifying to the mortal being.  Bloated flies hovering across the ground the size of balloons, child-sized geckos screeching and waddling their way towards smaller creatures to fight.  Occasionally there was a giant vicious wasp with orange body and raspy wings, alongside huge scorpions the size of cattle with piercing bayonet-length stingers.
All of whom left the demon alone.  They sensed nothing but death around him, and he in turn cared little for such wastrels among them.  Nothing dared attack him, not even the lowliest of creatures from the most irradiated of scorpion to the most torrid of bloated flies.  The flies tried to follow him, perhaps sensing he was like a vulture where corpses would sprout forth from around him.  They did not stay long enough to find out.  The only time the Scissoraptor went after anything not human, was a wild den of coyotes majoring around a dozen or so in one den.
A living creature was still a creature with a soul, and as such he did not shirk such opportunity when in a desolate place as this, especially after having travelled a good four hours without any sense of sentient life out there.  The dogs cowered before him, ragged pale seniors pulling back their doe-eyed pups into the hollowed-out den hidden beneath the land in a small sinkhole.  They couldn't even bare their teeth at him, the fear too great upon the scent of demonkind on the wind.  Even the most bitter scavenging coyote tried to play humble submissive, rolling onto his back pleading.
Not a single one of them ever dared to bite or maim him when he slaughtered their whole family.  A bloodline gone extinct, left to rot and fade away for all eternity into the abyss of time itself.  Forgotten.  His claws bloodied in leaving a twin trail from their nest as a warning to other predators, or perhaps an invitation to feast on that which remained.  He despised the taste normally, the souls of non-sentient creatures nowhere near as fruitful or blessed as those aware of themselves, their life, their own existence.  Dogs however were different to him.
	"A canid will do when man is not near...strange...it has been...years since I've had that taste in such a soul.  Simpering desires, basic instincts...protection...the need to survive, a will that...hmph...that some humans do not possess.  Perhaps that is why they make such good pets.  Maybe they fill that emptiness that Man possesses inherently."
Wandering beyond rivers and abandoned sheds, he almost never found a single human being in his entire search.  Until he reached the next town, all he ever found were three people at separate points.  The first was an old black man, biting at his hand whilst mumbling about his son, his eyes harrowed and struggling to accept as he hid within an old coyote den.  His soul tasted like madness, bittersweet like absinthe but with the biting spice of remorse as all he had on him were the shoes of a small boy, far too small for an adult.

The second was a young woman in her mid-20s, tanned Hispanic and a fighter of religious fervour.  She had nothing to give, nothing to fight with and had no chance of resisting despite her desperate attempts of prayer.  This simply annoyed the creature and quickened her demise, her soul tasting of sweet buttermilk that he always equated with blind naivety, marred with a spiteful peppering of arrogance.
The third and final soul was the most special, and one that the Scissoraptor himself would never forget.  He found himself outside a small candle-making store just off the main road, one he had walked on and veered to out of pure habit in wanting to keep a straight line to walk to.  The place was fully lit with candles in every single corner of the shop, all of various scents and memories that were both dead and artificial to the demon raptor.  Vanilla, Winter Morn, Macintosh Spring.  Scents of a fantasy that this land would never dream of ever again.
Sitting slumped against the counter, wielding a shotgun towards the creature that walked in as the sound of a bell rang above the shop door, was a young teenage boy no more than 16.  His body was covered in bruises, scars and poisoned welts thickly pronounced on his pale skin, now bathed within yellow light from candlewick.  The place had an autumnal warmth, soft brown oak walls and flickering amber flames.  The boy was half-seen in darkness, his left side more exposed than his right as he looked up, slowly raising his single-barrel shotgun.
	"Who...wh-who are you?"
	"...who do you think I am, child?"
	"I...I-i-i...you're...s-some kinda deathclaw?"
	"I am certainly death to many.  What a fascinating home you have made for yourself."
	"M-more like...my grave."
	"Hm...you acknowledge death so easily?"
	"I...I want to...I want to so badly."
	"And why is that?"
	"Because...I have nothing.  Nothing left for me...anymore."
	"Tell me."
	"You're not...you're not gonna kill me?"
	"Oh, don't worry...I will.  That or the poison inside your body will do that for me.  Even if your soul does not want to."
	"My...my soul?"
	"Your mind begs for death, it pleads and desires for it when you have absolutely nothing left.  Do you have family?  Friends?  An existence to go back to?"
	"N-n-no...nothing."
	"So do many...what makes you any different?"
	"My...my whole family...th-they...we were attacked by slavers...raided...we had a farm down south out on the wastes...we had a good place but...then raiders came, we had no way of fighting, we couldn't fight back, we...I saw my mom's kitchen just covered in red."
	"Mmmmm."
	"She had her face just up against the glass and it just-...I saw her mouth open wide and scream before...everything blew up in my face.  My dad, he had only one leg good so he wasn't gonna run anywhere, he grabbed my little brother and shoved him in my arms and told me 'you keep that boy safe Danny...you keep that boy safe or there ain't nothing worth livin' for left in this wasteland'.  That was it...I ran.  I just...I hold tight my baby brother and just ran out into the wasteland...running out...didn't stop."
	"And where is this...brother of yours?"

A look of great shame came upon his young face, cracked with harrowed grief and suffering much beyond his years.
	"...this old guy...he...he said he knew how to look after kids, said he could help me find a good place and...a-a-and...I trusted him.  But he just wanted him for...f-f-for...hoh jesus I was so stupid."
	"Did he die?"
	"I...no.  Not then, I got my bro out of there and he got away, took my brother's shoes and I just, I just walked, I-he was crazy, fucking crazy wanted to strangle my little brother for nothing!  I took his gun at least...this one right here.  Nearly got him in the head but...I never used one before.  Heh...not like that stopped me any."
	"Are you dying?"
	"Y-yeah...might as well be.  Wish my brother was here instead of me...I should have been more careful, I shouldn't...shouldn't have let him go near that barn we found, it-...it had monsters inside there."
	"You let your brother walk into a barn filled with darkness?"
	"Yeah...I didn't get to hear him scream long enough before it...got cut off.  I couldn't do anything, I shot a few of 'em these...f-fucking nightstalkers, fucking...mutants just wanna fuckin' kill them...if they were gonna kill us they shoulda killed me."
He pressed the shotgun to his chin, resting it as he sighed weakly.  Not even having the spirit to fill his lungs despite the constant pain from the rattling of his throat.  His hands looked frayed with poison, bites and stings clearly sinking deep inside of his body.  Scissoraptor smiled coldly, walking forwards seeing no desire to fight in him.
	"And yet your soul...continues to live."
	"What?"
	"If you had truly wanted to give up...when all else has failed you...you would not be here amidst this dying light, trying to gain sympathy to yourself.  If your soul had been weak, you would not have lived for this long.  Despite your mind begging you to give up...there is a part of you that does not wish in its truest state."
	"The fuck are you talking about?  I want to die, I don't have anything, my brother was ALL I HAD and I couldn't fucking save him!  I COULDN'T SAVE HIM because I was a fucking idiot, I shoulda known better, I should have-...hhh...hhh-hhhhh...B-bobby..."
	"Bobby?" he asked softly.
	"B-bobby...my baby brother...hhhh...I loved him, always played with him since he was born, we always like, played hide and seek together an' stuff, he was always good at...at...I didn't...I just...I didn't know they were there."
	"Didn't know what was there?"
	"I JUST WANTED TO PLAY WITH HIM ALRIGHT!?  JUST, FOR ONCE, FOR JUST ONE MORE TIME, I WANTED HIM HAPPY!  I DIDN'T KNOW THERE WERE MONSTERS IN THAT PLACE, I JUST WANTED TO PLAY HIDE-AND-SEEK, LET IT ALL FORGET, FORGET FOR JUST ONCE THAT THIS FUCKING SHITHOLE I'M IN AND-...just...p-play with him again...like we used to...god dammit Bobby."

A small glint came into the demon's eyes at hearing the name, only widening more upon hearing his next question being answered.
	"...what is your name, boy?"
	"D-danny...Danny just...that's all I am anymore."
	"...Danny...surely...would you kill for your brother?"
	"I already have.  I killed...a lot of things...maybe this one guy, I nearly saw him just attack us cuz we had stuff but I-i dunno if he like lived or not...I don't care.  Fuck this place, fuck everything...Bobby was the only thing that mattered, if I have to fucking kill an entire town just to keep him safe..."
	"You would...I can see it in your eyes."
	"Yeah?  ...you gonna kill me?"
	"Yes.  I know what your problem is."
	"Whassat?"
	"Your soul.  It robs you of your need to die, your ability to just push yourself over, so instead you must fight.  Trying to fight creatures begging them to kill you, but you cannot just lay down and die like a good obedient mortal...no...you have to be so insistent on being so difficult to kill."
	"Heh...mom always said I was...stubborn as a brahmin."
	"And yet you do not fight me...why?"
	"Cuz I'm...I'm poisoned...fuckin' weak as hell...just sittin'...waitin' to die."
	"I see."
	"Yer...some kind of demon, aren't you?  Like that bible says."
	"I am...but not the ones you have read of."
	"Can you...can you make a deal with me?  Like..."
	"...what?"
	"That's how it is isn't it?  Like, you can make a deal, with the devil...so you get something back?"
	"Are you offering me something?  Well...that's new.  I've never had that opportunity before.  Very well, I'm interested, what is it?"
	"Can you...bring my baby brother back?  To life?  ...I...I can show you where he is, just...you can take mine instead.  You can have my soul if...if you bring back my baby brother."
	"Hhhhhm hm hm hm ha ha ha ha...hhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaah how unfortunate for you.  I am a taker of life, my dear Daniel...not a giver."
	"What?"
	"I do not have the power to bring back the dead, once that soul is gone it is gone from this world, forever towards the spectral plane where they shall join the many, the forgotten and yet also not forgotten bound eternally within one glorious whole.  But if that soul is gone within my presence..."
He leaned forwards against the boy's lips, breathing a deathly scent upon his still breath.
	"Iiii...DEVOUR it...forever.  Not one single trace shall remain of it when I shall swallow this soul inside of you...and take it upon my own festering blackness to feed my own eternal self.  My dear Dan...my...dear sweet brother I-"
	"B-brother?!"

A moment's hesitation caused him to blink, the raptor feeling a sense of unease as he backed off slightly, snarling with long cruel teeth towards the young boy.
	"Yes, brother, of course you simpleton!  Brother of Bobby, are you deaf as well as inferior!?  I will take your soul, and I shall finally send you release from this cursed world!"
	"W-wait, what did you mean by your brother I-"
	"SILEEENCE!"
His roar sent chills across the house, candles flickering out briefly into darkness as the night soon came in.  For a few seconds there was no sound, no light, not even the barest of movement before light soon returned back to them, the boy still wounded and bloody with poisonous ichor down his cheeks and legs, the raptor growling with:
	"You are a wastrel, your very urge to give up on life I find pathetic regardless of what cruelty you have seen or experienced upon yourself.  Did you even try to seek your brother?!"
	"Y-yeah, I...I did, but...the stalkers, the nightstalkers they-"
	"Pathetic, I see the hesitation in your eyes and nothing more!  The only thing that sickens me further is the fact your very name is-...hmph...name..."
He turned towards the window beside them, staring out into the moonless wastes as his breath left not a single mark upon the glass window.
	"What good is a name that you or your brother receive when you have no mother left to call you by it?  Is that not right...Dan?"
Looking back towards the teenager, he saw he had finally passed away turning slumped against his shotgun, a weak sigh fading away as he walked towards Danny, holding him by the shoulders as he said:
	"Come to me Dan...come."
He opened his mouth as a howling abyss soon came to him, a screaming ruptured void from the human's throat as his soul came to him.  It was a powerful soul, one by human standards was with great strength and determination, now truly wasted by the harsh truths of this wasteland.  The demon thought it pitiful, but either way was pleased to receive a more hearty meal of thick meaty courage and brave suicidal determination.  It almost made him quiver at the ecstasy of such a taste, scraping his claws against the wood counter beside him tightly.
	"HHHhhhhhhhhhhhh...that...ohhhh...what a beautiful soul.  In such a lad like you...and yet you waste it.  Hmph...typical.  Just...typical.  My brother had much greater strength than you...much...greater."
He walked from the candlelit house slowly before making his way back north, leaving behind an altar for the poor Danny who laid clutching his shotgun neatly, cold and lifeless, discarded to the wastes.  Even the afterlife could not take him as the demon walked further on towards the next settlement.  A town named Attica, right next to another named Williamsport just across the river.  A flowing dead river where many corpses could be seen, much moreso than the cemetery he saw upon first entering.

Seeing the cemetery made him smile, finding much to his surprise that many of the graves had been ransacked and pilfered of all essentials, rotting corpses now all that remained.  He walked between the graves, some marked by ancient tombstones between other more recent additions in the form of simple wooden crosses, barely bound sticks roped with twine.  The sight of the dead made him nostalgic, gleefully bringing out his scissors and snip-snipping them up towards the sky whilst hopskipping across tombstones for his own amusement.
It was a false happiness, trying to ignore the strange feelings in his absent heart.  He wasn't sure why the encounter with the young Danny had made him felt this way, but regardless he stalked his way through the small cemetery relishing the musty scent, the smell of corpse dirt soothing him somewhat.  The demon took a small rest sitting upon one of the more solid tombstones and planted his scissors in the soil in front of him.
Languishing in the moonless night, he raised his head back and smiled upwards at the night sky thinking to himself, seeing no souls remained in this area for him as he headed onwards.  A secondary school laid nearby within the suburbs, strangely for being so near a place of death as if reminding students of their inevitability.  It didn't even look any different to the other houses wasted and long abandoned from around it.  Past the houses was a funeral home, a place that pleased him greatly but not as much as the country club across the way.
It was a gorgeous building, back in its days of self-entitlement upon long rolling lawns once fertile for golf-chipping and fairways of splendour.  But those days were now long-gone, a pale dilapidated manor in colonial style that struggled to maintain appearance, a proud decaying look with even more a decrepit interior.  Prowling across the fairway with a cloak taken from the funeral home, the demon heard voices from within as he stood upon the front porch, right in front of an elegant wooden door without windows.  People still lived here.  But not for long.
	"Perhaps it is time I show a few new tricks of mine...now that I feel more greatly in control after the past year I think I can...MMHMMPH...h-hrrrrk...HHRRRRK...hhhhhhhhh-HRRK...hHHLP...hhhhHHHhhhhhheeeeeelp...help...help me...please...help me Koopin...pleeeaaase...a-aarhghk...hmhmhmhahahaha..."
Were James suffocating from a crushed larynx, he would have had a voice like this.  For a brief moment, his voice warped and faded before losing his demonic candour that trembled throughout, his power trying to manipulate the vocal chords more finitely as he gasped a hoarse plea.  It wasn't perfect, and to those who knew James it would not fool them.  But to anyone behind a door it would do well enough as he knocked desperately upon it.
	"HELLO?!  SOMEONE, HELP ME!"
	"WHO'S THERE?!" cried a voice behind.
	"I NEED...h-heeelp!  I...s-some people...tried to eat me...please, I need safety!  Sanctuary!"
	"The fuck, who tried to eat you?!"
	"A-a-a man...and a woman...down south...just the two of them but...I'm scared.  I have no one to help me, please...p-please help me..."
	"Sh-shit hold on, jus-hold on I gotta tell sumbody!"
He sat at the door covered in his cloak, a dark blue cover that had once draped across many a departed soul.  The smell of the dead soothed him upon it, as he waited like a hermit begging for offerings.  Eventually the door opened five minutes later, perhaps six.  The people inside would regret their act of pity the moment they heard the creature's voice, a gasping wince slowly transformed into a demonic fugue.
	"Thank...youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIEEEEE!"
The door shut behind him.  None would ever know of the horrors contained within the dark country clubhouse.  Except for one person.  Ramona.

Ramona had never been the luckiest girl in life.  In fact one could say that she had been given a bad roll in terms of luck for all the things that happened to her.  She walked through towns that were soon decimated by hordes, she always escaped as the last survivor always separated from the group that kept her safe.  Her weapons or what few she found always broke before the final blow, and what little food she got was almost always out of date.  Not that the last part was unusual but she always seemed to get the worst pick of food, the apple with a worm in it for example.
Her short blonde hair almost marked her out as very boyish in a beige jacket and half-torn blue jeans, a baseball bat slung on her back along with her knapsack.  She hurried through the town of Attica like a harrowed rat, what little supplies she had all being bundled up in her sack.  Heading across the bridge that lead towards Williamsport behind her, it had been a rough night for her, the town behind her one she didn't want to go back to again for a long while.
She hastily ducked into a fast food joint beside the bridge, huddling up behind the counter beneath a long-dilapidated list of whopper meals and discount offers from ATM receipts for free cheeseburgers.  It was a good thing it was too dark to read or else she'd have been hungrier, longing for the days before she existed of when the world made such profit.  Various plastic chairs and bolted tables laid around the small outlet against clear unprotected windows.
The girl looked through her sack once again to make sure everything was there, crossing out places on a map that she stole from an information kiosk.  It was all she needed to indicate the places that still remained, the city it never was.
	"Hoookay that's a big NO to the old school area, that place is dead literally minus one crazy bitch.  Hospital...not the friendliest place really, would rather avoid that altogether and do NOT wanna stay there...holy..."
She tried to calm herself down trying not to remember the scene.  Or rather what she thought was within.  But she could never stop herself from asking questions, even to herself.
	"What even HAPPENED, like there were raiders at one point right?  Then it just...no, just, no you know what, fuckit, not my problem, not gonna care.  Now, hotel...obviously not...god...why did Kenny have to do that, fucking asshole cost us a good place but ohhhhh no, had to be some kind of 'smaller groups survive better fer less resources!'  I mean christ this isn't some kinda GAME here!  Ugh...whatever, he's not getting my mac anyway lessee, pizza parlour?  Got a good few drinks from there, think that place is ransacked good, sheesh Williamsport is really tiny compared to this town here.  Hmm..."

Ramona sat down in the shade of the counter hiding from out of sight as she looked over her things.  A box of matches half-emptied with its contents, various pieces of food including a box of mac 'n' cheese as well as two smaller boxes of "sugar bombs", a bottle of water not particularly clean and half empty, a ragged cloth, a smaller bag that jingled excitably when moved, and lastly a small silver box glistening with temptation.  Her hand strayed past it and it almost opened at her touch, forcing her to stare upon it.  Her fingers inched towards it tentatively for the course of two minutes before slapping herself away.
	"No, NO!  Just...j-just one more day, just one more day you can do it.  Y-y-you can do it, Carl said you could, you can DO this Ramona..."
Clasping a hand over her face, she hiccuped back a few tearless sobs of need before sighing with forced cheer.
	"Hhhhhooooookaaaaaaaaay that's enough of THAT now come on let's up an' at 'em girl!  Come on, it's not much but at least I mapped out Williamsport a little so we can try again next time!  Gotta tell the guys about that hospital too, maybe we can make a deal...long as Kenny stays home, or keeps himself quiet...fuckin' asshole...speaking of asshole."
She headed towards the back bathroom area of the fast food diner, feeling a sudden dirtiness come over her as she stared into the largely-unused facilities of the place.  Naturally it was broken down with only one stable toilet among three stalls, the women's bathroom being completely caved in by a crushed wall from the building next door.  But the sink still worked near the door, and there was still a hole in the ground which she used as for the room's original purpose.  The sinkwater wasn't exactly clean but she never felt quite right not washing after leaving a bathroom.
After the very minutely-irradiated water covered her soiled hands, she splashed some on her face to clean the dirt off before taking the ragged cloth from her sack and drying herself off.  Staring into her own reflection, her eyes looked surprisingly bright as she smirked bringing up her faded baseball bat.  The varnish was long-peeling but it still had a good cracking power for dealing with any undesirables.  Such as the giant cockroach that came flitting in from behind her hitting the mirror straight on.
	"AAAAAIE!  AAAAIIE FUCKING FUCK FUCK FUCK!"
Swinging her bat crazily towards it, she swung down on its head with a brutal crunch before beating it in repeatedly, until its upper body resembled a chocolate bar crushed underfoot on a hot summer day.  The beast was large but not threatening, its appearance even more alien than the usual insect was.  Her hands shook nervously on the handle before something chittered behind her, and lunged at her knapsack eager to taste the sweet sugaryness within.
	"GET!  OFF OF MEEE!"

Desperate to keep her supplies close, she barged her way out of the bathroom before hearing the creature come scuttling after her, chittering its wings beneath its chitinous back before she waited for it to come closer.  The cockroach blindly approached, leaping at her as she swung with eyes shut, screeching as her bat brushed against the antennae before colliding with the wall.  The recoil surprised her and knocked her back slightly, hands stinging of force as her bat went flying out of her hands before she felt the full weight of a small dog land on top of her, staring into the eyes of a giant roach.
Screaming with hands balled up, she punched at the sides rather than the slathering small face that began trying to bite at her, gnawing at her cheek as she tried panickedly to grab at her baseball bat.  It had rolled itself away underneath a table and just out of reach, forcing her to lunge outwards to grab it as she rolled by accidentally, laying on top of the cat-sized roach that wiggled its many legs against her waist.  She giggled with fright, panicking all the moreso as she shoved herself off and lunged for the bat, banging her head hard against the table's blunt rectangular edge.
	"OW FUCKING DAMMIT JESUS!"
The cockroach did not care, hurling itself back upright with a bobbing roll as it undulated its abdomen slightly, flipping to its front before crawling towards the woman.  Ramona this time was ready, her fear transfixed by blind fury as the pain in her head brought out a rage unkempt.  She slammed down her bat hard onto the floor, shrieking as she caved in the entire front body of the giant cockroach.  Her bat cracked even more, nearing a terrible state as she panted harshly, sighing deeply with great effort.
	"HHHHhhhh...hhhhhh...f-fucking...thought all of you were gone already from here...jesus...nnngh...whatever, I just wanna sleep, hope I can fix this damn bat too."
Hoisting up her supplies she headed out for her true destination.  Along the way she saw a hotel to her left, giving it a wide berth plenty as she twisted her way through three streets turning sharp before making her way towards the country club lawn.  For once in her life, her luck was about to change the moment she knocked the secret knock that indicated her membership.  No voice came from within.  She knocked the same rhythm harder.
	"Carl?!  CARL it's me Ramona!  ...Carl?!  ...you better not be sleeping again, hey!  Open up or Bright Eyes here is gonna kick your sorry ass-"
The third time she knocked, the door flew open and in she ran.  Before she even realised what she was doing, the door closed shut behind her with a forceful slam that shook through her eardrums, yelping as she buckled at the knees and almost threw her sack of goodies.  She grabbed it with her hands before doing so, catching it mid-air before gravity had a chance to take it as she walked further in.  The front desk area, normally reception with an L-shaped desk of many keyholes and a computer for registration, had seen better days.  So had the rest of the place.

Varnished heartwood now cracked and splintered through, oak and mahogany chairs barely able to stand firm for their dignity along with peeling walls stripped of their flesh.  A cadaver of classist refuge, windows all in a row twice the height of a human being to welcome in the light of a warm past.  Now they were boarded up, peeking through towards the deathly night sky.  The place was silent but for her footsteps, bringing out her baseball bat and readying herself for a fight as she walked into the living room past the reception area.
Elegant finery was long gone, the last breath of faded curtains and worn chairs buckling under the weight of existence now stood before her.  The chairs were still good, half of their fluff now gone but still a cushy place to sit, to catch one's breath as she tried to do the same.  The windows remained boarded up on all sides, with only the faintest of light peering in across the derelict house of elite gentry.  It was also their main meeting area and while she was nervous that no one was being called to her, she didn't notice the most disturbing detail in the place.
Large deep claw marks within the floor.  Not even in the carpet, but rather buried into the grooving of wood beneath that she only noticed due to the small blood spat sitting next to it.  Then she noticed the claw marks were oddly glossy.  Fresh.  Glinting in the soft light that still remained.
	"Wh-what?  That...that wasn't there before, was it?  ...no...no that's still fresh oh god...oh god wh-...what happened, JILL?  HARRY!?  H-harryyyyy?!  ...maybe she's still around."
She quickly got up and headed towards the upstairs lodging, past the hallway where a kitchen stood opposite a closed stairwell.  The kitchen was entirely empty, which to her was unusual because there almost always was someone inside maintaining it.  It was also nicely stocked considering their situation, a variety of tinned cans ranging from soup to meats that somehow still remained fresh as always.  Technically.  The kitchen was rather large too, a silver faded rectangle of various ovens, gas cookers and sinks both in the middle and across both walls.
Harry was nowhere to be seen, nor any living soul as she tenderly walked into the kitchen hearing an odd slithering noise.  Perhaps a creature had broke in and was now prowling amongst the rooms hunting for something.  But what creature would possibly make a sort of hissing noise, and one much different from that of the cockroaches she had fought?  She prayed it was not a nightstalker which was her only other theory as she stepped in more closely.  Then she heard a sudden scrape of a matchstick.
A fire suddenly blazed white light across the walls, screaming from a gas-powered grill that had been left on before fading away from the wall opposite.  Ramona shrieked along with it, falling back against the stairs before something hurled down on her head, almost crushing her as a chandelier from above came down with an ear-shrieking crash of cheap glass and gilded fool's gold.  No one seemed to call out to her, even in the midst of fire and glass suddenly fuming from the stairwell, forcing her to duck back to hide under the stairs panicking.
As she pulled open the closet door as a means to hide herself beneath the stairs, she found it already occupied by a former friend.  The body of a black man, hung and severed halfway down the middle with chest carved inwards.  His eyes stared upwards towards his brain, where deep claws had scraped neatly across his flesh, the skull exposed within three gashing strikes.

She screamed and ran up the stairs foolishly, not wanting to think as she stumbled her way into a nearby room.  Not even her room but one of the accommodations of the country club for more esteemed guests long ago.  Pushing her body up against the door as she slammed it shut, she huddled herself down and began to sob with fear, gasping like a frightened rabbit as the dark bedroom did not welcome her.
	"H-hoh god, hoh god no th-that was...T-tommy no, Tommy oh god what's happening?!!?  WHAT'S HAPPENING, WHERE IS EVERYONE?!"
	"Gone, child."
	"H-what?!"
	"Gone...to the abyss."
Sitting upon a single oaken chair in the middle of the room, was a creature of reptilian form, dark pebbled-brown with eyes blacker than charred flesh.  A light softly glinted from above him, a cold smile of teeth as he stood up slowly.  Before she even had a chance to run, she turned towards the door before suddenly a friend dropped down before her, hurled against the wall above the door to crumple right at her feet.  A black-haired woman of Hispanic tan in a green ragged dress, her chef's knife still bloody in her hand, but now violently twisted up inside her own stomach.
	"HARRYYYYYYYYY!  NOOOOOOOOOO!"
In her brief moment of panic, she backed up before she saw the creature right beside her.  Staring into her eyes, she darted for the door and tried to leap over Harry's body, but the hand fiercely digging its claws within the wood refused to let her leave.  Her struggle to force open the exit was met with impossible strength as she backed off before stumbling hard, crawling backwards along the floor, shrieking and panicking towards the bed.
The room was rectangular with a ruined persian carpet and four-poster bed that made great comfort in sleep.  Now it gave her sanctuary, protection as she threw the blanket hard over the demon now walking slowly.  A sudden stabbing thrust of some long dark blade tore through the blanket with little resistance, rending it to shreds before being cast aside in four pieces.  She was backed into a corner against the bedside table, one arm upon the bed as she reached for her bat, her hand twitching desperately.
	"Unlike most monsters, I do not disappear underneath a child's blanket."
	"Wh-wh-what...what...what are you?!  What have you done, WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY FRIENDS?!"
	"Your friends are all dead...perhaps five minutes ago...or was it sixteen?  Time has a way of passing on these wastes doesn't it?"
He smiled cruelly as she screamed and swung the bat, knocking it against one of the four columns of the bed and disrupting her swing.  The demon did not even have to react to it, rubbing his nose with disbelief.
	"Is that the best you can do, pathetic girl?  Are you a part of this place?"
	"G-GO AWAY!  J-JUST GO AWAY, PLEASE!  Don't kill me...p-p-please don't I'm sorry, I'm sorry I-"
	"Quiet!  Answer my question, are you a part of this place and those that once inhabited?"
	"I-i-i-i...I...I am...th-they...they were my friends, they were all my friends, why did you kill them?!"
	"Because they were fools, to offer such weakness as pity towards me in allowing me in and they paid for it with their lives.  Not that it would have stopped me had they turned me away, I simply would have had a more difficult time entering...for about five seconds."
	"You...wh-what...what are you?"
	"I am the Scissoraptor."
For once, he met a girl so traumatised by his sight that she did not laugh at this.  This pleased him greatly.
	"Do you fear me, young mortal?"
	"Y-y-y-...y-yes...hoh god please don't, d-d-don't hurt me."
	"And why should I not hurt you the same as I have done to your friends?  Their souls offered me some sating of hunger within me but...what's one more soul to feast on?"
	"Please...please don't...please don't no no no please please NOOO!  PLEASE, NOOOO!  I'LL DO ANYTHING!  ANYTHIIIIIING!"

He reached out towards her head as she shrieked and threw the bat away in panic, sobbing into her hands and howling for mercy.  She grabbed at his leg, pleading before he grabbed at her neck and hurled her across the room.  She didn't even try to run for the door, too stricken with fear as the demon blurred from existence, fading from her eyes as if blinking against the sun before reappearing as clear as day, grasping her neck and pulling her up towards his face.  His breath was still and non-existent upon her lips, the last gasp of a clinically-dead corpse.
	"Anything?"
	"YES!  YES JUST PLEASE SPARE ME!"
	"Hmmmm...new world such as this...a world with such interesting populations full of...misery and...desperation for survival.  This might be interesting...very well.  Make me think you are worth saving.  Your friends gave me sustenance plenty with their lives so I am not quite as partaken of souls at this very moment for a feast upon you...for now.  What can you offer me that makes your life worth anything?  Be warned that my duty is great, and can only be relaxed for so long until I must feed again."
	"My...m-m-my life?  I...I can...I can give you something, m-maybe you want...you want some food?  A house, m-maybe someplace to live?!"
	"I don't need you for that, I have this place now."
	"Oh...oh g-god why, I thought we were safe, I thought I was safe for once, please god please don't whyyyyy-"
	"Shut up."
A smack across the face silenced her with welted cheek, gasping at the ferocious backhand that was more powerful than she imagined.  Wincing from her right eye, she cowered from his sneer now grinding up against her face, eyes piercing into death and darkness.
	"What.  Are you.  Worth?"
	"I...wh-what...I...I was...I was scouting for food.  I know where...where there's lots of food out there."
	"What type of food?"
	"C-canned food, tins, s-s-some sugar bombs maybe a-a-and stuff, there's a mini-mart I found tha-that nobody's found yet!"
	"I do not feed on crops and livestock you pathetic child.  I feed on the living essence of your being...your life...your very centre of existence...your.  Soul."
	"H-hoh...hoh god no...nooo no no this can't be happening!  THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING!"
	"Not anymore for you."
	"WAIT!"
She screamed as she put her hands up, the raptor holding himself back from simply clawing through her face as she desperately thought up a sudden solution.
	"Y-you want souls!?  I can get you souls, lots of souls, I know lots of souls!"
	"Really?"
	"I-i-i know 'em, lots of people, people all over these towns just hiding out, holed up, nothing to do with us!  Th-they're just, survivors, tried to shoot me a buncha times too, I know where they all are!"
	"Hmmmm...interesting.  Tell me, how do you know of such people?"
	"I...I'm the scout.  I go out at...at night and...scout out for places to go find food, or shelter...or...s-something."
	"I see.  So you know of this place well then, this...town?"
	"I know everything, I know every place where people are, you want souls I can save you a lotta walking mister demon sir!"
	"If you are going to give me a title then you may call me master, for I am and always shall be your superior above all your species' existence."

He dumped her on the ground as he sat back upon his seat, smiling as his scissors appeared beside him with a glimmer, a twin-blade of darkness resting by his shoulder.  She dared not move from her place on the floor beside him, quivering with fear as she thanked him profusely.
	"Y-y-yes, yes master, th-thank you so much master!"
	"Do not congratulate my piety just yet mortal, for you still must make yourself useful."
	"I-i-i have a map of the place, both towns even, I can show you where to find people that are hiding, all marked for you to see!"
	"Really?  ...well...I do so enjoy having to run around less to find unsuspecting victims in my area...what a clever little girl you are.  You seem very willing to sacrifice others in order to save yourself."
	"I...th-the only friends I cared about are...d-dead now.  I...I don't wanna die.  I have to...I have to keep going, I just...I just wanna keep going, I can't die out here I just can't!"
	"You will do nothing of the sort, you shall remain here with me until I have deemed you to have lived out your purpose."
	"...please...please...I don't wanna die, please don't do this."
	"You won't if you obey me."
	"B-but what if something happens?!  What if I get killed out there if I help you, m-m-master?!"
	"Hmmm...it would be SLIGHTLY inconvenient I suppose, and it would rather make good use of my time in not wandering around aimlessly across this desert.  Perhaps...ahhhh...yes."
	"H-huh?"
	"I can protect you, with a small ritual we must perform between us."
	"R-ritual?!"
	"Yes...something I have never had the chance to do before myself least as far as I can remember but...it is a part of my legacy regardless.  Tell me...what is your full name?"
	"R-...Ramona.  Ramona Andrews."
	"Good...Ramona Andrews, if you can find me a new meal to partake, and offer it to me...then I shall spare you by the will of my existence and also protect thee."
The moment she heard her name uttered by the demon sent chills down her throat, creeping along her spine like an amorphous parasite at such sickening tone in his more "pleasant" voice.  She softly asked:
	"What...kind of ritual?"
	"A ritual where I shall mark thee with a sign of protection.  A mark of immortality that will ward off demons, and also strengthen you against the greater evils of this world and others beyond.  This mark shall allow you to sense evil, know evil, in order to avoid evil.  Call it a gesture of premonition, courtesy of yours truly."
He made a bow to himself, soaking up her fear with relish as she replied:
	"W-w-wait...did you...did you say immortality?  You can...you can do that?!  Like...m-make me live forever, and not die?!"
	"I am capable of many things," said the demon with a salesman's smile, "I can grant you eternal protection against the great unknown, IF you do something for me.  All I ask, is that you find me a good few souls, a dozen or so...and we shall have a deal."
	"It...you can protect me?  You really want to protect me, make me not...I could live forever...but...b-but wait um, why would you offer me-"
	"Oh well if you'd rather I just kill you-"
	"NO, NO, we can w-w-we can make a deal I just w-wanted to know what made you offer this for me that's all!"
	"Because...I find you a most interesting individual, Ramona Andrews.  Now, do we have a deal...or would you rather succumb to the same fate as that of your friends?"
To her there was no choice, not really.  As much as there was dignity in death, she also had to consider not wanting to be killed, not wanting to have her life end so easily to something so horrid as this beast.  She did not want to give him the satisfaction, if there even was any in his blackened heart.  On the other hand, she knew exactly what her offer would entail, and a deep pondering of thought came to her on whether to sacrifice herself, or others, was the better option.
It did not take her very long to consider her options in the very end, for she knew that in the end, the demon would still roam Attica regardless of her choice.  She slowly pulled out from her knapsack a scrolled map that gave quite an overview of both towns in the area.  Attica was marked much more clearly than that of Williamsport, which laid towards the west as a wide canvas of placemarks untouched by red pen.
But Attica was a living throng of spots and bulletpoints of various indications for food and danger.  Knowing where his next victims would be made him at ease, smiling upon her.
For the next two weeks, fear and suffering would come to the small town of Attica from which no creature would ever return.  Somewhere northeast of the country club, a hotel still stood.
A three-floored building well-stocked with people of mixed various backgrounds from across all the wastes.  Pleasantly dilapidated within itself but its blocked rectangular exterior remained firm and polite, always awaiting service.  The flag of America hung draped beside its door underneath an awning, ruined and tattered.  A guard sat at the reception desk, draped in leather armour with pale skin now flecked with bloodied sweat, his rifle sitting propped up underneath his desk well-polished to a sheen.  The lobby was well-lit even at night, a danger and a rarity in this world to have such electricity.

A voice came from the doors showing a familiar face, a ragged woman looking terrified with short blonde hair.
	"H-hello?"
	"...who's there?"
	"M-my name's Ramona, we um...we talked before?"
	"...the fuck are you doing back here?"
	"Listen, I just, I need help, I don't know who to turn to, I-"
	"We all need help, way more than you after you coming here.  Now get the fuck away from that door or else I'll make you get away."
	"N-no, you don't understand, there's this-"
	"I SAID GET THE FUCK AWAY!"
He pointed his rifle straight at her, shivering with fear as she stared straight past the guard's eyes towards the shadow behind him.  A shadow that slowly began to move by its own will as he slowly got up.  But the shadow went the other way circling around the desk opposite him.  She tried not to stare at it as it began looming ever higher above him, a breath not existing beyond his ear as the man threatened her to leave.
	"You know what would happen if you come back here bitch!"
	"L-look I'm sorry, I didn't mean t-to-I know what happened before but that wasn't my fault!"
	"YOU BROUGHT A PLAGUE OF FUCKING ROACHES, BULLSHIT THAT WASN'T YOUR FAULT, WE ALMOST LOST A KID BECAUSE OF YOU!  And then the time before that, half our water disappeared when you came round!"
	"THAT WASN'T ME I SWEAR!"
	"Then how do you explain disappearing when our water went away hmm!?  You're a fucking thief, either that or just plain bad luck.  I should shoot your fucking face in right now and save this wasteland all the bother, but I'd rather save my ammo.  Instead, I'll beat your face in until it looks like your FUCKING PUSSY!"
	"Please...I'm...I'm sorry I just-I'm really sick, my friends, I-"
	"YOU'RE sick?!  So am I, I'm sick of YOU comin' round here now get the FUCK OUT, or else I-GH-GHHRRR-GHHHRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!"
Ramona screamed and fell back at the sight of the guard's fate, scissors thrust through his very abdomen which poured out fluidly into a spiralling knot twisting around the blades.  Spasming violently as the man's head reared back, he dropped the gun as his hands began seizing towards death, the body shutting down viciously as blood poured its way onto the floor.  The scissors suddenly closed up before pulling wide open, severing the man in half as his flesh tore apart with his cracking ribs, organs falling like a burst-open sack of rotten food.
The Scissoraptor stood neatly with blood all down his front like a butcher, cleaning it slightly to no effect as he said:
	"Good.  That was phase one of our little trick.  Now for phase two, stand here beside me."
She stood next to him without question as he smiled to himself, Ramona panicking frightfully at the sight of the eviscerated human before her now in at least three large chunks of flesh.  She asked softly:
	"Wh-wh-what you gonna do?"
	"This."
A sudden ice cold went deep into her neck, plunging fast as she felt her entire body start to lose control at the collapse of her limbs.  It was almost instantaneous that she had no time to run, grasped by the creature's bloodied claws in an embrace to stop her from dropping to the floor.  He placed back the needle containing ketamine within James' satchel, chuckling at the sight of her draped across his arms.
	"Wouldn't want you to run away and miss the show itself...hmhmhahaha."

Hurrying into the lobby were two guards also in leather armour, wielding a shotgun and handgun respectively.  The shotgun was a double-barrelled 12-gauge in the hands of a white man with white hair and a neck the size of two fists.  The handgun was a blocky black beast with 14mm bullets, wielded by a woman of Middle-Eastern descent whose face remained pinched and constantly pursed lips.  No one appeared to be in the lobby.
	"The fuck's Marty got to?!" asked the woman.
	"No idea," said the guy, "you heard him scream too right?"
	"I know him screaming from anywhere, since the bugs got in."
	"Marty!?  Marty what's happening?!  Where'd you go?!"
	"Chris, look!"
The woman brought her friend over to the front of the desk, seeing a large blood pool streaking across the floor rather glossy under the clean lights.  In the middle of the pool itself, was a younger woman of short blonde hair and beige jacket tight against her body.  Her eyes were open, looking around quite fearfully in panic at the two people standing above her.
	"Who the fuck's this?!"
	"I dunno but holy shit she's lost a lotta blood!"
	"HEY, you hear me?!  Can you hear me?!"
The girl said nothing, eyes pulsating feverishly with fright.
	"Can you talk!?  Are you hurt anywhere?!"
	"She can't hear us can she?" said the male.
	"I see her eyes moving Chris, maybe she's gone into shock, get a doctor down here!"
	"A-alright...she looks familiar though."
	"F-fuck it just get a goddamn doctor okay?!"
	"Fine fine, uhhh lemme jus-SHIT FUCK!"
Suddenly the lights went out by a spark of lightning, plunging the lobby into total darkness.  Ramona was truly in fear for her life, not able to move or even warn them of the coming terror that approached.  Two flashlights turned on as white beams cast across the floor, walls streaked by their glow before Chris said:
	"I heard the fusebox give out, musta been a fuse!"
	"Really?" said the woman.  "A fuse blew in the fusebox, good one Sherlock."
	"Shut up Meera.  You wanna do it or shall I?"
	"You do it, you're the expert, I'm gonna go get a doctor for this woman.  If you see Marty slap him in the fucking face alrighty?"

Chris went over to the fusebox on the side of the lobby entrance, hidden beneath a somewhat-drooping plastic plant that, even in artificial state, had lost all life since long before this day.  The panel box was glinting with hot yellow streaks, and at first Chris thought the fuses truly had blown when he groped along the wiring with rubber glows.  But then he noticed something odd about them.
	"Hey uh Meera?  Did we change the wires at all recently?"
	"No why?" replied Meera.
	"Just these kinda feel weird like not as thick as they normally are an-wait wait hold up...something's stuck right up here lemme...just...NNNNGUH!  WH-SHIT!"
Tugging hard at a blockage further up the wiring space, he pulled out a severed hand with bloody veins dripping out of the broken wrist.  Said veins had been twisted round the wiring itself in a macabre fashion, making Chris back up hard before stumbling back onto a sharp thrusting point, practically impaling himself with surprise before he could even say anything more.  Meera did not even notice her friend die literally six feet away from her in total darkness, calling out:
	"CHRIS!  Chris?!  The fuck's wrong with you, you find a rat or something?!  CHRIS!"
She called out to where he was but saw nothing other than the faint silhouette of someone matching his proportions.  It was hard to make out Chris' body, but she certainly heard and saw the outline fall to the floor as she rushed over to find Chris brutally impaled.  Blood clearly pooled out from underneath the focal point, a large blade with strange circular handles in the dark sprouting from his back.
	"OHHH!  Sh-shit, CHRIS!  WHO'S THERE!?"
Meera swung out her handgun furiously pointing in all corners of the room.
	"WHO THE FUCK'S OUT THERE, COME ON OUT!  COME OUT OR I SWEAR I'LL KILL YOU!  I'LL KILL YOU, I-GHHHK!"
From the ceiling above her came the pair of scissors, suddenly transported to above only to directly come down and impale through her skull, splitting it almost in half.  Before the demon appeared before her in the final dark moments of comprehension, Meera felt her neck twisting savagely round with one creaking snap, blades pulling out before she fell on top of Chris' body, the scissors returning back into the demon's grasp.
	"Wait here," he said to his "bleeding" companion, "I shan't be long...hmhmhaha."
Ramona waited laying down on Marty's blood, terrified out of her wits and unable to cry for help, or scream or warn anyone even.  All she could do was watch the darkness around her.  And wait.  And hear the screams of those she had bartered for with the demon's promise.  In her terrified state locked in her body, the muscle relaxant savagely shutting down all ability to move as a painless drift came to her senses, she begged forgiveness.  Not to God.  Not to family.  But to herself.  The darkness screamed to her, her eyes dripping tears softly onto the blood.

Jeremy stood waiting at the doorframe, his tanned skin offset from the rest of his leather-draped body as he wielded a shotgun readily towards the general stomach area.  Bonnie, the mother along with their daughter Claris, sat fearfully back against the bed watching the door stay guarded.  The past half hour had been a tense and violent upheaval, their peace having been shattered by the front lobby area being filled by shrieks of agony, before the sounds of torment came closer and closer towards them.  Rooms broken into, doors torn apart, as were the inhabitants inside.
	"A-are you sure there was something?" whispered Claris.
	"I saw it," said Jeremy, "some kinda monster, I didn't get a look of 'im but it's not human.  Whatever that is it's not human."
	"Wh-what room did it go into?" asked Bonnie.
	"105, Kyle's room."
	"Hoh jesus no...I thought I heard Max scream I hoped I didn't-"
	"SHH!"
He hushed them as a voice came from outside, murmuring along the hallway of orange-painted walls and red ruined carpet saying:
	"Knock knock...hmmm?  No one here...knock knock?  ...no one here either...hmmmmm...knock.  Kno-"
Jeremy fired his shotgun hard through the door, blasting through whatever stomach laid on the other side of it as a grunt of surprise came from it.  The monster shuddered as he chuckled darkly, the man aiming his shotgun up higher.
	"WHO'S THERE?!"
	"...orange."
	"Wh-what?!  Orange?!"
	"As in, orange you glad that you'll be first to die?"
	"The fuck are you talkin' abou-GHHHRRK!"
	"JEREMYYYYY!"
The sudden swift thrust of blades through the wooden door pierced through his body, a sudden snap of his spinal column sending sprays of blood onto the ruined carpet as screams from inside came to the beast.  The man's spine was now twisted out of place, frayed like a torn rope twitching from his back as the scissors slid back suddenly, leaving a great gath in the door as the man fell back.
The door was soon demolished through by being wedged open through the crack by abnormal strength, scissors ripping apart the wood panelling as he broke through seeing two women.  Clearly mother and daughter as the Scissoraptor hurled his blades towards them.  The mother was now pinned to the bed's headrest, screaming as both blades trapped her by the neck firmly without harm, keeping her from escaping with her throat right against the centre where they meet.  The daughter had been quick enough to evade, but the demon stepped close towards her in a cloud of darkness, flickering the dull light of the room on and off as if he had become a shadow, raking his claws deep into her gut.
In that moment a man came rushing up from the hallway, hearing the sounds of screaming with blood pooling outwards from the door broken in.  A sturdy man in iron armour, Asian complexion with a short moustache and beard covering his rugged jaw.  He had been last to leave the security office but came running once the screams started to reach him.  He stepped into the doorframe, wielding his riot-control shotgun, a military-style weapon with a drum magazine underneath the main barrel.
	"God...dammit."
He sneered towards the demon ripping apart the young teenage daughter, tearing her abdomen out as she screamed howling with legs barely able to stand, before twisting her jaw off and sucking the life out of her in a vile "kiss".  The mother was screaming, crying for help and sobbing from her pinned place against the bed as she cried:
	"JUNG, HELP ME PLEAAAAASE!"
He propped up his shotgun and violently fired at the creature, knowing that Claris was long gone and there would be no saving her, the demon fading off from his view in a sudden flash of darkness.  It almost felt like he had blinked, despite the fact he was certain he didn't as the young daughter's body fell crumpled to the floor.  Bonnie was sobbing, pleading to be let free from the scissors still implanted within the headrest, splintering through the wood like two swords joined as she tried to scream once more.

She never had the chance before the scissors snapped shut.  She couldn't even speak, not even a gurgle as her head lay back before it rolled off down her arm towards the side of her chest, leaving Jung shaking with fury as he fired into the room.  Bullets sprayed through every inch of darkness that the demon could be hiding in, lighting up with a furious volley.  The scissors suddenly hurled themselves from the bed, whirling towards him as he pumped an entire clip into the metal blades, pinging violently off of them before they succeeded in scarring his arm deep.
Cutting down his entire right arm with a sudden slash, he dropped his gun and went roaring with frenzy as he grabbed the scissors, blood trickling from his gloved hands as a burning intensity went surging through them.  Screaming deep from the agony now surging through his spirit, he turned hard towards a demon shape, the raptor now behind him before he suddenly thrust forwards.  Deep, plunging through the raptor's heart now broken in two.  Never beating for the past few days but now only twitching just to repair itself.  The monster gasped a hot shudder.
	"HHhhhHHHKkkhhh...oh...y-you...you have a warrior's spirit."
	"WH-what?!"
	"No one...has ever...done such a thing to me with my own blade."
But the demon simply pushed himself forwards before grasping at the man's head, but he was fast enough to duck back and kick the scissor handle hard with a powerful boot stomp.  The demon staggered slightly, but it was enough for him to duck down to the floor, grab the shotgun and fire right at the raptor's head to blast it clean off, severing 2/3 of the skull as the right eye, jaw and skulltop disappeared.  The monster choked gargling, its ability to speak compromised yet no blood ever spilt from its fresh wound, jaw hanging limply by the smallest tendril.
	"N-NGHK...bhD."
	"You'll regret coming here," said Jung snarling.
	"UhK...Bhg...tuu DfFfr."
With a raspy chuckle reminiscent of a howling wraith, the demon slowly began to re-energise, repairing the damage to his body as his skull re-emerged, shattered bone and brain neatly snapping back into place.  His host's eye briefly reappeared as it once was, a mournful forest green before being swallowed up by the blackness of evil, the crackling sound of bone rearranging itself accompanying the sight as the Scissoraptor smiled happily.  He reset his jaw slightly with a small snap, mocking with:
	"Would you like a second try, samurai?"
	"I'm Korean you fucking asshole."
	"You'll be dead no matter where you come from."
	"Same to YOU!"

The moment he fired, the monster faded from his view making Jung dodge back into a roll, trapping himself in the room but waiting for his chance to strike as the monster reappeared once more.  He grabbed the lamp from the bedside table and saw the beast reappear ready to strike, before jamming the bulb straight into the monster's eye.  Electrocuting him briefly, it stopped the raptor from attacking, screeching violently with a sudden pain.  It was his chance to leave as Jung ran from the room, heading back towards the hallway.
However the scissors had followed him, hurling from the bedside and shanking deep into Jung's leg.  He went down with a roar, staggering against the wall as he fired back at the possesed weapon without thinking.  The pinging of pumped buckshot rattling against steel made it shudder unholy, as if outraged by such an assault.  He dragged his way up the hall, crying out:
	"EVERYONE STAY IN YOUR ROOMS, BRING OUT YOUR BEST WEAPONS WE'RE UNDER ATTACK!  WE GOT A MONSTER IN THE BUILDING AND HE'S NOT FUCKING AROUND!"
	"MONSTER?!" screamed one male voice.
	"LOOKS LIKE A DINOSAUR, YOU SEE ANYTHING NOT HUMAN, FUCKING PUMP IT FULL O' LEAD!"
	"LOOKS like?"
The voice slithered from behind his ear as he turned and fired, the Scissoraptor now learning as he grabbed the shotgun and fired it through one of the doors, screams coming from inside as people panicked even more.  Jung struggled to regain control of his weapon, roaring as he punched the demon in the face with an iron fist.  The snout bruised harshly but that did not deter him, kicking back the human hard as the scissors readily came flying from behind with the threat of impalement.
Jung however had survived long enough to not die so easy, ducking as he heard something come streaking up behind him before falling onto the floor, firing his shotgun once more to catch both raptor and scissors in one hit.  From this distance, it was not enough to harm the monster other than by making a few new holes inside its body which slowly reappeared back to solid cold flesh, not leaving a single trace of blood behind it as the scissors quivered menacingly from the blow.  The demon was not amused.
	"Ohhhh you're becoming one of THOSE humans aren't you?  That insufferable spirit that tells you to not die?"
	"Yes.  I am.  My name is Baek Jung-ho, and I'm not gonna let you fucking kill us all."
	"You won't LET me no, unlike that darling Ramona who is currently in the lobby."
	"What?"
	"But I have killed far stronger creatures than you, mortal."
	"...well you know what?"
He stood with shotgun at the ready in one hand, taunting the creature with a beckoning nod.
	"So have I."

Despite the monster's foul cackle of disbelief at such a confident human being, he stood stone-cold without hesitation despite his wounded leg and arm before firing at one of the hall lights above its head.  The raptor however was not so foolish and quickly backed off, sparks raining down upon the floor as one part of the hallway plunged into darkness.  He had enough shells to last him a whole week, waiting for the monster to reappear before he felt a sudden icy sting pierce into his neck.
	"You fight demons rather well...but can you fight against your own blood betraying you?"
Jung felt the world turn dead upon him, his arms dropping with his riot shotgun falling upon the floor as he grunted against a numbing pain riddling through his entire body.  Struggling to cry out a roar of fury, his knees began to buckle as he collapsed fully with the muscle relaxant taking away his strength.  It took longer for him to succumb than Ramona, his muscles pushing hard against the invading chemical before his eyes were the only thing that kept moving.  The demon's clawed feet now stood before him, unable to crane his head up.
	"Since your body so refuses to die, I will let your spirit go first.  All these people, whom so entrusted you with their safety and lives...they will all die because you simply did nothing...but lie on the floor like a cowardly dog."
A weakened groan of agonising fury came from Baek Jung-ho, the raptor chuckling darkly at such resistance.
	"Impressive you still speak, you lasted longer than the girl did by about five more seconds...or six.  But I hope you hear these people scream for their saviour who shall never reach them.  Humanity has reaped with this world that they've made...now they must sow, for me to feast upon their harvest of souls."
With a simpering bow he walked off into the dark hallway light, the last sparks fading away along with the demon, as the sounds of many people soon came to Jung's ears.  Howling screams, sobbing pleas, shrieks of agony as people called out for his name.  Unrelenting fury burned deep in his heart, the monster not even having the grace to simply kill him and spare this torture.  The world sank deeper for him, a misery gone eternal as he started to see the lights go out.  As if each light was a soul he had saved, that he had protected now lost from this world.
Whether it was seeing something else or the effects of the drug now in him he was not sure.  But whatever the case it meant something to him.  He struggled not to weep, he struggled not to hear the screams including at one point the monster roaring with a new pain, a new agony unknown.  Instead he focused on rage simply to take vengeance upon this beast, this monstrosity, for so swiftly slaughtering his entire people.  Darkness took him as he heard the voice of a woman come weeping from the lobby.
	"I'm sorry...I'm so sorry..."