Eva

  She had been torn between running up or down. While the roof seemed like a good place to wait for Dante, every instinct in her body forced her down as many finished flights of stairs as she could possibly find in the abandoned construction site. Those who ran anywhere but the street always were the first to die in horror movies. That and, well, with her melanin she liked her odds on the ground better.

  She could hear Dante and the creature tearing through the building, and it didn't seem smart to stay. He needed backup and Eva was determined to get help.

  However, once she found herself outside the building, she realized too late she was still trapped by the nearly eight-foot barbed-wired security fence surrounding the site. Ironically used to keep people out, but now a definite death trap with its massive chains and padlocked front gate.

  Despite her burning lungs and limbs, she sprinted around the building in search of another possible exit, though came up empty.

  Instead, she found herself on the original side of the building where the creature had fallen across the street when it was injured. Its green goopy blood still dripped and pooled from its perch.

  Swearing under her breath, she turned to go back to the front with hopes of either kicking down a gate, flagging down a passing car, or even scaling the damn fence if she had to.

  Before she could make a run for the front of the building again, a black figure came crashing towards the ground a few yards in front of her. Its body rolled a few times when it hit the ground with the sheer force it'd been knocked through the building's exterior. His body was eerily limp and she immediately ran to him, realizing the onyx creature was Dante.

  She carefully flipped his body over to check him, ignoring the heat that stung the palms of her hands.

  He'd changed completely; his entire body was the blackest onyx she'd ever seen, including his now spiked hair. His nails were sharp just as the spikes protruding from his forearms, shoulders, and just about all over his body and long tail.

  While he was still breathing, his body was covered in the creature's goop and blood. She realized he'd been fighting for his life. His clothes were gone, but he wasn't completely naked; his weapon belts stayed. The onyx seemed to encase him, though not protect him, she could still see he was wounded in some places.

  In the building behind them, the creature growled low. She looked up to see it leering from a hole in the wall on the sixth floor, where she was sure it knocked Dante through. It snarled down at them and Eva scrambled to find something to protect them.

  Her hands went to the vials in her pocket, and when she found what she thought was the right one, she used all her strength to hurl it at the creature mid-jump.

  Before it could make impact with its body, Dante at that same moment, had finally come to. He drew a dagger from somewhere Eva hadn't seen, and it left his fingers, if not a second after the vial had left hers.

  His dagger shattered her vial just as it made contact with the snakish hybrid and it bellowed in pain when both the knife penetrated its scaly yet slimy flesh and the acid splattered across its chest.

  Unfortunately, neither stopped the thing from its determined descent. If anything it just seemed to piss it off more. As if already knowing this, Dante covered Eva with his large body and rolled them out of the creature's impact.

  Skillfully, he tossed another dagger when he'd gotten them far enough away, and she noticed just how banged up the creature was. It was riddled with bullet holes. At least five daggers protruded from its back, stomach, and shoulders, along with long gashes that she assumed were from Dante's missing larger sword.

  And yet it kept coming.

  And even though Dante looked, not nearly as banged up but still harbored wounds of his own, he sprinted from Eva's side and back into the fray.

  Both he and the creature brawled in front of her, blocking her exit. Its tentacles snaked out from its back in an attempt to land blows, but Dante's short blades were too fast for it. He blocked each strike, slicing into its limbs in the same motion. His chest glowed the same icy blue as his eyes but would dim here and there.

  Eva knew he had to be getting tired. He'd been fighting this one far longer than the last two that came for them. This thing seemed more powerful than the other two. Monroe had said the acid-like potion only worked on lower and mid demons but it appeared to barely faze it.

  In her other pocket, she fingered the bottle she knew she needed to use to help Dante.

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  The portal vial. But with him so close to the demon she wasn't sure if it would suck him in as well.

  She had to get its attention. She had to draw it towards her somehow. It wanted her anyway, right?

  When the creature sneakily used a limb to knock Dante back a few feet she shouted at the demon before it could continue its attack.

  Without thinking, she waved her arms and shouted again. "Hey, you ugly fuck! Over here!"

  It took its attention from Dante, who was looking at her as if she'd lost her mind. It apparently deemed her the better prize, easily leaving its struggle with Dante, and rushed towards her.

  She gripped the bottle in her hand, ready to throw but once it had turned its back, Dante jumped it, not knowing she had a plan of her own.

  As he jumped onto its back with a questioning growl of what the hell she thought she was doing, he continued to stab at the creature. He pulled another gun from somewhere, this one smaller than the ones she'd seen him normally use, but before he could fire a shot, a bloody tentacle knocked not only him off but also knocked a surprised Eva over.

  The bottle slipped from her grasp as her body slid to the right near the fence, clattering though thankfully not shattering when it hit the dirt across from her near the building.

  She tried to rally herself quickly, but she was no demon. Her body ached with exertion and that blow to the stomach had knocked some of the wind out of her. Still, she heard Dante grunting, fighting again, and she knew she had to do this.

  Standing, though weak on her feet, she looked for a way to help again.

  "Eva, stop!" Dante shouted at her while going for his fallen gun.

  His opponent took advantage of his slight distraction and snatched him up, making the gun fly from his hands.

  While it didn't slide close to Eva, it was still closer to her than it was to Dante. So she ran for it.

  She'd never fired a weapon before and when she picked up the small gun, the cool steel felt foreign in her hands. Even though it was small for Dante, it still held some weight to it which surprised her.

  She wasn't sure how to fire it, but her brothers had made her watch enough action movies that it seemed not too difficult to figure out.

  Just point and shoot, right?

  The part that needed to be pulled back was already cocked by Dante, thank goodness, and she tried her best to aim.

  With one eye shut she aimed at the beast and tried not to hit Dante.

  She pulled the trigger and even with the gun gripped in both hands, the force scared her, pushing her back a bit. But she didn't drop it.

  Dante shouted at her with a warning, still trying to fight his way out of his slimy prison.

  She ignored him, firing again. She hadn't heard the first bullet hit anything, not even brick like Dante's previous shots had, but this one squelched when it hit the creature's flesh. She'd gained its attention again, which had been the original plan, but she didn't have the original vial anymore.

  So, what exactly was the plan?

  She fired three more times, this time both eyes open as she tried to focus on hitting her target.

  One went airborne, one hit slimy tentacle flesh, and the other?

  "Ow! Mother-fuck! Evanora!" Dante hurled profanities from his new gunshot wound.

  "Shit, shit, shit!" She repeated not only with the realization that she'd accidentally shot the wrong target but because she'd actually hit the limb holding Dante, and the creature had dropped him. But was now solely focused on her again.

  She pulled the trigger again when it started for her, but the gun only clicked silently with each pulse of her index finger.

  "Shit, shit, shit!" She repeated again realizing she was most definitely screwed.

  She wouldn't be able to get to the other vial before it reached her and all she had left was the glorified flashlight. Still, she tossed it, letting it crash in front of the creature's path as she made a dash for the building.

  The glass shattered between them and the brightest light Eva had ever seen erupted and crackled behind her. She was certain if she had looked directly into it she'd have gone blind, like staring straight into the blast of an IED she'd seen in a war movie once.

  Is that what Monroe had meant? Was she finally in her first battle? That's certainly what she felt like. Her body felt it.

  Untrained, sloppy, and terrified.

  Terrified not only for her life but Dante's. And though there was no time, she still mentally cursed her parents for putting her in this predicament untrained and unprepared. A sitting duck. A fucking damsel.

  She hated feeling helpless. But still, she fought.

  For her life.

  For the crystal around her neck.

  For Dante.

  The demon snarled in protest at the blinding light, a clever distraction on Eva's part, but that's all it had been. A two to three-second distraction that didn't give her enough time to cross the distance from the fence to the building and easily locate the last remaining vial.

  She was out of ideas and hoped Dante was close enough to offer any assistance as she felt the demon's slimy tentacle wrap tightly around her waist again, snatching her back.

  But just as soon as its grip had tightened, it released her along with a roaring pain-filled screech. She'd heard the stabbing squelch before it screamed out, grateful Dante had been there just in the nick of time, as always.

  The creature's body slumped to the dirt with a heavy sigh and Dante pulled out the massive metal post he'd forced into its back so deeply it protruded from its chest. He repeated the motion once more with its head.

  Eva had fallen just in front of its face, and the final assault splattered green goopy blood onto the front of her already ruined outfit.

  Dante sighed heavily, tired and possibly frustrated. She could tell as he pulled the massive pole out again. This time he let it clang to the ground.

  He came towards her but it was more like stalking. He was beaten pretty badly and she could see his exhaustion. It was in his walk and his face. But his eyes? His irises were the brightest icy blue she’d ever seen them, matching the hue pulsing in his heaving chest.

  She'd never seen anything like him before; she didn't know this was even possible for him. Though she shouldn't have been surprised, he was a demon, after all. She wondered what other demonic qualities he held, though didn't have time to think about them.

  When his hands slipped under her arms, lifting her from the ground his claws dug into her back painfully. And finally, she realized his icy blue eyes were filled with anger. Towards her, she feared.