I was awakened by the creaking of metal.

I hurriedly sat up and looked at my watch. 2:15. I’d been asleep for over 6 hours.

The floor beneath me shifted slightly, and the metal creaking began to sound more like moaning. I could hear brick and cement crumbling, glass shattering.

A demon was in the building. And a large one, at that.

Knell had disappeared. There was no telling where he went or how long he’d been gone. I ran back into the building and began descending the stairs. I would have to find the angel and get all the way down to the first floor before the whole structure collapsed.

As I neared the 25th floor, I began to hear high-pitched, childlike screams. I gripped the delta and continued on.

Demons have been known to mimic human screams and speech to scare their victims into submission…and to deter any would-be heroes. I had to remain focused, or I’d lose the battle before it had even begun.

Knell would be fine. I would find the demon. And the demon would be destroyed.

The screaming soon subsided, and the air was instead filled with what sounded like a flurry of small explosions. The demon was on the move again, probably breaking more holes in the walls to expedite the collapse of the building. I was partly glad, because its sudden change in behavior probably meant that Knell was giving it a run for its money, wherever he was.

But it also meant that we were out of time. Everything was shaking and swaying and falling apart; already, the staircase was coming out of the walls. I had to find a faster way to the ground, or I would soon be finding the fastest way.

“CLARION!”

It was Knell’s voice. Or perhaps the demon’s voice, if it had decided to retry its first plan. It was too soon to tell, but I headed toward the sound anyway.

The 14th floor looked frightening, to say the least. There was no ceiling anymore: debris fell freely from the upper floors and crashed straight through to the lower ones. Most of the floor had crumbled away; all that was left was a network of crisscrossing steel beams and pipes that were already beginning to fold under the strain.

I hung onto a pipe and scanned the darkness with my flashlight. There was no sign of Knell. And it was too dangerous to move from my spot to look for him: the whole floor could cave in at any minute.

I hadn’t yet felt familiar enough with the angel to call him by name, but it seemed I wouldn’t be able to find him otherwise. “KNELL!” I yelled as loudly as I could.

It wasn’t long before I got a reply. “Clarion! I’m over here! Wait, I’ll come to you!”

Knell emerged from a hole in the adjacent wall, inching towards me on what was left of the floor. He was covered in colors from head to toe, and dragging a large, dark object behind him.

“This didn’t really go the way I planned!” he shouted over all the chaos. “But I got something that’ll save us both: the demon’s wings!”

He pushed them into my arms. They felt like leather and liquid all at once. Like a thick, viscous lava.

“Are you insane?!” I exclaimed. “You can’t just steal a demon’s body parts! Once they’re separated from the main body, they disintegrate! These aren’t going to save anybody!”

“They’ll hold! Trust me!” he replied, already climbing onto my back. “Besides, if we don’t try then we’ll both definitely die here anyway! We’ve got nothing to lose!”

He had a point. “Alright, what do I do?!”

“Just hang on to them and jump!”

The wall in front of us conveniently crumbled, creating an opening to the outside. The groaning of the metal was deafening; everything was definitely about to collapse. It was now or never. So, I squeezed my eyes shut and jumped.

I heard the skyscraper collapsing, getting further and further away. Air rushed past my face. Colors dripped off the wings and down my back, and Knell’s horns dug into my neck, which was a bit uncomfortable. But at least we were still alive. His crazy plan had somehow worked.

Strangely, although Knell was so close, I couldn’t feel any body heat from him at all. I couldn’t even feel him breathe. He was probably doing his statue routine again, but it felt like I was carrying a corpse. It was unsettling.

I was about to consider the possibility that he might actually have died, when he suddenly sprung back to life. “Clarion, the ground!” he yelled into my ear. “Drop and roll!”

I finally opened my eyes, just as the earth came rushing up to my feet. It was too late to “drop and roll”; what I ended up doing was more like “crumble and tumble”.

Afterwards, my clothes were covered in dirt, my skin was covered in bruises, and I couldn’t see a thing. I pulled my flashlight out of my bag and looked around. Knell was sitting in front of me, looking calm and surprisingly immaculate. His skin and clothes were dirt-free; even the colors had come off of him somehow. I supposed it was just an angel thing.

He turned to me. “That was cool!” he crowed. “I’m sorry for being a lousy lookout, though. I did see the demon coming, but I thought I could take him. I probably should’ve woken you up.”

“Yes, you should have…”

“So, are you going back to sleep?”

I looked at my watch. 2:32. Dawn wouldn’t come for at least 4 more hours. But the area we were in was so exposed, we were likely to get attacked again anyway. Besides, I’d slept enough for one night.

“No, we’re moving on,” I said. “And on the way, I’m going to teach you the right way to destroy a demon.”