Demon's Awakening Ch. 01

Prologue

It was a night like any other until Mina dangled her foot over the edge of the bed. An unconscious and benign mistake.

Shadows began shifting under the bed, forming into a black clawed hand. The hand reached up, playfully stroking Mina's ankle to test the waters. A human's energy was laid bare when sleeping, prime for inducing. The entity felt her energy seeping through, a delicious essence of life. Something he never had yet always hungered for.

His fingers glided down the arch before resting his thumb on the sole of her foot, pressing in. Sharp nail pricking into the skin, a vicious smile appeared in the dark.

Alor's deep voice slithered around the room. "It is done, you are mine."

Mina remained motionless. Chest slowly rising and falling under the oversized t-shirt. She wasn't going to rise to the bait, how boring. Time to play with his food instead.

Alor's lethal fingers curled around Mina's ankle, charged with such power he could taste it on his tongue. In one tug, he threw her entire body out from under the sheets onto the hardwood floor. He erupted into menacing laughter and dissipated into thin air.

Rudely awoken and dishevelled, Mina slowly hauled herself up onto her knees. "Fuck."

Children were taught to fear the monsters under their bed. But Mina had grown up with them, and she was too dazed to deal with this now so she padded back to her bed.

***

MINA

"Are there haunted items in this apartment by any chance?"

As if on queue, the light above the table flickered with a dilated hum. Seated at the living room table, my land lady decided to drop by for a visit. But it was prime time for an interrogation, and I needed answers. There was something dark in this place. I could feel it.

"You ask that like it's a normal question." Janet laughed into her tea before setting it down. She was a kindly 60 year old lady. Her lips pressed into a pensive line, eyes drifting around in thought. "From what I can recall, the mattress might be haunted?"

A long stretch of silence passed. The joke never came.

"You've got to be kidding me." I said flatly. No wonder the apartment was so cheap. I got scammed!

Janet's eyes flashed voraciously, baring her teeth in a wicked chuckle. This was nothing but fun and games to her. "The last tenant had no trouble." Janet waved a hand. "You're a seer right? This is nothing you can't handle." On one hand she was right. I was suited to this sort of thing, seeing things others cannot see. But on the other, it made me more vulnerable to those in the Spirit Realm. My knuckles turned white on the mug nestled in my hands.

I didn't hide the urgency in my tone. "What if the entire building becomes haunted?"

Janet gave a careless wave before getting up off her seat. "I respect the dead, if they want to haunt let them be. They don't concern me."

This thing isn't dead, it's never been alive.

It was 9pm by the time Janet left. I pressed by back against the front door and watched the overhead light shutter again. Entities were like college kids at house parties, they become untamed under the moon. Bad things happen in the dark, so they said. And that was true--but it depended on what kind of entity you were dealing with.

I did everything I could to ignore the flickering light. Since my apartment was an open floor plan, in one fluid motion I snatched some ice cream from the kitchen and leapt onto the couch to turn on the tv. The screen emitted white static, and as I was about to dig into my cookies and cream all the lights in the room cut out. Pitch black except for the illumination from under my bedroom door.

Fuck. I slammed my ice cream on the coffee table. "You're being an attention whore!" Clearly, this thing's fun was just beginning. It was a power move but I had no choice and needed to confront it now. Get on friendly terms at the very least.

I slowly felt my way through the dark, cringing in anticipation as I turned the door knob and kicked open my bedroom door. I wasn't taking any jump scares from this thing. I'd slept in this room the night before, on the haunted mattress. I thought about addressing it then, but the moonlight through the windows showed nothing. No signs of movement, no swirling shadows. Just silence. It wasn't a good sign. After all, when you dared to address an entity as sinister as a demon, bad things were bound to take place. They had a hold on you, so to speak. Words were power.

***

It was one of those nightmarishly hot evenings in June. Khloe and I sat in a classroom with broken air con, staring into space. Even the lecturer was droning, absentminded from the heat, tapping through his powerpoint on Rosemary's Baby.

"It's distracting when the teacher is close to our age." Khloe whispered, her eyes glazed over. He was un-buttoning his linen shirt.

I gave her an impish grin in return. "Don't act like you hate calling him sir."

She sunk back into her seat trying to hide her snicker. "I never denied that."

Hugh was one of the latest teaching additions to the university. Though he was filling in for another, he was competent in his field of Gothic studies. A man of romanticism, who would have thought? Everyone found him eye-catching, when he opened his mouth we expected John Keating but got... whatever this was.

"Bloody hell, I'm sweating balls here!" Hugh burst out in a fit of sweat, flinging his laptop shut. Everyone's head bobbed up at his sudden reaction, straightening in their seats assuming his irritation was directed at the class. Hugh dragged out one of the empty seats to the front of the class, directly under a ceiling fan. Sitting down, he leaned back to bask in the fan's wind. Beneath the undone buttons, his sweat slicked chest was now exposed, he sighed in relief.

"Sir, it's only 4pm."

"Thank you, the sun will set soon." The class went silent. We all looked around at each other, chairs scuffing back a few people headed for the door.

"No!" Hugh pointed an accusing finger at the early risers. "If you walk out I'll mark your assessment results down by 10%. Relax in here till class ends."

They returned to their seats while the class began to spread out and attempt to relax in the heat. We really lucked out with four ceiling fans, Khloe didn't waste time securing a spot under the fan Hugh was occupying. I dragged a chair over to see that there was no room under that fan any longer, it had been populated quickly by other fangirls.

"Mina!" I turned at the familiar voice, seeing my other friend Ethan sitting in a sparse group at the far end of the room. He waved me over and I felt my heart skip a beat. He's offering me a seat!

I smiled and sat down beside him, the cool wind welcoming. "Thanks."

"We'll have to buy cold beers tonight." Oh crap, I had a date night. Right. "Do you still want to go go carting?"

I grimaced. I didn't want to do anything in this heat. "What do you prefer--go carting or ice cream and a movie at my place?"

Our knees were touching. It felt like Ethan was somehow closer to me even though he was sitting on his own chair. His gaze was intense, thick lashed and dark. I couldn't look at him for too long.

Ethan's ears turned red. His jaw hard set. "Y-your place? That sounds much better. Don't wanna die of heatstroke." He rubbed the back of his neck and I giggled coyly. He did that when he had no idea how to calm down. We were long time friends, but I thought we could manage something more. No matter how weird it would seem.

***

Date night started out great. I took note that none of the usual signs of paranormal activity were triggered when Ethan arrived. No flickering light. No creeping mist. No nothing. He hauled a six pack of Budweiser onto the kitchen counter and lit up at the sight of me pulling Pizza out of the air fryer.

I grinned. "You're good with New York style?"

"Of course, straight to my heart." There was a light blush dusting his cheeks. "I don't think I've had a New York pizza since I was a kid? Time flies."

I scoff at the admission, before dishing out the pizza onto a plate. "I can't believe you. I could've sworn we had it in middle school on sports day?"

Ethan held a finger to his lips. "Don't tell my mom." He cracked open a beer for me and slid it my way. "I'll get the movie up."

Once I heated up some garlic bread, I brought our meal over into the living area when I stopped in my tracks. Freddy Kruger was on my Netflix homescreen. Just my fucking luck, entities loved anything that could inspire negative energy and fear.

Ethan gazed at me over his shoulder, registering my obvious hesitation. "What, chicken?" He almost sounded patronising, there was even a mischievous glint in his eyes, one I had never seen before.

I bit my lip to satiate my nerves. This was a classic date move, watch a scary movie and the scared one will cling onto the other. An easy reason to touch and escalate things further. Ethan was playing checkers but I was playing chess. There was no way in hell I was giving Ethan what he wanted. If I did, the entity in my room would flip the fuck out on my horror.

"No." I rolled my eyes.

"It's ok to be scared." Ethan lounged back lazily, gesturing for me to sit beside him in the circle of his arm. "I'll protect you."

God, he was really getting an ego stroke out of this. "Don't be silly. Just hurry up and start the movie before our Pizza gets cold."

At first I was fine, munching on my Pizza slice and sculling my beer. But then I lost my appetite quickly, stiffly enduring the jump scares while maintaining my composure. I don't think I was totally focusing, because it seemed to blend into the odd sounds from the apartment itself.

It's not real. Nothing can touch me.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood up as a sudden weight pressed in. I gave an involuntary yelp, Ethan tried to smother his snicker. His fingers were on my nape. His smile was teasing. "You get so worked up over--"

I dove into his lap, circling my hands around his waist and pressed my face into his torso. I couldn't watch the movie any longer. The sounds needed to stop. I tugged the front of his shirt over my ears to stifle it.

Somehow, we ended up on my bed after that. My lips pried open under Ethan's tongue. Again, he was surprisingly eager. The nice side I knew had been slowly turning over the course of the night. Not that I cared. I only wanted to focus on one thing, anything but the dreaded noises.

"I pride myself on being an upstanding citizen," Ethan gasped as he kissed me urgently, like he was dying of thirst yet holding a part of himself back. "But I think I'd lose all sense of fucking self resolve with my cock inside you."

I couldn't help but giggle under his mouth. Fine, that was hot. I was on the pill. "Give it to me."

Our clothes were strewn onto the floor. Ethan threw me onto my stomach, gripping my ass against his hips. He swore under his breath when his fingers stroked my pussy. I pushed back into him, closing my eyes to focus. Heat pooling right where I desired him most.

"I'm warning you," he hissed with pleasure, teasing my entrance. "I'm fucking insatiable--"

Something scratched my ankle and I jolted around, laughing nervously. "Why don't I face you." I said playfully, pulling Ethan onto the bed so that he wasn't standing.

His face became a dark silhouette blocking the light fixture above us. I gripped his cock and gazed up at him. "Make me forget myself."

Even though Ethan had warned me, I wasn't quite expecting this level of horny. He practically split me down the middle in one thrust that seemed to escalate.

"Ah fuck." Ethan couldn't control his low moans and I could barely catch my bearings. God he went deep! I felt myself moving to the pull and tug of his cock, breath trembling. I supposed this is what I'd asked for, to only be able to focus on one thing.

I languidly opened my eyes to gaze at Ethan. His eyes glowed like molten lava, born from the fires of hell.

Wait. That wasn't right?

The glare of the light above slowly flickered, dimming enough to see Ethan's face. All brown eyes and dark lashes.

"God," he groaned, flushing. "You're so pretty. I want you to be mine." In a sudden surge of strength, Ethan flipped me back over onto my stomach and drilled into me. Hooking his knees over mine for better, deeper access. I couldn't help but scream into the mattress. Where the fuck did his stamina come from?! I was going to bruise from the insistent pounding.

My brain was scrambled by the time Ethan slowed. His nails dug into my hips, guiding me up and down his shaft.

"Oh I haven't fucked in a millennium!" A thousand voices exclaimed. "Least of all a seer."

Ethan was roleplaying now? Fully spent, I rolled over to face him. When Ethan smiled down at me, sharp canines protruded from his lip. Black markings like lightening bolts shot up his muscular arms, until they converged up his neck in two lines, ending under his eyes. My blood went cold.