CLASH

In the Name of…

“Last one!” shouts the manager which make Bryan and his colleague readied themselves to wash the last car just enters…

Bryan was surprised to see the red mustang climbed the platform, and the beautiful goth girl comes out her car, wearing a black spectator, a metal band t-shirt, rather large for her slender body…. Spiked leather choker on her neck, another spiked leather wristband on her right hand, black denim trousers, ripped on her thigh, showing her white thigh beneath the trousers, and a pair of canvas black and white sneakers on her feet…

His colleague sneaks a peek to the goth girl waiting at the lounge….

“She’s gorgeous….” He said to Bryan who about to finish polishing the car, but smiles a little, acknowledging her beauty…

“Hey… Where are you going...?” Bryan asks, looking at his friend…

“Watch and learn, Bud…” His friend said, smirking, feeling confident, combing his hair as he walks towards the goth girl….

Bryan smiles as he looks at his friend sitting next to the woman and introduced himself…He shakes his head and continue polishing the red mustang…. Not seeing his friend smirking as the goth girl grab his hand and take him behind the carwash where no one could see…

Not seeing when they both kisses and in a blink of an eye shoot up towards the sky above…

****

“Your shift has finished, right…?” Asked the goth girl as she accepted her keys….

Bryan nods his head, looking for his friend where nowhere to be seen…

“Come…. Luc wanted to see you…” She said that makes Bryan confused, yet followed the woman to her car…

Far above the sky, at the very edge of the ozone layer, a frozen body of the colleague of Bryan slowly pulled by the gravity….

****

“Hey, look…. A shooting star… Make a wish...” Said a boy to his friend who started to close their eyes to wish upon the burning corpse that in a snap of a finger turn to ashes….

****

“He just left…!” That’s all the disgruntled manager of the carwash has to say to the two agents….

“You seem to have a problem with Bryan…. Is he some kind of trouble…?” Asked Andrew….

“No…. No…. He’s a good kid, keep everything to himself, always stay away from trouble….” The manager said….

“So, why all the fuss…” Asked Andrew again….

“His co-worker….” He said angrily…. “He supposed to help me close the shop, instead he was nowhere to be seen….”

That notion set an alarm on Andrew’s mind….

“Is it possible, with your permission, for us to see the CCTV….?”

His colleague looked curious, but followed them to the computer that record the CCTV footage….

And what they saw stunned them, as they saw the goth girl pulled the man and then returned alone before leaving the carwash with Bryan….

The local agents quickly pulled his phone and dialled his base…

“Could you find the owner of one red mustang with this plate number…?” he said, taking the photos of the plate number from the monitor, before turned to the manager and said…

“We will have to bring this recording with us, sir…” He said to the manager who happily oblige….

****

“Where are we going….?” Asked Bryan loudly, trying to overcome the blaring sound of heavy metal music she plays….

Is she really, Luc’s friend…? He thought, but realizing the unorthodox method the man of the cloth has, he thinks that she could possibly be…

But it still failed to amaze him….

His experience with his father makes his antipathy towards the men of cloths were still strong….

He looks at the goth girl who didn’t respond to his question but keep on driving to the heavy metal songs until they reached an intersection with an overpass above, where below the flyover row of wire meshes barricade the place, and in the shade below the overpass, Bryan saw makeshift huts from cardboards, canvass, and plastics filled the place….

“He’s inside…” Said the goth girl, nudging her chin towards the shade under the bridge, where he saw the black sedan wears by the preacher parked at the side of the road…. She waited until Bryan closed the door before she sped away towards the city….

Bryan hesitates a while….

What am I doing here…? Why should I meet him….? He thought, ready to leaves the location when a loud scream comes from under the bridge….

He should have run away from the scream, but instead Bryan dashed towards the underpass, pushed himself through an opening at the wire mesh and run towards the source of the scream, and there he stunned to see Luc pinned a homeless woman to the ground with his right knee, his right hand in the air, make a claw, ready to stab at the homeless chest…

Most of other homeless were hiding, fear and terror on their faces…

Then Bryan stormed the preacher, making the both tumbled on the dirty ground….

“What are you doing?!” Shout Bryan, pinning the preacher on the ground, ready to hit his face when a menacing growl sounds from his back….

“Watch out!” Shout the preacher, as he tossed Bryan to the side, and the man raises both his leg, bring his knees to his chest, blocking the body of the homeless, whose eyes turned pitch black, her ears turs pointy, razor sharp teeth filled her blood drooling mouth, her finger tips long and sharp…

Bryan was surprised to see the strength from the preacher who kicked the homeless with his legs, that throws the homeless up, slammed to the beam of the bridge….

But to Bryan surprise, the homeless hand and feet grabbed the beam behind her, growling menacing while Luc hurriedly stand on his feet, getting ready….

The homeless torpedoed the preacher who slide to the side, grabbing the neck of the homeless jacket, throwing her back to the ground….

“The power of the Morning Star grants me power to cast out you out, demon! I cast you out!” He shouts pressing his palm to her chest….

Sizzling sound and the smell of burning clothes from her chest, along with the distorted scream from the homeless…

Bryan eyes widened as he saw a black smoke evaporates and hovers above the preacher and the homeless, and form a thick mist where he saw alternating form of faces, heads with thorns, batwings, talons, claws manifested of the black mist…

“Go!” Luc said, not looking at the smoke which dashed like a lightning, out from the underpass, as the homeless face, ears, teeth, nails turned back to normal….

Luc removes his hand from the chest of the homeless woman, leaving a burning hole in the shape of his hand on her dirty clothes…. Then stands up, patting the dirt off his trousers, and combs his tousled hair, while another homeless’ closing and help their friend….

“Thank you…. Thank you, Preacher…” Said the man that seems to be the leader of the homeless, thanking the preacher before they hurried themselves and went into hiding, back at their makeshift sheds….

“Are you okay…?” He said, with weak smile in his tired face towards Bryan who still sitting at the dirty ground….

“Who… Who are you…?” Asked the man, with his trembling fear with fear, ignoring the extended hand from the preacher….

“What do you mean…? I’m Luc…” He said, squatting his hand on his laps, hand clasping in front of him….

“Look, you’re in shock…. Let’s talk about it somewhere else….” Luc said, again extending his arm that met the trembling hand of the man, who then follows the preacher and leaves the underpass….

****

The homeless woman sighs in relief….

“Thank you, Lord, for saving my soul…. From now on I will….”

She hasn’t finished her pray when she hears loud swooshing sound outside her carboard shed…

Trembling, she opened the cover of her shed and peek her head out….

She throws herself back to her shed, covering her mouth with her glove covered hands, her back pressed at the pier of the bridge….

Outside she saw the black mist hovers above the other homeless’, she saw strings of mist enters the lot through the top of their head…

She saw as their faces turn devilish, grinning towards her as they slowly approach her shed….

“Help me God…. Deliver me from…. Aaaaaaaakkkkkhhhhhh!” She shouts as group of hands of the homeless’, with long sharp nails rushed in her shed, grabbing her by her ankle and dragged her out her shed….

She struggles hard, kicking, hitting around, but their grips were strong, and her struggles means and affected nothing to them as they circled her body, menacing looks on their distorted faces….

“Let’s eat, friends, our master has given us our meal for today, bwahahahaha!” One of them said….

“Aaaaaaaaaa!” The homeless woman screams as the other rushed, jumped at her and started devouring her….