Devil's Touch

Ch 10 - Rewarded

"Well since it's a yes or no-" Greg didn't get a chance to finish his smart ass remark that he was about to make before Thorn sprang at him and swung his arms like baseball bats with nails in them right at his head.

Greg just barely managed to duck Devil's attack before he tried lashing out his his bloodies hands. Greg was just about to make contact with Thorn's face when he was swatted to the floor like a fly by the Lizard's heavy tail. Greg tried getting up just so that he could get away from the now emotionless mask that was Thorn's face as he toyed with Greg. It was a hard realization to come to, but Greg realized that this Devil was probably able to kill him in a split second despite Greg's gift he was defenseless. Thorn was too fast, just too strong, were all the Originals like this?

Greg felt a darkening chill run over his body at the thought of having to be trained by all of them as Thorn had told him when they had first started. How was Greg going to handle all of the Originals when just this one was simply slapping him around like a defenseless child. But that was probably all he was too Thorn, and he was probably even less to Synder who--as Thorn put it--was the strongest of them. 'Them' could only mean the rest of the Originals and Greg could only guess that they others like her were terribly strong, and yet Synder had told her that they were losing the Devil war that was going on so what did that say about Logan and Cerberus. And he was suppose to stand up against the both of them?

Greg shut his eyes in an effort to hopefully calm himself down but all that happened was that he saw both Logan's and Cerberus' faces as if they were painted onto his eyelids. Panic rose up in his body and Greg began to feel another cooling feeling almost like he was sweating, soon enough he heard the sounds of footsteps quickly going away. When he opened his eyes again he saw that Thorn had retreated from Greg until he was some ten feet away and was holding his left arm closely to his chest. But that's not all that Greg saw. All around him he noticed that the air had taken on a crimson hue, almost like there was a red mist that had suddenly appeared around him.

Greg shot to his feet heart racing, was this the mist that Synder had spoken off that appeared hen he blacked out and went after anything that moved? But if it was, then why was he able to see it and how was he still in control of himself. According to Synder, whenever this mist showed up Greg had gone completely homicidal, going after everything in sight, slaughtering them simply by being close to them. He had to get away, that all that Greg thought in his mind. He didn't want to black out and go on a killing spree, so he went towards the only one that he thought could help him.

"Thorn!" Greg cried taking several desperate steps towards the Devil who backed away and hissed at him. Greg paused and took another step toward the Devil before he extended his hand pleadingly. "Help."

Thorn's eyes went wide and Greg watched in horror as the human flesh was ripped from Thorn's body revealing a giant lizard with horns everywhere on his body. He looked more like a porcupine than a lizard, just with much larger quills. They weren't all long though, only the ones along his head, back, and tail were longer than two inches. Thorn let out a vicious hiss and swatted at Greg though he was probably nine feet away, it was more a warning than an attempt to harm him. But why was he warning him?

Greg got his answer when the mist began to gather itself around his until it almost looked like- blood. Greg caught a strong metallic smell that could not be mistaken for anything other than blood. But the shock didn't come from the smell of the blood, what shocked was that the mist shot out from around Greg's arm like a spear and headed straight for Thorn. The Devil's eyes went wide as saucers when he saw this and he leaped into the air clinging to the ceiling with his claws, making the mist hit only the stone wall of the sewer tunnel.

Greg's eyes went wide and he dropped his hand to his sides thinking that the mist followed wherever his arms were pointing. He looked up at Thorn who pounced from the ceiling and took Greg to the ground. The sheer impact of the attack knocked the wind right from Greg's lungs as he looked up at a howling Thorn who instantly retreated from Greg a stream of red flowing behind him. Greg rolled to his side half to try and get some air back into his lungs, and half to see what was happening to Thorn. He caught site of the large Devil rolling around in the sewer water as it he were trying to get something off of his skin.