Split Souls

Prologue

"Where's James?" Drake asked the man standing next to him. He was breathing hard and shook his head. They were clearly high strung from the fight they just had.

"We lost him. Fucking thing came out of no where."

"We have just a short ways to go, we do this or we all die anyways." Drake said moving from the wall, he was covered in blood and filth. He had his own wounds but ignored them at the moment. Or tried to, the wound on his shoulder burned like hell. The smell of death and decay was everywhere, mixed with the damp moldy earth smell of the odd hall that they ran in.

They ran down the stone hallway, the floor sloped downward and was made of dirt, the lighting very dim. Just a string of light bulbs that were set on the right side of the hall gave minimal light. Dust was visible in the air as well. The smell of sulfur and some other odd scents were added to the mix making their stomachs want to relieve themselves. Ahead they heard screeching and horrid sounds.

"What if we're to late?" Ian asked next to him.

"Then we are already dead anyways. Keep going." Drake reiterated, they came around a corner and saw a few others of their small team. They were helping to fight against things that now ruled this world. Things that looked at people like objects. They jogged going toward the sound, and what they knew had crawled up from hell itself.

"Did they do it?" A woman asked running behind him now.

"Sounds like they have started." Ian said and Drake saw the wooden door ahead first. Something slammed against it, but they didn't slow. They had to get there before the things let loose evil that couldn't be put back. As it was they were struggling against the demons that possessed the world.

Drake and his group fought hard against being slaves or having their wills stripped from them. If you were human, you were expendable. The only thing stopping them from extinction was because the things that now ruled in this world needed humans to live. Some ran scarred, hiding, rarely coming out. Others lived among them doing as they asked, finding the other humans for them.

His group fought against those controlling the world. In short these things were demons or evil spirits, whatever you wanted to call them. There were different types, different levels and some of the beings weren't what you called a demon. Demons were fairly low but not something you should mess with.

It all had happened so fast, no one knew what to do about it. One day you were sitting in your office working, and the next the world was in utter chaos. There was no knowing how many survived the actual war that broke out shortly after. Communication over seas had been severed, and the countries around America had suffered just as much destruction as here. Half the population dying in the first wave.

Somewhere, somehow a gate that should never have been opened was opened. The world was thrown into chaos. Most places a kind of thick fog blocked out the sun and it was just a grey land that existed until the sun went down. There were a few city centers that were left untouched by the destruction and were now places that anyone with a rational mind and thought for survival would ignore.

Drake reached forward toward the door. Here tonight they knew that a ritual was being preformed to bring others up from hell. Beings that were like the one that had first arrived at the beginning nearly twenty years ago. The one that was in control of it all, was something else entirely. No one knew how to get rid of him. He'd had more than just humans attempt to kill him. None had succeeded and not for the lack of trying or not getting to him. He just didn't seem to be able to die.

There was a sudden silence, it was deafening in the hallway. Drake paused looking back at the others, weapons drawn. They looked nervous but none of them wanted to face what would happen after this was said and done.