The Monster Within

“You want to act like a monster, you can go and live amongst them.” Michael’s voice was icy, his tone angry—monstrous even—nothing like the caring, benevolent angel I’d known.

I was shoved viciously to my knees. My hands were bound tightly behind my back and Michael pinned them to the floor with his foot as he tore open my shirt to expose my back.

“You don’t have to do this,” I whimpered.

Another angel pushed my head to my knees, arching my spine unnaturally. I saw the glint of the seraph blade as it was handed to Michael, still dripping with the blood of his previous victim. Michael plunged the dagger in and sawed at the bone. My throat burned from screaming. I wept as bloodied feathers floated to the floor like petals from a withered rose.

I passed out before the end—before I was cast from Heaven. I awoke as I landed, my bones shattering against the rocks of a nightmare landscape where fire spewed from pits around my broken body.

I lay there until he found me—he who had led the uprising against God. He squatted beside me, sweeping a gentle hand across my brow, an unexpected gesture. “Ah, Belial,” he sighed, “What have they done to you? Butchered you like a worthless hog!”

Tears streamed down my face at his touch.

“You have two choices. Serve at my side, or burn in eternal damnation until the end of days.”

Not much of a choice! “Of course, I will serve you,” I grated out in a voice barely recognisable as my own. 

Pain lanced through me once more as my transformation began. I writhed, screaming in agony as my broken bones and shredded skin knitted back together. Fire burned in my shoulders as new wings burst forth, wrapping bat-like around my naked torso. Gone were my downy feathers. These wings were membranous, each digit talon-tipped and lethal. I stretched them and rose with a single swoop.

I caught my reflection in his eyes. My eyes blazed, my anger igniting with a thirst for revenge.