My eyes shot open, but everything still was black and cold. But as I slowly came to my senses, I felt the throbbing pain in my jaw, stomach, and in multiple other places on my body. I was laying on cold smooth flooring when I remembered where I was. The same prison that I would be staying in for as long as Dolan had my book. I opened it somehow, and now he had access to it. My existence hangs in the balance of that book and the Jade eye, but I can't let him find that out, or he'll completely use it against me. This is my last chance, and I can't let him get away with messing my one mission. "Oi, demon! Wake up, we have some things to discuss." Dolan's voice came from the other side of the metal door before it opened, Dolan had book in his hands and the Jade eye was now hanging on a necklace around his neck, the gem emitting a faint green light in his shadow.

"Is this some kind of joke? There isn't anything important in here, just a bunch of empty pages. Way to waste my time." He spat as he threw the book down the ground in front of me, I picked it up in my hands carefully, opening the book. To my surprise, he was right, there was nothing in the pages. Though at the back, I noticed small scribbles. It was just a drawing of the Jade coloured gem with writing on it. The writing was so ancient that even I couldn't understand it, it must be language of our forefathers from centuries back when demons roamed the earth freely before being kicked out. The devil didn't say anything about having to translate old language, I never studied anything about this language. Great, just my luck. Dolan turned a bit, hearing Shima walking over, and the light filtered through the gem, casting a faint green light onto the pages of the book. I could see writing now faintly being shown. The Jade gem is the key! That's why it came off the book easily when it opened, so I could use it to see the writing. This is what my brother and sister meant when they told me not to doubt my creator's intricate ways, I guess.

I need that gem, otherwise I won't be able to even know what my mission is. "Hey little demon boy!" Shima brushed past Dolan and nearly landed on me as I quickly closed the book. "Shima, don't flatten the kid." Dolan sighed with annoyance, scratching his head, seeming to be thinking really hard about the situation he had gotten into. "Are you saying I'm fat Dolan?" Shima scowled, whipping her head around to send a deadly glare in his direction. "Maybe." He hummed with a smirk. I sat there confused at their interaction, what odd relation, kinda reminds me of my brother and sister's interaction back home. "Whatever.." Shima rolled her eyes, glancing back in my direction.

"So demon boy, what's it gonna be today? Are we gonna go shoot some motherf...ers today?" She reached over and messed my hair up, I flinched, moving away from her touch as I felt heat rise to my face despite the very cold draft in the room. What an odd feeling, did I have some kind of bad reaction to her? Am I allergic to cats? I poked at my face. I couldn't help but wonder what in the name of the devil was happening to me as I tried to assess my physical health. "Awwww!! Look! He's blushing! Wow, I didn't think demons could blush, let alone have one show because... ya know, they have red skin so it's kinda hard to see. This is priceless, a demon blushing!" Shima pointed at me, laughing hysterically, which only caused the feeling of this 'blush' to become harsher.

"Come on, get off your lazy demon butt and let's go! Melissa is waiting! We're going back for a raid at that place since Melissa and I were up all night figuring out a plan while you napped! Isn't this gonna be fun!!?! Our first raid together!!!" She clasped her hands together, practically in my face, something was off about her. And I mean way off from normal enthusiastic Shima when I say that, she was acting like nothing happened the other day. I swear I saw a glint of something sinister in her eyes when she was in my face for a split second though. So I was getting all kinds of bad feelings about this, and Dolan wasn't going so that didn't make me feel any better about this raid. There goes my naivety again, but who am I kidding, I can't and don't trust anyone here.

             I stood up reluctantly and followed the pink cat prancing her way out, humming a tune. My ankle was still giving me a hard time, as it hurt a bit to walk on, I must've done something to it the other day. But I didn't have time to stop as Shima dragged me out of the base, Melissa was already standing outside with her arms crossed. I could finally observe what she looked like in full view, unlike the other day when she was standing in the dark. She was definitely a purple owl with cold blue eyes, she wore a tank top with some black ripped jeans and black boots. "Well hello there, demon boy..." She greeted with a dangerous tone in her voice, sending a brief glare in my direction when she said the last part, making me slow down my walking pace as I now trailed timidly behind Shima. Completely lost, I stayed close behind Shima like a child would with a parent in a big crowd, every now and then I'd look at my surroundings warily. I took note of the now boarded up hole in the wall to the enemy's fortress, seeing people patrolling that general area. Looks like we, well I, caused quite a commotion from getting us caught.

             Though at the front, the gate was wide open, very little people were patrolling the place, much less the area surrounding it. We slipped in and past any people guarding the fortress, we got inside quickly through a small square opening, we all clambered in. "Melissa, is there any other way in? Maybe something less cramped?" Shima groaned as we crawled through the cramped passage. "No, unless you just want to walk up to the front and knock on the door with a f..king basket of cookies and hope that they'll just let you in, be my guest." Melissa hissed, continuing to move through the metal maze, the ground creaking beneath us as if the thin metal would break under our combined weight at any second. "Well, which part of this fortress are we aiming for?" Shima asked. "The basement, there's less people to spot or hear us down there." Melissa answered with an annoyed sigh.

Finally after what seemed like forever, we stopped and Melissa opened a square hole in the small passage we were in as we all dropped down. Melissa and Shima both landed gracefully on the ground. And for me? Well I'm sure you know what happened to me as I tried to get down. I landed flat on my face, the sound of my body colliding with the concrete ground resounding throughout the room. I jumped onto my feet quickly, seeing Shima and Melissa scowling at me. "If you f..k this up for us, demon boy, I'll have your tail hanging on a wall above a fireplace as decoration, got it?" Melissa threatened with venom in her voice, I swallowed nervously as I nodded. Following after her and Shima as they moved quickly and skillfully around corners. I struggled to keep up with them as the never ending maze of hallways kept going on and on, when we finally stopped in front of a large metal door with a large handle.

            "Okay, so I'm gonna place a bomb right here, and it'll go off in 30 seconds, so all we need to do is get as far away as possible from the explosion, because it's blast radius is over 50 ft and these maze of corridors will double that radius for some major carnage." Melissa laughed darkly with a wild look on her face as she pressed a square metal device to the door, a flashing red light started to go off as Melissa and Shima bolted in opposite directions down different halls, I ran off in another direction. And just as I was turning a corner, a loud explosion resounded down the hallway, a strong blast of air knocked me over. I regained my stance quickly, but I was too slow to react to the flames barreling towards me like an angry bull charging as it threw me back a couple feet. A couple burns and scrapes, that's okay, not as bad as what I usually get. I'm prone to accidents and creating them, or simply because I'm always in the path of destruction. I'm just a mishap magnet, as quoted from my my brother and sister. I really need to stop thinking so much about them, and just thinking in general.

             Carefully standing up as I brushed myself off briefly, before staggering back the way I came. "Hey HeckBent, hurry the f..k up, we need you to help us carry this sh.. out of here pronto." Melissa ordered as I covered my nose with my sweater to block out the smoke and scent of burnt metal that was making my eyes water. "Take this, it shouldn't be too heavy." Shima handed me a bunch of other metal objects with straps, just like the gun, except larger and heavier. I stumbled out, balancing myself out with the heavy metal objects that were slung across my chest and on my back. "Be careful, I think one of those can explode like a bomb if they get rattled around too much." Melissa warns me, Shima had opened her mouth to say something but Melissa elbowed her in the ribs, is there something bad about them not blowing up? Is that what they're supposed bto do? I wouldn't think that'd be too efficient for fighting, from what I've observed anyways.

I followed closely after them as we left behind the destruction we made, leaving with the supply of metal objects and odd small oval shaped ones with metal keys stuck in them through an emergency exit in the maze of halls. We managed to slip past the people patrolling the base without any trouble, as they were all racing to the building we entered previously in order to investigate the explosion. "Whew, made it just in time before the party got there, then things would've got heated." Shima sighed contently with a sinister smirk on her face, Melissa mirroring her expression with the same smirk, the two looking at each other out of the corners of their eyes. I looked between the two, wondering what in the name of the devil were they doing, are they communicating telepathically? I've heard high class demons have mastered that skill, usually elite graduates who go on scouting missions with the legion.

But they aren't demons, or they would've had red skin as well. I'm the only demon able to be on earth right now, otherwise the devil would've told me that there were other recruits up here with me. They act just as mean as demons, well, real demons that is. I'm not sure if I even apply to being a "True" demon, I never had a mean spirit, I kinda just lived with no negative urges. I just came into existence empty, no feeling, no darkness in my head, or cold blooded desire to tear any living thing apart.. I don't crave destruction, chaos, or pain on other beings because I don't like to hurt others. I'm not the type to be rough or scuffle either with my siblings even, mostly because I'd always end up being crushed on the bottom of my brother and sister when we wrestled. I was the voice of reasoning, the one who you would most likely see crying in a corner somewhere as if they were gonna rip each other's throats out when they argued. I've heard of demons who've gone rebel, the trouble makers. You would've thought the devil would be proud of his creations, making efforts to over take the beings of the upper world, but even he has standards... surprisingly. But these two have the motives and blood cravings of a demon, and yet they act like they've been here all along. So it's impossible to even think that they're some kind of demon... right.....? "Hey! Kid! Watch where you're walking!" Melissa's voice cut through my train of thought as I'm yanked by the arm to the right.

"You nearly ran into a tree, you dumb f..k, be lucky we're here to keep you on track and think for you." Melissa sneered, flicking me on the forehead. I rubbed the spot that got hit, following after them once again as we began moving forward towards the base. We dropped off the collected weapons and other items in the underground storage before heading inside. "Oi! Melissa! Bring the demon to my office!" Dolan's booming voice demanded as a "greeting" to our return. Melissa pressed the gun to my back, shoving me towards the slightly ajar door at the end of the hallway. I stepped in reluctantly, trying to swallow down my nervousness and anxiety building up. "Come in and take a seat, but close the door behind you kid, we have some serious business to discuss." Dolan wasn't facing me, the back of his chair was all I could see past the desk. I did as I was told, closing the door quietly and sitting down on the chair.

"So, this little Jade gem, it doesn't do anything. Does it?" Dolan asked, turning his seat around to face me. "Not th-that I know of, b-boss..." I answered quietly, trying to keep from seeming suspicious. "Are you sure?" Dolan leaned forward and rested his elbows on his desk, observing my facial expression carefully. I sunk into the seat, wanting to disappear, one thing I knew about myself:

I can be read like a book

"Well, you wouldn't mind me doing this, would you?" He asked, placing down the Jade Eye and taking out a mallet. "N-no.." I looked at it warily, hoping I could try and use something called reverse psychology on him, but it never worked for me. Dolan brought down the mallet but in a blink of an eye, I grabbed the mallet before it hit the Jade Eye. "So this thing is valuable! It has to do something with that book, that this came from, right? You little lying son of a b*tch! I oughta have your tail cut off and used as a f*cking tie!" Dolan slammed his fist down on the desk, grabbing the collar of my sweater and pulling me over the desk a bit, having to hold onto the edge of the desk. "What are you playing at, demon boy." He spat angrily throwing me to the floor, walking towards me and dragging me to my cell. "No, p-please, boss, you don't understand...!" I started, but my attempts were useless as he tossed me against the far wall of my cell.

"You useless son of a b!tc#! Wasting my time, and thinking you can lie to me, you worthless wast of time!" Dolan angrily threw down the gem that was clutched in his hand, the green gem shattering to bits. The whole thing was in slow motion, each individual emerald green shard shimmering in the light being casted from the lightbulb in Dolan's office. At my feet, lay what I thought was the only key to me being able to complete my mission without messing up, shattered to bits on the ground, my only hope. Gone, now in itty bitty pieces. I wanted to scream, I wanted to cry, but all I did was sit on the floor, expressionless as my back was pressed to the cold cement wall. I felt as if the air in the room became thinner and thinner, making it hard for me to breath normally as I wheezed, trying to collect my racing thoughts as the horror of the situation finally dawned on me of how badly screwed I was. What did I do to deserve this sudden turn of events for the worse? I felt light headed, as I clutched at my sweater, tears welling up in my eyes before they began to spill. Each one of them landing with a splash on the cement ground, soaking into it and leaving a dark mark.

                       "Tch, you're such a waste of time." Dolan growled, slamming the door shut behind him. I curled up into a ball, wanting nothing more than to disappear from sight, to pretend this all away. I wasn't fit for this job, I wasn't good enough, I'm too weak willed to fight back. And now, this place has become my new prison, the new Hellish nightmare I live in. I can't do anything right. I let my siblings down once again, I let my own kind down, I let the Devil down, I let myself down.... I'm so useless....

              I'm a failure