I could nothing but watch as the love of my life dropped to the floor, his blood spilling out onto the ground.

Someone was going to die for this...

Victoria dropped the knife that Lilith had given her and rejoined the circle. Darkness was closing in on the abandoned street where we stood. As Victoria took her a blue light began to shine from the pool of Alec's blood.

It was working.

The darkness was getting closer. The light was becoming brighter by the second. The dark seemed to be retreating just a little bit from the light. It wasn't going anywhere though. Not yet at least. The air over Alec's body seemed to rip into two, and the shadows around us were being sucked up into the space in-between. The universe beyond ours.

A whole new realm, but, there were more important things to deal with first.

"Alec!" I shouted, running towards him. His head was turned slightly, staring up at me. He had managed a small smile in his dying moments it seemed, he looked content, at peace.

But I wasn't.

Shit. Why? Why did  it have to be Alec? I should've never fallen for someone so bloody brilliant. Someone like him. Someone with all those problems and struggles, but someone who had always stood up for what was right. The one person who had fought to bring me back after Kaicius had taken over.

Why did I fall in love with the hero?

I certainly wasn't a good guy, and, most of my life was wasted by wrecking the lives of others. Alec had changed me, and now he was gone I'd lost that person to keep me grounded. Oh, I was going to keep my promise... and if we caught up with Will Jackson I was going to rip his fucking head off.

He my have started this Apocalypse, but I was going to make damn sure that I stopped it.

"Kian, we have to go."

Victoria put an arm around my shoulder, the tears in her eyes mirroring mine. We needed to move. Of course, the portal was never going to stay open for long.

"I know," I replied, taking one last look at Alec's smile.

Picking up his hand I pulled the ring off his finger. That was one part of him I could take with me. I slipped it into my pocket as I got up and followed Victoria to where Michael and Callum were waiting. Fuck. I couldn't look at him without seeing Alec...

"I'm sorry," Callum said as we reached them "This is.."

"You don't have to say anything," I replied.

"He's in a better place," Michael added "I can guarantee that."

"Can you?" I asked him sharply "Because, for an Angel Of The Lord, you're not exactly good Michael. We lost the one person who held us all together. The one person better than any of us! None of us had the heart or the courage that Alec did! How are we going to explain why..." I felt my voice break, but I still I carried on "How do I tell his mum and brother that he's dead?"

"We start by making sure that the world dosen't end," Victoria replied, her voice hard with emotion "Then we figure out how to get Alec back. I promise you Kian, I will get him back."

I looked up at the portal and sighed "He deserved better than me."

With that I stepped forward into the light and suddenly I was in the middle of a huge public square, people rushing about and a crowd looking on from behind barriers, all being held in place by armed police officers.

What the hell?

Before I could take in any more I was knocked on the ground, rolling over I saw that Callum was on top of me. He immediately jumped up and offered out a hand to pull me up.

"Sorry," he said awkwardly.

Next came Victoria, and lastly Michael, before the portal closed behind us like nothing had happened.

Then out of the crowd a group of people, four walking, and one older guy in a wheelchair, dressed in a tartan suit with long wispy grey hair and a moustache to match. While the others wore different colored jumpsuits and matching masks. One was bright red with golden wings protruding from the back that flapped around angrily behind him, the second guy was in a fully black suit that just had a large white letter 'M' on the front, his eyes just a swirling white mist inside his head, the third was a woman, her short blonde hair at odds with her light blue suit, and the last guy wore a green suit that seemed to be made of scales, like some sort of lizard.

"Welcome to Pleasantville," the old man in the wheelchair said with a smile and a thick Scottish accent "I think you had better come with us. We need to talk."

"Professor..." Callum said, heading over to the group "I'm sorry, I got stuck."

"Let's not do this here, dear boy. Falcon will escort you to the Academy, we can discuss what happened there," the professor replied nodding to the guy in red with the wings as he rolled himself away, the others following him.

The weird winged guy turned to us with a scowl that was clearly visible underneath his mask "Whoever you people are, and, whatever that thing was... you're going to have a lot of explaining to do."

With that he turned and followed the others, so we had no option but to follow his lead through the crowd. I was just hoping that the portal closing didn't mean we were stuck here, and that Lilith had kept up her end of the deal to stop any demons from making it out of hell while we crossed over.

The last thing we needed was the spawn of hell to be free on Earth once we figured out how to make it back, if we could make it back that is.

As we followed Wingman through slowly dissipating crowd, I had admit, I wasn't hopeful.