Satan Saint - Episode 2

The sunlight was pale and monotonous as it fell through Maruno’s bedroom window. Waking up with a dull groan, he slid out of bed and half opened his eyes to look outside. A flat grey sky greeted him, still somewhat dark as the sun still rose on the other side of the household. It was the sort of day where everything could be seen clearly, but yet it all lacked the luster it once held.
“Huh…” Maruno thought, not wanting to dispense energy for the muttering of a syllable. “The sky kind of matches the pavement on the sidewalk.”
The final word of that thought reverberated in his head, as if calling back something he had overlooked.
And Maruno’s eyes slowly awakened as he recalled the things he had seen and heard the night before. The strange violet glow, the clanging of metal and Katie’s almost enraged expression as she had walked across the sidewalk right before his eyes.
“What was all that?” he wondered. “Wait… should I ask her about it? No… no, I don’t know her that well; I shouldn’t pry into her personal life after only knowing her for a day. But…”
Her angered expression slipped back into his mind, and he compared and contrasted over and over with the sweet young girl he had walked home with.
“…why?”
“Maruno!” his mother called from downstairs. “Are you awake yet? You don’t want to be late for school!”
“Coming, mom!” he called back. He slipped on his uniform pants and undershirt as well as his pair of household slippers. He shoveled his schoolbooks into his bag and tossed it over his shoulder before heading out his bedroom door and downstairs.



Stepping out into the lukewarm morning air, no foreseeable change in the sky could be discerned, so it was safe to assume the weather was going to be dull for a full twenty-four hours. Still, the temperature wasn’t uncomfortable, and Maruno felt quite content in his school uniform. Besides, it wasn’t the weather that was bugging him.
“Do I mention it to her? I don’t know if I should. Maybe just in passing? Oh, yeah, right. How well would that go over? ‘Hi Katie! So I saw you outside late last night. What’s up with that?’ Yeah, definitely not going to mention it right now.”
He touched his hand to his stomach, feeling the very nauseating combination of excitement at seeing Katie again, and the nervous anxiety over what he had seen and heard. It was like someone was flipping a switch in his nervous system, going rapidly from excited to nervous and back again. It bounced to the top of his gut to the bottom, and made the thoughts that were running through his head even more jumbled and confused.
“Maybe she’s comfortable enough around me already. No, there’s no way. Man, my gut is writhing! Why am I so nervous?! Or am I excited? I can’t tell! Oh, man, there’s her house. Maybe I should just keep walking. No! No, you said you’d walk with her, so you’re going to stick to your word! What is wrong with my GUT?!”
His breath caught in his throat as he saw movement at the front of Katie’s house. Her front door swung open, and Maruno could hear a faint “I’m off, father!” from within the doorway.
And there she was, just as he remembered her from their walk. Relaxed expression, skin glowing and warm, eyes bright and cheerful, and a smile that made Maruno’s anxiety almost fade into the grey cloud cover above, never to be found again.
Almost.
“Good morning, Maruno!” she called over to him as she jogged over to her front gate.
“Morning, Katie.” Maruno said with the best smile he could muster. It must not have looked too weird because Katie’s smile only grew bigger in response.
“How was your night last night?” she asked as they started toward school.
“Well, I got all of my assignments done.” Maruno said.
“Oh, no!” Katie exclaimed, suddenly wide eyed with panic. “I completely forgot to do the math assignment!”
“Was that because of-” Maruno began, but cut himself off when he realized what he was saying.
“What?” Katie asked, looking up from her previous quick rummage through her book bag.
“…Nothing.” Maruno said. “Did you want some help with it? I’m pretty good at math, at least most of it.”
“Could you really?” Katie asked. “I’d be really grateful to you!”
“It’s no trouble.” Maruno said. “We’ll have some time before classes start.”
“And it didn’t seem that difficult.” Katie said, finally pulling a worksheet from between two textbooks inside her bag. “I think I get most of this stuff.”
“Then we’ll be able to finish it in no time.” Maruno said. “So where do you want to start?”
“Um… at the beginning, I guess.” Katie said.
Their conversation lasted for the rest of the walk and continued even as the school bells rang for the beginning of the day.



“Thanks again for helping me to finish that assignment this morning.” Katie said as she walked home with Maruno again.
“No problem.” Maruno said. “I’m just glad I could help.”
“I’d like to return the favor somehow. Are there any subjects you’re having trouble with?”
“Well, I’m not having trouble with most of my classes, but the one that troubles me the most is probably world history.”
“I can’t say I’m an expert, but I’ll definitely try to help.” Katie said. “Do you want to meet before classes start to work together?”
“That works for me.” Maruno said.
Once again, they arrived at Katie’s house and said their goodbyes. Once Katie was out of sight, however, Maruno’s thoughts drifted back to the events of the previous night.
“Okay, I’ve barely gotten to know her, so I don’t know what she does in her spare time. That may have been just a one-time event. If she does it again…”
Maruno stopped in front of his house, hesitating at the front gate.
“…If she is out that late again, then I’ll have to ask her about it.”



Later that night, Maruno waited at his desk, trying to distract himself with his homework assignments but could only get so far as writing his name at the top of the worksheets. He tapped his pencil madly against his desk, looking down at his homework and back up again, trying to get the various theories and speculations as to Katie’s late night secrecy out of his head. Even so, he could not shake the feeling that something was amiss.
“What would that light and sound have to do with her? It has to be some obnoxiously complicated coincidence. It has to…”
Motion outside his window caught his eye. As if by instinct, he rushed to the windowsill and stared outside, trying to see if he had missed anything important.
“Ah, damn…” he thought, slumping back into his chair. “Am I going to freak out every time a bird flies by or the wind rustles the leaves? Maybe I’m just overreacting to this whole thing. I mean, seriously. What do I know about what Katie’s like outside of school?”
He gave an exasperated sigh and slouched out across his desk, his hands supporting his head.
“But one thing’s for sure, I do like her. Maybe that’s why I’m obsessing over this whole deal. Am I just thinking too much into it?”
He gazed out the window once more, but far more relaxed than he had previously. The sky was still dark with overcast clouds, but it looked like it would clear up overnight.
“Another sunny day in the works.” Maruno thought with a smile. “Something to look forward to.”
Movement once again caught Maruno’s attention. Glancing over to the left edge of his window, he expected one of the neighbor’s animals or some rogue piece of garbage being blown about by the wind.
Katie was once again walking along the sidewalk, this time in the opposite direction, away from her home. The harsh look of determination was etched into her features as they had been before, which only appeared more menacing in the dark of the overcast sky.
Maruno quickly shut off his desk lamp. He wouldn’t be able to stand it if Katie looked at him with a face like that.
“Two nights in a row?” Maruno thought, concern rolling through his mind. “There has to be something troubling her.”
He stood up and headed for his bedroom door, but stopped as he grasped the doorknob.
“Wait… is it really my business to get involved in something like this? What can I do for the problems she has at home?”
He turned back towards the window. The thought of Katie being so emotionally pained as to make her wear an expression of such fierceness on her face made him tense up in anxious concern.
“Ah, dammit! I have to try and help somehow!” he thought, and snagged his hooded sweatshirt off of the door and rushed down the stairs and out the door.



Maruno had been a little too indecisive before leaving, and it turned out that Katie had a very determined and quick stride. That being the case, Maruno was left quite a distance behind her by the time he managed to get outside.
“Stupid laced shoes… they take way too long to get on!” Maruno thought as he tried to catch up to Katie. He was finding that it was a surprisingly difficult thing to accomplish, as she was walking as though in a rush to be somewhere.
He followed her as quickly as possible, surprised that she didn’t turn around at the sound of his footsteps.
“What could be so bad as to make someone this intensely focused?” Maruno thought, watching as Katie actually increased the speed of her walk to a light jog. “Wait… what if she heard me and is trying to get away? But she probably would have turned around to look behind her if she had…”
Scenario after scenario ran through Maruno’s head, as though he was trying to put together every possible reason that this was happening the way it was.
Katie eventually rounded a corner at a crossroads, leading to a more run-down part of the district. Maruno hurried after her, shoes scraping on the pavement as he ran after her.
He rounded the corner, and was scared half to death by the sight of Katie’s face just inches away from his own. Shock and surprise flashed on both of their faces, but Maruno couldn’t find the traction to stop completely. He tripped over his own feet in the confusion and flew straight into Katie, knocking both of them to the ground with a thud.
“Woah…” Maruno thought as everything started to come back together. “…What’s this I feel on my…!”
Maruno realized he was literally face-to-face with Katie, his lips pressed against hers.
“GAH!” Maruno yelped, pushing himself up off of her as quickly as he could.
“Wait…” Maruno’s thought once again. “Why is the ground so soft…?”
Looking down, Maruno realized far too late that he had lifted himself by planting his hands firmly against Katie’s breasts. She stared up at him, wide eyed with confusion and a growing sense of panic mixed with anger.
“I- NO! I JUST- I MEAN-…!” Maruno stammered madly, yanking his hands off of Katie and trying to explain himself as his face turned deep red.
Katie responded with a powerful slap across Maruno’s face that left him sprawled out on the sidewalk next to her, clutching the side of his face. He gave a submissive sigh; he knew he deserved it.
“What the hell are you doing?!” Katie yelled, standing up quickly and dusting herself off. “Why are you following me?”
“Well, I was trying to catch up with you…” Maruno said, sitting up and rubbing his left cheek. “Ow… I saw you the other night, too, and you looked really upset about something, so I thought if I saw you like that again I’d try to help-”
The sight of someone walking towards them from across the road caught his eye. From what Maruno could tell, he seemed like a rather rough looking individual. He was in tattered clothing with messy, oily hair, and more shuffled his feet across the pavement than walked. His head was hung low and his eyes were shaded by the hair that hung down over his face. He shifted his right hand, and the gleam of a knife caught Maruno’s eye before he was able to hide it.
Maruno stood up quickly, spreading his arms out to place himself between the stranger and Katie.
“Katie… we’ll have to talk later.” he said. “Just stay behind me.”
“You don’t know what you’re dealing with!” Katie protested.
“He doesn’t look very strong. I can take him.”
A dark shadow began to grow from behind the stranger, actually rising from behind him and branching out in the air. The vague shadows formed into a large torso with two arms and a head. The shadow became more definite and shaped itself into dark, leathery skin. Sharp claws grew from the fingers on the hands. A large jagged-toothed maw split open at the base of the head. One large, green eye spread wide open at the center of the forehead. Two large horns sprouted from the crown of the head, curving upward like two antelope antlers.
This entire creature sprouted from the stranger’s back.
“What… what the hell…?” Maruno’s legs gave way underneath him and he fell to the ground in shock.
“Like I said…” Katie said, walking between Maruno and the creature. “…you don’t know what you’re dealing with.”
With a bloodcurdling howl, the beast and stranger charged forward together, as if the creature were controlling the human’s movements and motives. The human stabbed at Katie with the knife and the beast struck with its clawed hands.
Katie dodged out of the dagger’s path and gave the human a powerful knee to the gut, forcing the air from his diaphragm and causing him to fall limp. The next moment she leapt up between the beast’s arms and gave it an uppercut right on the bottom of its jaw, causing it to go flying back and falling hard onto the pavement.
“Claws and fangs of violence…” Katie said as a violet aura of light began to glow around her. “The green eye of envy… and the horns of anger. Another typical demon of crime and theft.”
“You can see me…” the demon spoke, its voice coming from the human’s mouth in a raspy dry voice. “You know what I am… and this dark aura…”
“It is no concern of yours what I am.” Katie said. “What you should be worried about is how much farther into Hell you’ll be sent.”
The glow around her intensified, gusts of wind spiraling around her as a flurry of chains seemingly appeared from nowhere. Grasping the chain out of the air, she leaped into the air and hurled the chain, tipped with a large barbed arrowhead, straight through the demon’s chest. Instead of blood, sparks like from a metal grinder flew from the puncture wound. The demon roared in pain as the chain began to coil itself around his arms, torso, and neck. Struggling frantically, the movement only caused the chain to become more entangled around him. Katie lighted down nearby, holding the opposite end of the chain in her hands.
“By this rite and by the contract of the binding seal,” she recited, “you will be downcast. Attempt to trespass here again and I will not be so lenient.”
With this, Katie slammed the other end of the chain into the ground, cracking the pavement around it. The cracks burned a fiery red as the chain began to drag itself into the earth, slowly at first but gaining speed quickly. The chain rattled loudly as the links dragged their victim towards his sentence.
Trying to resist, the demon struggled to maintain a hold on the human’s body. Slowly but surely, however, his grip was loosening. With a loud crack, the demon was pulled free of the human’s back. The cracks in the ground split open into a large crevice, plumes of heat and smoke rising from its depths. With a cry of defiance the demon was dragged inside, the gap closing with a loud crack. In that instant, everything faded back to normalcy; not a single mark on the pavement, not the slightest hint of damages to any of the surrounding area.
Katie turned back to see Maruno white faced with confusion and disbelief.
“Wait…” Katie said, looking back and forth between the site of her brawl with the demon and Maruno’s expression. “…You saw that?”