Alex was exhausted. It was three in the morning and he still could not sleep.  All the voices in his head would not stop clamoring. Depression and Guilt were working together whispering lies about how pathetic he was. He had been working overtime all month. He had not been to church in weeks. He could not remember the last time he confessed his sins to someone. All of his accountability partners had flaked over time. Alex could already see the patterns repeating themselves. He was about to go on a porn binge and he knew it. 

He reached for his phone. It was going to take him a few minutes to get past the porn-blockers but he knew how. He could feel the darkness all around him in his room. The scent of sin began to attract a new group of demons. From within Alex, Guilt whispered to Depression, “our plan is working. Make room for The Others more wicked than us. He will not escape this sin cycle.”

Guilt stepped out of the open door of Alex’s heart and slithered around the room trying to find the perfect spot for The Others to enter. His shadowy husk began to look at every dark corner trying to find the right spot for the portal to open. The sin-scent was filling the entire house. The atmosphere grew darker and darker. A thick cloud permeated the atmosphere around his home.

 Two of Alex’s Angels were fighting to break through to him. They flew around the dark atmospheric cloud-wall around Alex’s home. Micah’s sword battered it over and over again to no avail.  He screamed toward Lydia, “we must break through to him!” I can sense a portal about to open into the room.”

 Lydia peered through the veil of the rapidly growing cloud-wall. She could barely see Alex through the sin-born darkness. Her tender heart called to him, “Resist, chosen child of God! You were made for more!”

The room was finally full of darkness. Guilt cackled with delight as the portal opened in front of him. He could see her coming from a distance. She moved like a serpent.  She began to step through the portal that Guilt had opened for her. Her naked body had skin like that of a snake. A foul odor filled the room as her bare foot touched the floor of Alex’s house. She fully stepped through the portal and stood in front of Guilt. Snake spirits began to slither in behind her and fill the house. Some of them began to slither up her calves and adorn her while others darted off toward Alex near his bed.

 “Is he watching?” her voice dripped. 

“Yes, my Queen Mother” answered Guilt.

 She patted Guilt on the head. “Good boy.” Her neck twisted back toward the portal as her voice called for The Others, “come my children!” 

Another seventeen demons stepped through the portal. One at a time their goblin-like bodies squeezed through the narrow portal. They were famished and ravenous to be inside a human. They filled the house. Their tattered bat-wings touched the ceiling and their bodies were covered in slime and vomit.

She beckoned to Guilt, “Keep the portal open. I will enter him and feed on his flesh.” Her serpentine body rubbed up against Guilt as she sauntered over towards Alex on his bed.

 “No!” screamed Micah as he saw the Succubus Spirit get even closer to Alex.  Micah yelled toward the other side of the cloud wall where Lydia was trying to break through. “We need Elsius or the boy will lose his soul to Hell!” 

Lydia was growing more and more distraught with each passing moment. “He is caught fighting in the Second Heaven in the dark realms,” she responded. “There is no way he can get to us. If Alex doesn’t pray he will be doomed for all eternity.”

Lydia peered deeply into the rapidly growing cloud-wall. Her pure eyes could still see through the darkness. She saw the Snake-Woman join Alex on his bed. Lydia screamed at the top of her lungs, “Alex, seek the Father for help!”

Alex had his back leaning against the headboard of his bed as he continued to watch pornography. Every demon had followed the Queen Mother into his room. She would be the first to enter him. They watched her waiting to get full invitation to enter the door of his heart. The Queen Mother’s torso elongated as she leaned in toward Alex. Her long forked tongue licked his shoulder and his neck leaving a trail of slime. Her tongue circled his ear as she whispered dark temptations into his thoughts. The porn was not dark enough yet for her to enter him. It was getting darker as she tempted him. The room grew ice cold. The Snake Spirits climbed the walls and slithered into the bed with Alex and the Temptress. 

Alex felt feverish. The voices of Depression and Self-Pity were echoing inside of him telling him to comfort himself with what he was watching. It was not working. He felt no comfort. He felt no pleasure. He thought it was odd that he was not feeling any guilt like he normally did. “Where did my guilt go?” Alex thought to himself. “I used to call myself a Christian.” 

Micah’s sword clanged against the cloud-wall over and over again. His wings flapped frantically as he strained with all his might to get past the cloud-wall that was being created. “I can’t break this atmosphere. There is deep witchcraft involved somehow.”

Lydia kept yelling. Hoping her voice would pierce the darkness of the atmosphere. “Alex! Ask God for help! You don’t have to do this!” 

The Queen Mother looked up from her victim and locked her gaze on Lydia. Her right hand moved her silky black hair away from her face as she taunted the pure angel,” You cannot save him! His sins have invited me here. I destroyed his father and his father’s father and I will destroy him as well.  But first I will enter him and feed on his flesh.”

Lydia did not want to show her pain but tears began to stream down her face as she felt helpless to rescue her beloved human. The Queen Mother laughed at her. “You are so weak and pathetic. And your friend cannot break my witchcraft.”

Micah had fully lost his composure hacking at the dark cloud-wall like a madman. He flew to the top of the cloud and struck it with his sword but his blade broke into two pieces. Micah collapsed upon the dark canopy of sin and witchcraft and began to groan. With both hands, he pounded on the canopy and yelled at his beloved human that he had watched since birth, “Alex! Pray to the Father to free you from your sin!”

The Temptress laughed at his effort. Her left hand cupped the back of Alex’s head as she whispered dark temptations into his mind.

Alex’s willpower was breaking over and over again. His flesh was craving something more explicit. Thoughts he had never heard before ricocheted inside of his mind daring him deeper down into lust. Suddenly, Alex heard a faint voice in his mind. “Ask God for help! You don’t have to do this!” Alex looked at the search bar on the porn site and the disgusting words he had just typed in it. 

“I don’t want to do this,” he said allowed. Alex put the phone beside the bed. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. His lips barely moved as he prayed for the first time all year. “God, please help me.”

In the spirit, his prayer shot straight up to Heaven. It pierced the cloud-wall right between Micah and Lydia. “He prayed!” they exclaimed. 

In a moment, Alex’s prayer left his house, crashed through the darkness in the second heaven over his city, and reached the ears of Father God on his throne. The Father heard the voice of his son cry out to him and he immediately shouted to the Hosts of Heaven with a voice that echoed like many waters, “GO NOW!”

Across the the heavens in the dark realms, Elsius heard the command of the Father, and all of heaven thundered as he took flight to protect the Father’s child. He flashed across the sky like lighting; the sound of thunder following him in his wake. His armor grew hot and glowed like embers as his speed increased. His wings peeled back like a hawk as he began to dive toward the earth. He descended like a comet in the night sky. Fire followed him leaving streaks of blue energy in his path. Sound exploded from him as he broke the darkness of the Second Heaven. Without slowing down, he flew straight through the cloud-wall of Alex’s home and landed with a boom as light exploded from his being! As his armored feet hit the ground beside the bed, light and lightning exploded from his being vaporizing the snakes and stunning the demonic horde. The aftershock of his arrival disintegrated the cloud- wall freeing Micah and Lydia to fly in behind him. 

Elsius’s giant hand instantly grabbed the top of the Queen Mother’s head. His fingers drove into her skull behind the skin on her forehead. He jerked her head around and locked eyes with her as if to melt her with his gaze, “HOW DARE YOU TOUCH A CHILD OF THE KING!” his voice roared like a giant lion. His other hand ripped her forked tongue out of her mouth stealing the scream right out of her. All the goblin demons were frozen in a fearful panic. They had never seen a warrior-class angel before.

Alex suddenly felt much lighter. “God please forgive me for my sins. I bind the Spirit of Lust in the name of Jesus.”

“Elsius took a metallic silver cord from his waist and wrapped it twice around her neck. She screamed as the hot silver melted her skin. With one swift motion, Elsius tightened the cord, and black blood splattered all over the floor as her head was severed from her body and bounced on the floor in front of him. Micah and Lydia were stunned speechless as they stood several feet behind the giant angel. 

Elsius took a step forward toward the rest of the demons. All of his armor was silver and glistened with power. His long hair was silver and white like a white wolf in the snow. His muscles were like chiseled stone and he stood before them as a king and a warrior. His diamond-moon eyes stared at his enemies as he drew his sword from his back between his giant wings. Lightning and fire danced across the blade as his right hand gripped it tight.

His mouth barely moved when he spoke, “I am going to kill every last one of you.”

Before they could respond, he kicked the head of the Queen Mother right at them! It crashed against a little demon called Self-Hatred knocking him on his back.  In a flash of metalic light, Elsius was upon them and sliced all of them into pieces. His blade consumed them faster than they could scream, leaving nothing but a pile of limbs and wings and blood on the floor. It took only a few seconds. 

Elsius turned around toward Lydia and Micah and began to clean his sword as he walked toward them slowly. Lydia had a pure white towel in her hand and was already cleaning the slime off of Alex’s neck as he was bent over in repentance. 

Elsius looked at Micah, “this house is defiled. You must send for the Angel of Cleansing. That familiar spirit of Guilt got away and closed the portal behind him. You must help teach the child to forgive himself or he will always invite that accursed creature right back.”

Elsius sheathed his blade and turned toward Lydia, “Have you gotten all the snakes out of him?” 

As Alex continued to pray, Lydia reached inside his back and pulled out another Snake Spirit. She broke its neck and tossed it aside.  “He is a work in progress” Lydia responded with an endearing smile towards her favorite human.

“Why was the witchcraft against him so strong?” asked Micah.

“The Monitoring Spirits alerted the Marine Kingdom to his bloodline. The boy has a great destiny.” 

“I want you to stay and protect him,” said Lydia. 

“I have not been fully commissioned to serve him. He must mature into his identity as a beloved son before he ever steps into his calling. I must continue to fight on behalf of his clan. Where are his Guardians? Both of you are his Attending Angels, correct?”

 “Horrible things have happened,” Lydia said quietly as she looked down. 

Elsius paused solemnly. He then motioned for Micah and Lydia to come to him and he embraced them under his arms and wings. 

Lydia began crying, “I was so scared we were going to lose him just like his father.”

Micah started sobbing as well. “I wasn’t strong enough to break her witchcraft. I was going to have to watch them consume him.”

Elsius’s words were gentle. “you did your best son, that’s all the Father ever asked of you.” The boy is safe now let your hearts be at rest. Trust in the Father. He has good plans to prosper him.” He held them until their hearts were at peace once again. 

He bent to look at them in the eyes, “Fear not, the Father will commission new Guardians for the boy. Attend to him. There is a man at his church who wants to teach him the ways of the spirit. Make sure they meet. If the boy learns to pray he will not fall to the temptations of the Evil One.” 

 Elsius took a few steps back to prepare to spread his massive wings. He looked at them with assurance in his voice, “I trust you to take care of him.” The giant angel spread his wings and ascended in a whoosh of wind and was past the Second Heavens in a moment.

Lydia and Micah looked on into the night sky above them seeing the warrior fade from view. Their eyes returned to the room. Demon blood was everywhere. Charred snake remains plastered the walls and the floor. The tongueless head of the Succubus was still where Elsius had kicked it.  

Micah put his hands on his hips as he retracted his wings, “I still have no idea how the two of us are going to protect him when all of Hell is coming against him.”

Lydia had returned to attending to Alex. He was still bent over on the floor repenting of his sins. She got down on her knees next to him. She leaned over him and hugged him deeply.  She smiled sweetly back at Micah, “as long as he learns to pray he will always have a fighter’s chance.”