The wall I'm jammed against reeks, that familiar odor of khat, piss, and sand smeared across the dusty plaster by the door. It's like every other time I've been in this position - a quiet, frantic jostle of bodies, lined up to make an unannounced visit, the soft hush of voices, the glint of glass and steel as all the players take their position. Enoch's up ahead, as always, and I can feel Sam's breath on the back of my neck, boots nudging mine as stillness descends, the distant wail of wind and voices from somewhere covering the sound of our approach.

Just like a thousand times before - the night we scrambled through the moonlit streets of Vilnius, hot blood and fresh silver the rule of the day, our chase trailing drained bodies and brass in the wake of the hunt. Chennai was similar, in a way, to tonight: the moment before the world explodes, I remember, the hard growls of something chained in the basement of a CD shop, the queasy feeling in the pit of all our stomachs as we felt it, no amount of kevlar and steel stopping that ancestral fear.

Small, in the scheme of things, really. The world's far older than we can possibly imagine, and as choked with nightmares as a drowned man's lungs. Things of shadow and sinew, whispering through open windows or sliding words around one's mind, needing to be invited for the slaughter, or prowling the last scraps of woods left untouched by metal and coal. They've all fallen by the side of the road, by now, the old terrors in the dark, with the march of sword and shot slicing away things that feed on blood and bone, and great ships piled with cargo toppling, unaware, the homes of the watery things that drag men down. We've gotten better at their jobs than almost all of them, now, seeing in the dark ourselves, able to kill with a flicker of light and a whisper of command. Even the strongest fiend, gorged on the soul of the forest, can't stem the tide, after all, and the last few monsters that survive have either made a truce with progress, or remain older and subtler by far than the petty litter of relicts and abominations strewn across history's trail.

But tonight is now, the blunt dome of Enoch's helmet dipping in acknowledgement, and the glint of green as his goggles go up. It's smooth, instinct itself guiding us all, and the signal passes down the line with barely a conscious thought. It's time, my watch buzzing silently against my wrist.

Fingers tighten on pistol grips, breath stills, a hand moves, and then, at last, the world ignites.

Hellfire comes to visit, shadows seared away by the grenade's rays, a ringing in the ears scarcely stopping the smooth flow of practiced bodies into the compound's courtyard. Like wind, we come, fanning out to the corners of the sparse ground and giving the sign, in turn, that wherever our prey is, at least he's not out here.

The door to the house splinters quietly under Enoch's axe, and the dull gleam of infrared pricks the darkness, now, shining green in my vision as we check the living room.

Dead.

Bodies slump in the corner, their eyes seared out by the thing's presence, most likely, and the makeshift altar in the corner smashed by the blow of something stronger than human hands. We're close, the adrenaline thumping in my temples, the grind of carbon and steel against what's left of my legs barely noticed as we close, swift and silent, on the bedroom, the stink of something ancient hanging in a rotten cloud over the entrance.

Sam looks at me, and I nod, motioning behind me. No doubt it's already got the scent of its old nemesis, by now, but best to play this out till the end.

Enoch's glance matches his compatriot's, and I take a deep breath of my own. Behind that scrap of plywood and paint, what we've been tracking for years, now, lurks, grown fat off the suffering of our kind. Gorged on unearned reverence, complacent in its victory.

But now? Well.

Now, hell's coming to call.

The boom of Enoch's fire cuts the stillness, shrapnel thudding into the wall before us as his boot sends the remnants of the door crashing to the ground. He's in, I'm up, Sam bringing up the rear, rifles raised and the glare of lasers cutting the green of the night like silent knives. A little more, a little farther, past the bed, and there, the thick lilt of Enoch's buried beneath his growl.

"I've got it."

It's not even awake, yet, the chaos outside but a mote of dust to the thing's long drink from the cup of power. Older, by far, than the petty vampires and scattered djinn, the Unseelie themselves draining their blood into the streams of the Black Forest for decades, now. Not one for raw strength, this thing, not one for stalking in the night anymore, feeding on nightmares.

This group, this fucking pack, have fed on the dreams and terrors of us for centuries; bright, shining lies leading too many of us to the slaughter, and I can feel anger surge in me, the wobble of my sights forcing me to still my breath. Its eyes are opening, a shine of gold falling across its face like marble, and I can feel every ounce of breath in our bodies hold at once. Even knowing what it is, what it's done, isn't enough to stop the feeling of awe as it heaves itself upright, wings scraping the ceiling with a sound like knives on glass.

"You."

Enoch's finger slides silently onto the trigger, the soft click of my own safety drowned out by the crackle of hellfire beginning to bloom behind me.

"What a lot."

Its voice is like silver and honey, all at once, contempt crackling at the words like frost as the beast turns its baleful gaze on Enoch.

"An apostate, an abomination, and a whore, come to play at being what your master never could be. Tell me, my child, do you remember the palaces they build for us? The songs they sing, the men they get to serve us? I know you know them so, so well, my child."

Its lips press in a thin smile, an alien knowing twisting its features for a moment as Enoch shakes, before a casual glance of warped glory slides my way.

"And you, Major - were you not satisfied with what you were made with? Did the plan for all things fail you, that you corrupt your body like this and hide in the night, from what you did, rendering unto Caesar?"

The last, echoing words are laid on Sam, as it reaches out a hand, the air around us beginning to heat and the urge to kneel stirring inside us both.

"We stole them from your kind so long ago, now. They couldn't hear your words anymore, blinded by their own creations and drowned out by the many, many ways they offer themselves up to us. Dead and done, and your own wards will hunt you, hating you, with not a finger to lift for us. This is the b-"

Have you ever seen one of their kind get hit by fifty-caliber sulfur-jacketed silver, before?

I promise, it's not always as sweet as this, the urge to obey the thing melting away as whatever glimmering stuff it's made of pastes the walls, its death silhouetted in a burst of flame as Sam hurls everything she's got into it, feathers blackening like leaves in an inferno as the fucker dies.

One round. Another. Another, another, another, thunder rolling from Enoch's gun and mind, lit by flashes of the works of man and the simmering lick of our companion's handiwork. Again and again, until the dreaded, soft snap of a hammer on air sounds, and it's done, and my own instincts return.

"Enoch?"

Dazed but triumphant, I can see, the monster's fingers not quite able to touch him before he brought the trigger home, the hulk of a man's cheeks glimmering with tears at last.

"Sam?"

Her nod is sharp, satisfied, a cold smile on her face as she slugs me in the shoulder, the razor curl of her horns not quite hiding the glimmer of excitement in her eyes.

And me, alive, still, despite my best efforts and reasonably unharmed. Surprise and sheer, bloody verve has its merits, after all, and I can feel the exhaustion set in as I kneel to check the thing's face. It and its ilk have sparked so much pain, so much hate, but now, here, in the heavy whisper of a dust storm beginning outside, in some damned corner of the Earth burnt over too many times to count, we're on our way to ending it at last.

Fishing open the pouch on my chest with a grunt, I dig out my notebook, face stapled to cards flickering by, one by one. Names, on a list below, with a line through them, only one left unsullied.

The last card matches, and the sinuous curl of Sam's tail around my forearm as I put pen to paper doesn't even bother me, for once. It's how she's made, after all.

And the spark of satisfaction in my heart, a cold, hard triumph welling in me? How I'm made, in the end. Damned, maybe, and proud of it.

Raphael... Michael...

"Gabriel," I announce with finality, drawing a fine black line through the dead thing's name, a boot to the corpse on the floor punctuating my words as I stand.

I can't resist, as we turn to leave, addressing it, one last time, though sightless eyes are already beginning to wisp into smoke.

"You had a good run," I admit, a smile no less vicious than its own spreading on my lips. "Keeping us all down, playing with us, making us fuck and fight and damning us all for it. A good game, for you fucks."

"But now?"

I nod.

"We're coming for your boss."