Battle Of The Souls

In a town not too far from here, there lived a boy named Zen. Zen was a quiet boy and he liked to keep to himself. He had just started going to college and everything was going good for Zen. After school, he would hang out with his friend Izic and do every day things that friends would do. Yes, it seemed to be just an average life for Zen.

One day, Izic came over and said to Zen, “I found this book in your attic the other night. I put it in my backpack for safe keeping and forgot about it.”

Zen took the book and looked it over. On the front, it said family album with three claw marks underneath. When he opened the book, a black cloud of dust hit Zen right in the eyes. Zen squinted and said to Izic, “Just throw it out. It is nothing but a torn up dusty book.”

Izic did as he said and threw it out. While Zen was trying to wash out his eyes, he noticed a burning smell then he hears Izic shout “FIRE!” as he ran to the trash with a bucket of water to put the fire out. After Izic threw the water, they both noticed that the only thing burnt was the book. It had completely turned to ash. Both Zen and Izic had no idea what had happened. Zen and Izic decided it would be best not to tell anyone about what had just happened. They shook hands and then as Zen is walking away he turned to Izic.

“Now clean up the mess you made and we can continue with our day,” Zen told him.

Zen peeked around the corner with a grin on his face. Izic was not happy that he had to clean it up, but he grinned back knowing things could have ended a lot worse. After Izac was done cleaning they both went on with the day like nothing had happened.

*

That night when Zen went to bed, he had the oddest dream. He dreamed of this dark cave. From within this cave, he could hear a voice saying in a whisper, “Zennnn.”

When he got to the entrance of the cave, the voice would stop. Zen peeked in and said hello, but there was no reply. Then out of nowhere, this shadow came out from the dark and lunged at him.

“I got you now. You are mine forever!”

Zen woke up in fear and soaked in sweat. He sat up and noticed a sharp pain. When he looked at his shirt, he could see that he had blood all over the front of his shirt. He quickly took his shirt off and headed to the bathroom mirror. When he looked in the mirror, he could see that he had three deep cuts that looked like claw marks going straight across his heart. As he looked closer, he could see that the wound was starting to heal and turning into scars within minutes. He noticed he could not see his face that well when he looked in the mirror so he wiped it off with caution.

After the first wipe, he noticed that he could see his face, but it was not his at all. It was a face that was filled with darkness and had this feeling of demonic darkness as the darkness cast out his face in the mirror. Zen rushed to turn all the lights on then he rushed to get under his covers and waited for the sun to rise. While he was under the covers, he thought to himself that this couldn’t be real and that he must de dreaming still. Why was this happening to him?

*

A few hours later, the sun came up. Zen felt like it was safe for him to come out and he would try to forget about what had just happened.

Zen and Izic met up later that day to go to church like they did every Sunday. On the way, Izic asked Zen how his night went.

“It was good. Why?”

Izic replied, “No reason. You just look like you are really feeling under the weather.”

“I will be fine. I just had a bad night’s sleep. Thanks for asking.”

When they got to the church, he noticed that he started to feel worse. When he tried to go in, he found it impossible to step inside so he decided to tell Izic that he would see him later. He went home to rest hoping he would feel better.

*

A few hours had passed when all of the sudden Zen heard a knock on the front door. When he opened it, he saw that it was Izic and a priest from the church.

“Sorry to stop in unannounced like this, but I thought since you missed mass you might want to at least get a blessing done,” Izic greeted Zen.

Zen looked at them with eyes dark as night and replied with a deep, scratchy voice, “Go away you are not welcome.”

Izic turned to the priest and said, “I am so sorry, Father. Zen has never ever done that to anyone.”

“My son, I do not think that was Zen we were talking to just now. I felt a darkness I had not felt in a very long time,” the priest told Izic.

Then he asked Izic if he knew what could have happened to Zen. Izic told the priest about the book that they found. The priest asked Izic what the book looked like and when Izic told him what it looked like the priest froze.

“I knew I felt the presence of a familiar darkness. That was the book! It must have vanished into the book -- the one without a name. I haven’t seen it in a long time ago. I don’t know how it was released, but we must help your friend.”

Izic looked at the priest. “How do we help him, Father?”

“I feel we might have only one option to save Zen and that is to purge him of this thing of darkness.”

“Will it kill him, Father?” Izic asked as his eyes begun to water.

“I hope not, my son. I hope not.”

After they talked, they decided to go through with trying to get rid of it so they went to the church and got the proper items they would need to do this.

*

Later that day, Izic and the priest went back to see Zen. They knocked on the door and it opened. They both entered the house and noticed Zen was not doing well at all. He was very sweaty and weak. The priest asked him to head to his room and lie down. Zen did just that as both Izic and the priest followed him.

When they got to Zen’s room, Zen passed out in his bed and that was when the priest started. He told Izic to bind his hand and feet to the bed and make it tight. Izic looked at him oddly, but he did not argue with him as he tied him to the bed with the rope. Zen was so weak that he could not put up a fight. All he could do was ask why they did what they were doing, but he then passed out again.

The priest began.

He started with a short prayer. While he did this, he would slash holy water around the room. Then he started to do the same to Zen. When he did this to Zen, Zen’s eyes shot open and proceeded to speak to the priest.

Staring at him with eyes as dark as night, he yelled, “Get out! You are nothing but a fake and you hold no power over me!”

The priest held his ground and told Izic not to show fear for fear would only feed the beast. The priest continued as he read passage after passage about God’s strength over the dark ones. As he did this, it became more and more defiant. It swore and tried to show in any way that it was above God and nothing can rid it from this body. This continued all night and was very trying on all involved then the priest read the passage saying how God vanquished the dark one. He asked Izic to read it with him.

All of the sudden, the beast went quiet. Izic and the priest couldn’t help but notice the sun was starting to shine. A few minutes later when the sun started to shine on Zen’s body, they noticed that the room felt peaceful. After a little bit of being in the sun light, Zen started to wake up.

“What happened?” he asked.

Izic told him what he and the priest had done for him and Zen started to cry. It was not tears of sadness, but it was tears of joy for he felt they had saved his life. Zen thanked them over and over as they cleaned up the mess that was made.

As the priest was leaving, Zen asked, “How can I ever repay you, Father?”

“Never lose your faith,” the priest told him then he disappeared into the sunlight.

Zen and Izic went to the church to try and find the priest that helped them, but he was nowhere to be found. They tried and tried, but he was gone. Izic and Zen made a pact to help each other and never lose their faith. As for the one without a name, Zen had no memory of it. Izic felt it was best not to remind him and never spoke of it again.