A feral sound could be heard in a dark room with the only light coming from all seven of the Demon’s glowing eyes. This wasn’t a regular demon, either. This was a Demon of the Falcon Clan, a demon specializing in Wind and Fire combinations. In most cases, the members of the Falcon Demon Clan were hunters, looking for their next targets. This particular Demon, however, was the one being hunted, by a Soul Watcher. Soul Watchers are the defenders of all others, killing Demons with their Soul Weapons. The Weapons take a form based on their maker’s personality, with the Weapon having a personality of its’ own. In this case though, the Soul Watcher had yet to get his Weapon to speak, which at this particular time, was driving him crazy. “Dang it, say something, will you?” Kenneth muttered, looking at the ornately designed pistol in his right hand. Kenneth was a young Soul Watcher, at the age of fifteen, and was also still in school. He stood at 5’9 and had brown hair, blue eyes, and a constantly quizzical expression. He was dressed in a maroon vest over a red t-shirt with blue jeans and red tennis shoes. His age made him the best bet to counter attacks on school aged humans. His uncertainty of things, however made it difficult for him to succeed on his missions. His whispers, however, were picked up by the Demon, who picked that precise moment to strike. Catching the movement of the Demon’s eyes, Kenneth rolled out of the way, muttering curses under his breath as he came to his feet. He looked around for the Demon, his eyes darting all around the room. After nearly giving up, he heard a growl from above and saw the Demon’s eyes at the ceiling of the room. “Time to die, Demon!” he roared, bringing up his pistol so that he was aiming directly at the Demon’s middle eye. He fired twice, but the Demon was just fast enough to get away from the shots, charging again at Kenneth. “Dang it, hold still!” he shouted, firing another shot as he moved out of the way. This time, his shot hit the target, though it seemed to only irritate the Demon, who then created a fireball in his hand. “Well, this could be worse, for me anyways. Ain’t about to get any worse for you, however,” he said with a smirk, snapping his fingers. Just then, the bullet that had hit the Demon exploded, sending the Demon back to where it belonged. “Tch, that was a lot harder than it should’ve been,” he sighed, sounding highly irritated. He then reached into his right vest pocket to pull out a device that resembled a watch computer. Putting it on his left wrist, he turned it on by pressing a red button on the side.

“Ah, Kenneth, how did the mission go?” an elderly man with whitish brown hair and green eyes had asked.

“Not well, Tellon, not well. The thing nearly killed me more times than was necessary,” Kenneth replied with a roll of his eyes.

“Now now, no need to be so hard on yourself. You got the job done. Don’t forget to file the paperwork for your mission once school is done.” Why did the higher ups always require paperwork? Kenneth had too much to worry about from classes to be dealing with paperwork.

“Alright, Tellon. I’ll get it done. Over and out,” Kenneth replied, shutting down the communication link. He then sighed as he turned to leave the room, making sure to send his pistol back into his soul.

A couple of hours later, he found himself in English class. That was something that he found highly irritating and highly strange. Why on Earth did an American need to learn English? It’s like making a Japanese citizen learn Japanese, or a Russian citizen learning Russian. They didn’t need to learn it, cause they already knew it. Kenneth shook his head as he listened to his teacher talking. He almost fell asleep had he not gotten a nudge in his side. He glanced over at Nisa Sampson, a girl who tended to make Kenneth nervous. She was his age, blonde, fair skinned, and had green eyes that were slightly tinged with blue. She stood at about 5’6 and seemed to have a flirtatious expression on her face more often not.

“I’d stay awake, if I were you. You know what Mr. Thomas does when people fall asleep in class,” she told him. Something else about her was that she was also the smartest student in the school. Guys didn’t really like that, so for some reason, few guys actually hovered over her every word. Their problem was that Kenneth seemed to be her focus, hence why she made him nervous. He never knew what she was going to do next.

“Tch, I’ll survive. I’ve gone through far worse than a detention,” Kenneth replied with a shrug. He and Mr. Thomas had clashed before- over sleeping to be exact. Kenneth was bored, plain and simple. Mr. Thomas just took things too seriously, and as such, was one who always incited conflict with others. Kenneth was used to it by now, cause Mr. Thomas was also his uncle.

“Your call if you want to stay after class,” Nisa shrugged as well. Kenneth could tell that she had other things to say, but he knew that if they were caught talking in class, both of them would be in detention. Fortunately class didn’t last too much longer after that, and the bell rang, sending the students to either lunch or class. Kenneth had lunch first, as did Nisa. She usually ended up having him join her and her friends, or just sitting with him. He honestly hoped she’d want to eat with her friends and leave him behind this time, cause he needed time to think about his mission earlier. Walking down the halls of West Chester High School, he had little in the way of thought outside of his mission at the moment. His stomach took that point to growl, bringing him back to the subject of lunch. He looked around and sighed. There was never really any short lines in the lunch room. So he instead went to the vending machines. Getting chips and a soda was the easy part. Getting through the lines at the machines was the tedious part.

“Geez, even the vending machine lines take too long,” he muttered, shaking his head. He finally got his food and headed towards a table. Before he got there, though. Nisa caught up to him.

“Hey, don’t even think about sitting on your own. I’m sitting with you,” she said with a smirk. Kenneth just rolled his eyes, cause he knew that there were at least two or three guys who had the first lunch along with them that wanted Nisa to sit with them instead. The fact that she sat with Kenneth was something that drove them mad, usually resulting in threats that were never backed up. Kenneth wasn’t normally an intimidating person, but he could pull it off, just by glaring at whoever was pissing him off at the time. He didn’t know what it was specifically that backed these people off, but it worked.

“Great, now I get more death threats today,” he joked, sitting down at a table. He really wasn’t looking forward to dealing with the punks, but they seemed to enjoy picking a losing fight with him.

“Kenneth, quit joking like that. It’s not either of our faults that those guys like me. They just haven’t gotten it into their heads that I like you,” she replied with a smile. She always said that, knowing that it made him blush. Why couldn’t she just not flirt with him? He already knew she liked him, so repeating it with words and actions was beyond necessary.

“Can you not do that? It puts me at a worse spot than normal. Those guys that normally give out threats then proceed to actually attempt their threats. I have too much to worry about to have to fight my way past a couple of morons,” Kenneth replied. He glanced over at where he knew the guys would be sitting, and immediately caught some hard glares and a muscle flex or two. It was going to be a long day. Shaking his head, he then felt a buzz from his cell phone in his left pocket. Pulling out his cell, he saw that it was a text message from one of the ops that kept track of Demon movement on the surface. Flipping his cell open, he saw the words [Two demons nearby. Both are Falcons and both seem to be upset with you for some reason.] Shaking his head, he glanced towards Nisa, noting that she was a bit busy eating at the moment. It came as a flash, two of the guys that had been glaring at him shot up and raced towards him, human skin shedding away to reveal their true Demonic forms. The Falcon Demon clan had the sense of sight and hearing that were on par with their namesakes. Their flight, however, was clumsy and they were often regarded as the lowest of even the Lesser Demon clans due to their ineptitude with even the simplest of tasks. Kenneth, as such, was more than prepared to respond quickly. Taking note of the confusion and fear already running through the cafeteria, he made a quick move to get between the Demons and a frightened Nisa.

“Soul Weapon, unleash the power!” he shouted, his hands infront of his chest and about a foot of separation between them. Both were cupped to accomodate a green ball that had appeared out of his chest, one that soon altered into the form of his pistol. “Alright, now it’s show time,” he then said, taking aim at one of the Demons and firing off three rounds. He registered the hit but wasn’t quick enough to fire at the other Demon. It rammed him from the side, sending him over the chair where Nisa had been sitting. Good thing she got the heck out of dodge. This was going to be a messy battle. His main problem right now though, was that the attack had neutralized the muscles in his left side. They weren’t damaged in any way, just numb. Gritting his teeth, he attempted to stand as the second Demon howled in apparent triumph. “Tch, don’t stand too close to fallen comrades, nimrod” he said, snapping his fingers. The corpse of the first Demon then exploded, catching the second in the blast as Kenneth hobbled away as fast as possible towards cover. Once he was safe, he looked towards where the blast had been, seeing only smoke at first. Thinking he had won, he slowly stood, his right hand on his left shoulder. His eyes then tightened as he saw a dark shape in the smoke.

“Oh, great. It’s alive. Guess things aren’t that easy, huh?” he muttered, shaking his head. He was at half strength and was fighting a Demon that was apparently one of the strongest of its’ clan. This was definitely going to be a long day. Shaking his head again, he pulled his gun up to be level with the Demon’s center eye. He fired a couple of rounds, but the Demon moved before he could. His eyes tightened again as he looked around, just barely able to see the Demon shoot out a smoke screen. “Crap, now I’m fighting blind here,” he complained, covering his mouth with his right forearm. He closed one eye while trying to keep the other open, watching for the Demon’s next attack. He barely saw one of the Demon’s six clawed hands shoot towards him, dodging it just quick enough. The Demon then sent in the rest, one at a time and not letting up.

“Oh just give up already, you piece of crap,” he said, ducking and dodging. He was starting to get his left side back, but it was hurting to dodge, and that wasn’t fun. He managed to fire a couple of shots off, not sure if they hit until he heard a Demonic grunt. He then snapped his fingers, hoping to kill the Demon, but again he was unsuccessful. What was it going to take? He noticed that the smoke was starting to clear up from the Demon’s attacks and his bullet’s explosion. The clearing smoke was all he needed to see Nisa creeping up behind the Demon with a sword in hand. Where had she gotten a sword at this school?

“Nisa, wait!” he called out, then wishing he hadn’t. The Demon spun around, facing Nisa with a triumphant expression as it then charged towards her. Nisa, however, had taken on a calm and collected expression, her eyes glowing a golden color.

“Phantom wave!” she shouted out, swinging her sword horizontally in front of her. A silver wave came from her sword, striking the Demon and slicing it in half. Nisa then looked towards Kenneth and smiled, walking over towards him. “You seemed like you were having fun,” she said.

“Since when could you call upon a Soul Weapon?” he asked, his expression one of shock and surprise. He would have been notified had there been another Soul Watcher in the area by Central Command. Of course, there was a way for that to be avoided, had she-

“Just now, actually. I heard a voice call out to me while I was hiding. It told me to call out the same words you did to call your pistol and it brought out a sword for me,” she replied with an indifferent shrug. She usually didn’t take this sort of thing lightly. But then again, once a person was awakened to the fact that Demons were moving around in the world, they tended to change their outlook on life in some ways.

“To be honest, Nisa, that was completely reckless. I don’t care what that voice told you, you haven’t been trained to handle Demons. You just got your-” he said, being interrupted by her putting a finger to his lips.

“I was perfectly fine. My sword, Phantom, told me what to do. I knew that he knew what he was doing, so I did as he said,” she replied with another shrug. So even she could hear her weapon? A girl who was new to all of this and definitely untrained? Kenneth was getting annoyed by this now.

“I guess the name makes sense based on the attack you used. Alright, I guess the first thing I’ll have to do is report all of this to my superiors,” he replied dubiously. He wasn’t exactly a fan of spontaneous happenings, and this was obviously not fun for him.

“Superiors? You work for someone?” she asked, her expression becoming curious.

“Yeah, I’m what’s called a Soul Watcher. We guard the human race from the 19 Demon Clans that look to add more human souls to Hell. We do so with our Soul Weapons. The problem with the Demons is that they can possess a living human’s body and drain away their soul, before using the body to take even more souls. The two Demons here had probably been using their hosts for awhile,” he replied with distant eyes. He hated seeing someone become possessed. It was not a fun thing to watch unfold or to end, because the person that was possessed never stood a chance of rescue.

“So that explains why you tend to be tired or late to school. You’re off fighting these Demons. Well at least that question has been answered,” Nisa replied, lost in thought. She was obviously thinking about something, but what Kenneth didn’t know, nor did he want to know. After a few moments, she merely giggled before looking back at Kenneth. “Talk about an exciting life. The only time you seem bored is when you’re here at school, I bet,” she then said, giggling.

“That, or when I have no missions and nothing to keep me from being bored during that little period of time,” he replied with a shrug.

“Ah, I see. Y’know, there is something else I’m wanting to find out today,” she said, getting right in front of him, her face so close to his that the tip of her nose was touching his.

“O-oh?” he stuttered out his reply, trying to escape but realizing that she pretty much had him pinned against a wall.

“Yeah, whether or not you like me,” she said, kissing him. Kenneth had not been expecting that, but there wasn’t really anything he could do except kiss her back. Nisa kept the kiss short, thankfully, because he was starting to feel his legs weaken. He didn’t want to have them buckle under the pressure.

“Uh, well I mean,” he started out his reply, stuttering again. Why did she enjoy making him nervous? He wasn’t a fan of this, but what was he going to do about it right now? He couldn’t do anything at this point, other than maybe respond to her open ended question. “Yeah, I guess I do,” he then replied, his eyes going distant briefly.

“Good, cause a one-sided love would be boring for me. Now come on, school’s probably done for the day, so lets hang out!” she said, grabbing his hand and pulling him out of the cafeteria, and towards the front doors of the now near empty school. Yeah, this was going to be a long day.