Once Upon a Midnight Dreary...

Jonathan Mars was running for his life.

It was dark out and he could hardly see. The paved road was empty. Empty. But there was something out there, he was sure of it. The air was cool, but he could not feel it. He could only feel the heat from all of that running. There was no other sound than his hurried footsteps on the pavement and his heavy breathing. He was running out of road. What ever he was running from pursued him.

His mind was trying to reason with him. There was nothing out there, it said. It's only your imagination. But instinct would not be reasoned with. Instinct was telling him to run and so he ran.

All he could do was just keep on running. But he was getting tired. Getting tired of all of this running. He was wasn't in the best of shape, he could admit that. He used to play football when he was younger. Not anymore, that would probably be 20 to 30 years ago. Not now. Now he was panting. Panting so hard he couldn't hardly breathe. His chest was tight. His body was heavy. He could easily pass out. The adrenaline was still there though, and that kept him going. He didn't know where to go. He didn't know where he could go to be safe. He just knew he had to keep as much distance from that thing as he possibly could.

He tripped but rolled up and kept on running, in one fluid motion. Adrenaline was his only ally.

A wrong turn. A dead end. A wall in front of him, walls at his side. He had no where to run to. No where.

The thing was getting closer, he could feel it. He was helpless against it. He felt the sensation to falling. The utter helplessness of not being able to fight the pull of gravity. He wanted to cry. He, a grown man, wanted to curl up into a ball and cry until the scary part was over. But no this was real. He stood his ground and waited of it, whatever it was to come.

He put his arms up. "You can have my wallet, and my phone and my watch, you can have whatever you want!" He yelled out into the night. But it didn't answer. He didn't really expect it too.

Everything was still. He could hear his pulse still radiating a loud thud, thud, thud, thud from all of that running and from the fear. The raw fear that was starting to fill his being. But he pushed it all away. He had to keep his ears peeled. He had to be logical. There was nothing out there. Then he heard it. Wings against the night air.

Vaguely he thought of an angel rescuing him from the horror that was about to come. But no, his instincts told him otherwise.

He backed himself up as far as possible against the wall.

A figure showed itself in front of him. At first he thought it was imagining it, but figure slowly came into focus.

It was dark but his eyes were already adjusted. It was a man. A man with pale skin, blonde hair, dressed in a black suit, a modern angel.

But as the phantom approached, he did not relax.

"Please don't." He begged. He didn't really know what he was going to do. He just knew it was bad. "Who are you?" He demanded with a surge of bravery one felt when one knew the end was here. He knew with every fiber of his being that this apparition before him was no angel.

"Your stepson." Was the last words he heard before the pain enveloped him.