The choice

  Jack awoke in the darkness, cold and shivering. The concrete floor was unforgiving and his body ached. He rolled over on his side as he began to wretch, the all too familiar stench of vomit and alcohol filling his nostrils. He wiped the last of the vile mixture from his lips with his sleeve and surveyed his surroundings.

  “What the hell have you gotten yourself into now Jack” he mumbled to himself as he stared into the shadows hanging heavily about the large room, cloaking much of it from view. He had no recollection of how he got here, though that was no surprise when he was drinking. His head was pounding and he needed a bathroom, so he set out into the darkness, hoping to find an exit.

As he moved through the shadows he got the feeling he was being watched. A cold chill went up his spine and he froze for a moment, listening to the darkness. It was silent, entirely too silent, but he tried to shrug that off.

“Anyone there?” he called into the darkness. After a long tense moment with no answer he moved forward again. “Just the damn booze messing with me again…” he told himself, but he felt that was far from the truth. Despite how much he had drank (and how much had that been he wondered) he was uncharacteristically sober. Or so he thought until he saw her.

She was clad in black rags. Her tattered raven colored wings hung about her shoulders eerily twitching now and again, causing feathers to fall dropping slowly to the ground. Her icy blue eyes peered from beneath a dark grey cowl, her lips curled into a soft smile as she spoke.

“Welcome Jack, we’ve been expecting you.” Her voice was smooth and cold like the ocean depths, and equally as powerful. She had little more than whispered but the sound resonated through his whole being.

“Who are you?” he said shakily.

A light rose from behind her as another form appeared and stepped to her side. It was the most beautiful woman Jack had ever seen, her ivory skin seemed to glow, casting back the shadows from her. She had wings as well, but no feathers fell from hers. They had the look of fresh pearls, and spread elegantly behind her like a flowing cloak.

“We are the angels of life and death,” the newcomer spoke softly, her voice radiant and bright, “and the time has come for your judgment.”

Jack stumbled back in shock “You mean I’m… dead?” he stammered.

“Not yet” the voice of the darker one spread over him like oil, thick and viscous, he felt himself wanting to wretch again, but fought it down. “We have seen your life and the darkness in it, and we have come to you to give you a choice”

“What…what kind of choice?” he looked to the beautiful one, for she was easier to stomach than the grotesque mockery of an angel that that stood next to her.

She smiled to him and it washed over him like a summer breeze, filling him with a sense of peace “All of your life, you have made the easy decisions, and it has led you down a path that has brought you to this… So we give you this choice now, you must go with one of us. You must choose life or death, but choose wisely Jack…For only one of us will return you safely”

Jack pondered this a moment. He had had a hard life, but most of it was his fault, knowing where it led him, he could change it all. He stepped forward towards the radiant angel and said “I want to live.. I want to go with you…”

The darker angel seemed to hiss as she spoke “Are you sure of this. Once you make your decision, there is no turning back...”

Jack shook his head “No doubt.” He turned to the smiling radiant angel who opened her arms to him and he stepped into them feeling a sense of peace wash over him as her wings folded around him.

She leaned down and kissed his forehead gently “Always with the easy choices Jack,” she slid her hand to his chest tracing over it with her long fingernails before her smile turned to an evil sneer and she sank her claws into his chest.

Jack screamed as he looked down, seeing the blood gushing from his chest, covering her ivory skin with crimson. “Life isn’t always pretty jack, at least not on the outside”  He looked over her shoulder to see the darker angel shaking her head sullenly, her blue eyes that had seemed so icy now tinged with sadness…he hadn’t noticed before that despite the rags and tattered wings she too was quite beautiful. He looked back to the angel who now held him in her deadly embrace…she grinned wickedly as she dug her hand deeper into his chest pulling out his heart and holding it between them. The last thing jack saw was  that sweet radiant smile as the angels teeth ripped into his heart, blood spilling down here ivory cheeks…