Killing The Apocalypse Devil Chapter 2.

Chapter 2 – Fire, Fur, and the Swarm.

-0-

Kazuo and Kaede stood in front of the burning building.

What was left of their apartment crackled with oily flame, and somewhere within, the last surviving dakimakura of DandanPan’s ambiguously-gendered villain was curling into ash. Thick, black smoke spiraled up into the hell-colored sky, marking their departure like a funeral pyre and a signal flare rolled into one.

Kazuo watched the blaze with an expression that hovered between indifference and mild annoyance. He adjusted the strap of his gear pack, the weight of coiled wires slung comfortably over one shoulder. The heat kissed his cheek, and he turned slightly toward Kaede.

“You really didn’t have to use all the cooking oil.”

Kaede was crouched a few feet away, tightening the straps on her sniper case and tugging the sleeves of her coat into place. She didn’t look up.

“It was symbolic.”

“It was excessive.”

“It was a symbol of excess.”

Kazuo stared at her for a long beat, then gestured toward the flames that now threatened to ignite the billboard above, which still featured a faded ad for fried chicken and cryptocurrency.

“Pretty sure you summoned something with that thing.”

She stood up and dusted ash from her knees. “If I did, it’s going to be very confused by how delicious it smells.”

And then, from somewhere beyond the rusted railing of the building’s front steps, came the sound of something crashing through the trash-strewn alley. Heavy paws. Frantic hissing. Metal clanging like a parade of regrets.

Kazuo squinted toward the sound. “Speaking of confused demons.”

Mittens exploded around the corner in a flurry of motion, fur puffed out like a spooked pompous dandelion. His cigarette was gone, his eyes wide in the unmistakable panic of a predator turned prey.

“MOVE. MOVE. MOVE!” he screeched, leaping onto the remains of a mailbox with less dignity than usual.

A moment later, the thing chasing him emerged.

It was a rat—at least, that was the closest word that fit. But it was the size of a motorcycle, its fur smoldering with veins of living fire. The smell of sulfur and singed hair hit them like a wave. Its eyes glowed a molten red. Its fangs clattered together as it skidded to a stop and hissed, sounding more like a cracked engine block than any living animal.

Kaede whistled low.

Kazuo tilted his head. “...That’s new.”

Mittens launched himself from the mailbox onto Kaede’s shoulder, claws digging in for traction.

“There are so many things wrong with that thing,” he panted. “One—it laughed at me. Two—I think it’s got opposable thumbs. Three—it knows my name.”

Kaede was already unslinging her rifle. “You woke it up?”

“I threw a rock at it! For science!”

The rat snarled, crouched, and lunged.

Kaede fired.

The bullet curved mid-air, dancing off a rusted pipe, through a shattered rearview mirror, and directly into the burning rat’s left eye. It shrieked—a horrible, clattering sound—and skidded across the pavement, smashing into a burned-out vending machine in a pile of sparks and flaming fur.

Kazuo raised an eyebrow as its corpse twitched, leaking something that steamed on contact with the ground.

Kaede blew smoke off her fingers and smiled.

“Boom. Rat-a-tat. Pun intended.”

Kazuo gave her a look that screamed centuries of secondhand embarrassment.

Mittens hopped down from her shoulder, strutting toward the steaming carcass with mock pride.

“Well. That went better than expected.”

The street went quiet.

Then, from every crevice—storm drains, cracked pavement, broken windows—came the sound.

Scratching. Skittering. Snarling.

Dozens.

Then hundreds.

The ground vibrated with the promise of very tiny, very angry feet.

From the shadows emerged more rats. Smaller, yes. But still twisted things, their bodies burning like tinder, their teeth slick with something that shimmered like battery acid. Some of them had extra eyes. One had a can opener for a tail. Another looked suspiciously like it was wearing half of a discarded McDonald’s hat.

Kaede took a step back.

“So. You... woke up all the rats?”

Mittens looked left, then right.

“Science is a noble pursuit. And also... run?”

Kazuo was already moving, wires trailing behind him like streamers in a haunted parade.

Kaede fired a few warning shots that pinged harmlessly off walls and demon fur. “They’re swarming!”

“No shit!” Mittens yelled, bounding ahead and shoving a tiny rat off a rusted scooter as he hijacked it.

Kaede ran after them, boots slamming pavement. “He’s riding now?”

Kazuo caught up beside her, slicing a flaming rat mid-sprint with a garrote made from his spools of wires, strings and threads tied around his body.

“Science!” he shouted with mock enthusiasm.

Behind them, the swarm howled. One rat got too close and burst into giblets as Kaede roundhouse-kicked it into a wall. Another latched onto Kazuo’s arm—until he turned a shoelace into a whip and shredded it in a single flick.

They turned a corner. Ran through a collapsed daycare full of cursed plushies. Vaulted a makeshift shrine to a demon god made entirely of crushed soda cans.

“Left!” Mittens shouted, veering down a side alley and narrowly avoiding a meat-hook trap hanging from a lamppost.

Kaede cursed as she ducked it.

Kazuo kept pace, muttering under his breath. “I retire for one year. One. Year.”

The rats kept coming, relentless and many-legged, like an army of flaming bad decisions.

They would need shelter soon.

But first—they needed to survive this punchline.

And behind them, far back in the fire and smoke, their burning apartment collapsed into itself with a groan, as if sighing in shame at what it had unleashed upon the world.

-

The streets were a blender of sound and fire, rat shrieks echoing off broken glass and melted steel. Kaede reloaded mid-sprint, sweat and soot smearing her cheek as she scanned for an exit that didn’t lead straight into hell’s orthodontic nightmare. Kazuo moved like clockwork beside her, slicing any rat that got too close with flicks of cord so fast they hummed. Behind them, the swarm pulsed like a single living organism, howling and seething and snapping at their heels.

Mittens, still on the rusted scooter, weaved ahead, tail held high like a ridiculous banner of war.

“Left! Left again! Abandoned parking garage—” he shouted, swerving to avoid an ambitious rat.

They didn’t see the man until they were already nearly on top of him.

He stood in the street with a shotgun slung over his shoulder and a badge glinting dully beneath the blood-streaked remains of a once-blue uniform. His face was lined, jaw locked in the expression of a man who’d seen the end coming and decided to meet it halfway. He raised one arm and beckoned to them.

“Move it!” he barked. “Down this way!”

They followed without hesitation.

The cop led them through a service tunnel choked with old mannequins and collapsed signage, then into the ruins of a once-proud suburban temple: the Ichiban Mall. The signage flickered faintly, casting ghost-light on the cracked tile and graffiti-covered walls.

And then, without warning, the sound of the swarm stopped.

Kaede halted mid-stride, rifle half-lowered. Kazuo looked back.

Nothing.

The demon rats hadn’t just stopped chasing them—they’d vanished, as if some invisible curtain had dropped between predator and prey.

The cop didn’t pause. “Come on. You’re safe in here. For now.”

They emerged into what had once been a food court, now repurposed as a refugee camp of tarps, broken furniture, and haunted faces. Survivors huddled under flickering string lights, cooking over fire barrels. Makeshift signs marked trading zones, sleeping areas, latrines.

Someone had spray-painted “NO RATS ALLOWED” across the Taco Heaven entrance in what might’ve been ketchup.

Kazuo’s gaze swept across the encampment. “People are alive?”

The cop gave a curt nod. “For now. Welcome to the blind spot.”

Kaede frowned. “Blind to what?”

“You’ll understand later,” he muttered. “Name’s Sergeant Taira. That’s my daughter, Yui.”

He gestured toward a small girl seated cross-legged beside a flickering campfire. She looked about fourteen, pale and distant, her hair unevenly chopped, wearing a hoodie with an anime print half-scoured off by soot. She didn’t react to being introduced. Her eyes didn’t seem to be focused on anything at all.

Kazuo stared at her for a beat longer than necessary. Something about her presence felt like a bruise under the skin of the world. But he let it go.

Taira showed them to an empty space by an old bakery kiosk. “You can rest here. We don’t get many ex-military types with working weapons.”

Kaede didn’t correct him. Let the man believe what he wanted.

As they unpacked, survivors cautiously approached with nervous thanks, some handing over canned goods in appreciation. Kaede nodded but didn’t speak. Kazuo took the food but didn’t eat.

Later that night, the mall flew in and out of calm. Conversations, coughs, distant screams—all muffled by walls that hadn’t been cleaned since capitalism died. Kaede slept lightly, rifle across her lap. Kazuo stayed seated with his back against a freezer, eyes half-closed.

That was when he noticed it.

A red dot. Faint. Hovering across the far wall like a phantom from an old toy. It danced once—twice.

Mittens stood, tail twitching. His ears perked.

Then, without sound, the cat vanished into the dark.

Kazuo exhaled slowly. “He’s chasing a dot.”

Kaede stirred. “What?”

“Our cat. Laser dot. You know.”

Kaede sat up fully. “Kazuo. He chased a demon rat army on a scooter. That’s not a normal cat.”

Kazuo shrugged. “Normal’s relative.”

She groaned and shoved him. “Why didn’t you stop him?”

“I figured it was... cathartic.”

“You figured it was—” She growled, standing. “If he dies, I’m turning your figurines into kindling.”

They searched the mall until close to dawn. No sign of the cat. A few pawprints. A claw mark in the vending machine. Nothing else.

Then the sky changed.

From the middle of the mall’s atrium, just beyond the remains of a carousel and a once-innocent Build-A-Bear kiosk, a fissure opened in the air.

It wasn’t gradual. It popped into existence like a zit on the surface of reality—a jagged wound glowing blood-orange.

And through it came the imps.

Dozens.

Red, Cackling, fluttering on malformed wings, eyes glowing with ancient malice and petty cruelty. They dove down upon the survivors, shrieking like joyless children at a birthday party turned execution.

The camp erupted into chaos. Screams. Scrambles. Kaede shot one imp out of the air mid-dive. Kazuo tripped another with wire, dragging it across broken tile until its wings tore clean off.

The rest weren’t as lucky.

Survivors were lifted, kicking and screaming, dragged toward the portal in twos and threes. Taira fired into the swarm, expression unreadable.

Then he lowered his gun.

And smiled.

Kaede saw it first. The shift in his face. The way he stood still as the imp grabbed a boy behind him, didn’t even flinch.

“You son of a bitch. You've been luring innocent people here for Demons.” she hissed.

Taira turned toward her, calm now. “It’s not personal. It’s… arithmetic. I give them souls, they give me power. Eventually, immortality. Demonhood, maybe. Better than starving out here with the rest.”

Kazuo took a step forward. “That girl. She’s not your daughter.”

Taira smirked. “Street rat. Found her half-dead. But she can hide things. From anyone. Even demons. Even Hell. Soul’s been claimed by one of the princes, she's a lucky one.”

Yui stood silently behind him, arms slack. Her eyes shimmered faintly, like oil on water.

“The portal,” Kazuo said. “She’s been hiding it.” The mall too.

“Bought us time,” Taira said. “Now we’re out of time. I need two more for the offering. You two’ll do fine.”

He raised the shotgun.

Kaede reached for her rifle.

But Kazuo moved first.

In one flick of the wrist, he unsnapped the pair of rusted handcuffs from Taira’s belt. Wire gleamed. Metal flashed.

Taira’s head left his body in a perfect arc.

Silence returned.

Yui didn’t scream. She didn’t move. She just stepped back from the growing pool of blood.

Kaede looked down at the girl. “You were part of this?”

Yui shook her head. “He said if I helped, I’d get my soul back. I’m sorry.”

Kazuo looked at the swirling portal. It pulsed now, unhidden, the imps retreating into it with their bounty.

Kaede turned to him. “Mittens is somewhere in there.”

The cat must have been lured into the portal or accidentally fallen in.

“I know.”

“You sure about this?”

“No.”

A beat passed.

Then Kaede squared her shoulders.

“Fuck it. Let's go save the furball.”

Yui stepped forward. “I’m coming too.”

“You sure?” Kazuo asked.

“My soul’s in there,” she said. “So is your cat.”

Kazuo smirked faintly. “Let’s hope they’re not in the same cage.”

And without another word, the three of them stepped through the wound in the air—into Hell, or something worse.