"Logan!" Kyle said, rushing towards him. "Are you okay?" he asked, crouching down and resting his hand on Logan's shoulder.

Logan nodded his head, still trying to catch his breath. Max and Ian stood a few feet away, staring in disbelief.

"What did you just do?!" Ian shouted at Logan as he approached him.

"What's your problem?" Kyle shot back, glaring at Ian and helping Logan to his feet.

"Outside," Logan said, his voice serious as he leaned on a bench for support.

Kyle helped Logan outside, with Max and Ian following behind, uncertain of what to do or say.

After a few minutes of Logan sitting on a bench and the other three standing restless in front of him, Ian spoke up. "What just happened?" he asked Logan, his tone now more calm.

"That was a demon," Logan replied calmly, looking up at the others as their expressions shifted from curiosity to fear.

"Demon?" Max said, his voice tinged with fear.

"Let's all go home," Logan said, smiling gently at Max. "You must be tired." He finished saying as he stood up and started walking.

"I'll take you home," Kyle said, catching up to Logan.

"Meet us at the coffee shop tomorrow at 7:30am. We'll talk over coffee," Logan said, turning to Max and Ian.

"Here, put this on," Kyle said, handing Logan a helmet. Logan smiled at Kyle as he put on the helmet and hopped on his motorbike.

Max and Ian watched in silence as Kyle and Logan sped away on the motorbike, leaving behind a trail of dissipating smoke. "What now?" Max asked, breaking the silence.

"We should go," Ian replied, starting to walk down the cold and dark streets that led to his house.

***

“Thanks for bringing me home,” Logan thanked Kyle as he returned the helmet. Kyle looked at Logan, wanting to ask him more about what had just happened.

“I’ll try to explain everything tomorrow. I still don’t have all the answers myself,” Logan said, gripping the rosary tightly in his hand as if seeking comfort.

“Okay,” Kyle said with a sigh. “Get some rest,” he added before flashing a cocky smile at Logan.

“Goodnight,” Logan said, standing on the driveway as Kyle drove off. He wasn't sure if Kyle had heard him or not. When Kyle was out of sight, Logan reached into his pocket for his keys. He opened the door carefully, trying not to wake up his grandmother. Once inside, he took off his shoes and tiptoed up to the second floor. He left his shoes inside his room and went, carefully, to his studio.

Once there, he rummaged through boxes of his grandfather's things that he had stored there before turning it into his painting studio. When he went through all the boxes and still hadn't found what he was looking for, he started to worry. "Could I have thrown it away?" he asked himself as he looked around the room. Then he remembered the trapdoor that led to the attic. He looked up at the ceiling and moved a stool to reach the handle to bring down the wooden stairs. When the stairs were finally down, he turned on his phone's flashlight and climbed up to the attic. He had to crouch due to the low ceiling, and as he looked around, he found countless useless things. Just as he was about to leave, he saw what he was looking for: his grandfather's exorcism books, hidden in a corner under a pile of other boxes.

When Logan found the exorcism books, he carefully brought down the box and left it on the studio floor. Then he closed the attic access by folding the wooden stairs and pulling up the trapdoor. He put back on the boxes the scattered items that he had left on the floor before going to the attic and moved the easels to clear the center of the room. Sitting on the floor with the box, he debated opening it for a few minutes before finally doing so. Inside, the books were dusty and cobweb-filled, and a spider crawled out when he pulled out the first book. Startled, jumped a couple of feet back landing forcefully on his ass. He bit his lip to  not let out a scream that could wake his grandmother up accidentally bit too hard cutting his lip, which started to bleed down his chain and started to stain his shirt. After gathering the courage to kill the spider, he began to remove the contents of the box. Among the nameless books with leather covers, he found various religious items like rosaries and figurines of saints. He eyed the books for any information about what happened at the church, and after a few hours of reading with his phone lantern, he accidentally fell asleep on the studio floor.

Logan was abruptly awoken by the blaring alarm. He glanced around the studio and realized he had dozed off while surrounded by books. With a groggy mind, he headed to the bathroom. Staring at his reflection in the mirror, he noticed the dried blood on his chin and shirt, and the dark circles under his eyes. After undressing, he turned on the shower and let the warm water run down his body.

As he finished his shower, he wrapped a towel around his long brown hair and tied another one on his waist and gathered the scattered clothes from the floor. The chilly air in the corridor sent shivers down his spine as he hurried to his room to get dressed. While drying his hair with the towel he walked down the stairs and got into the kitchen, he greeted his grandma with a light hug once he was there.

“Good morning grandma,” he greeted her, his stomach growling with hunger.

“Good morning dear,” she responded as she put a couple of bread slices in the toaster. “Do you want breakfast?”

“I’ll grab something at work,” he responded, remembering his conversation with Kyle, Ian and Max.

“You need to eat more,” his grandma said, poking him in the stomach with a worried and warm tone that only a grandmother knows how to do.

“I know, I know,” he said with a light laugh before heading back to his room. He grabbed a few books from the studio and put them in his bag before calling out, “See you later,” and opening the door to leave, before leaving he made sure that he was wearing the rosary and finally left.

As Logan dragged his heavy feets down the lonely and empty streets the feeling of exhaustion started to take over his body, the fact that he slept on the floor and late prevented him from properly recover from the events that happened at midnight, also the cold weather, his lack of clothing and his semi-wet hair wasn’t making him feel any better. “I should’ve grabbed a jacket,” he thought as he cursed himself for only wearing a T-shirt and an oversized hoodie. He pulled the hood of his hoodie over his head and continued to make his way to the coffee shop, taking slow and deliberate steps.

As he approached the coffee shop, Logan spotted Kyle, Ian, and Max waiting at the door from far away. He tried to pick up his pace, but his exhausted body protested at the thought, so he continued walking slowly.

“Good morning,” he greeted them with a faint smile, trying to conceal his fatigue. “Why are you waiting out here?” he asked.

“The coffee shop is closed, and I don't have the keys yet,” Kyle explained, annoyed at having to stand in the cold weather.

Logan suddenly realized he had the keys and fumbled for them, dropping his rosary in the process.

Ian picked up the rosary and handed it back to Logan. The sight of it reminded them all of why they were there.

“Come on in,” Logan said once the door was unlocked.

“Do any of you want something?” Logan asked Max, Ian, and Kyle as he placed his bag on a table and put on his apron.

“You haven't tied your hair up,” Kyle observed as he followed Logan behind the counter.

“I was too tired this morning,” Logan replied as he prepared a coffee with milk for himself, a black coffee for Ian, and a hot chocolate for Max.

“You want something?” he asked Kyle again, noticing that he hadn't answered before.

“Just a coffee with milk,” Kyle replied before taking a seat next to Max and Ian.

Once Logan had finished making all the drinks, he placed them on a tray and brought them over to the table where the others were sitting.

“Here you go,” he said as he set the drinks down. Logan sat down and took a sip of his coffee, feeling the warmth spread through his hands.

“Are you going to tell us what's going on?” Ian asked impatiently. He had barely slept the night before.

“Let's have breakfast first. I'm not going anywhere,” Logan replied with a smile before taking another sip of his coffee. The rest of the guys looked annoyed, but they complied and started to drink their drinks.

Once they were all finished all the eyes turned to Logan, he knowing what they wanted stood up and went to grab his bag that he had left on a table, when he came back he grabbed the books from the inside and put them on the table. 

“It was a demon,” Logan said seriously and directly. 

"How can you be so sure?" Max asked, his voice barely above a whisper as he recalled the events of the previous night.

Logan pointed to the books that he had brought. "Last night's demon was a Shadowgale," he explained, flipping through the pages until he found the creature's entry. "Is a creature that is made entirely out of shadows. It has no physical form, but rather takes on the shape of a large swirling mass of darkness that engulfs everything in its path. When it appears, it creates a strong wind that can knock people off their feet and makes it nearly impossible to communicate due to the sound being eaten by the creature." Logan started reading. “This demon is particularly terrifying because it feeds on the energy of those it surrounds, draining them of their life force until they are left weakened and vulnerable.” Logan finished reading and looked up to see Kyle, Ian, and Max with pale faces. "Are you okay?" he asked, his concern evident as he closed the book.

“How do you have those books, and what did you do last night?” Ian asked once he had recovered from what he had just heard.

“These books were my grandfather's. He was an exorcist, and I inherited all of this from him. As for last night, I simply exorcised the demon,” Logan explained with a smile.

“How did you do it?” Kyle asked impatiently.

“Did any of you hear anything last night?” Logan asked, and the rest denied with their heads. “I recited the Prayer of Saint Michael the Archangel, a simple trinitarian formula would have been enough for a low-level demon like the Shadowgale. But I didn't know that, so I used a high-level prayer that left me exhausted,” Logan said as he showed them different parts of the books.

Logan looked at Kyle, Ian, and Max as they absorbed all the information, knowing that the surprises were far from over.

“Are you an exorcist?” Max asked, a hint of fear in his voice.

“No,” Logan answered gently, offering a reassuring smile to Max. “I'm a demon hunter, which is quite different, but I'll explain more later,” Logan spoke in a soft tone, attempting to ease the tension in the air. “Which brings me to my next point,” he continued, making eye contact with the three of them. “You three are also demon hunters.”

***

"The Lord is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life—of whom shall I be afraid?"

Psalm 27:1