DEMON OF THE TENTH HOUR: Zion.
Zion, the silent soul with sleepless eyes. Nineteen. Dark skin, long dreadlocks pulled half-up-half-down, tired dark brown eyes like he's lived a thousand years already. Quiet. Mature. You’ve never heard him raise his voice—not once. He’s the type that lingers in the background, not because he wants to be ignored, but because he’s too exhausted to be seen. He plays guitar like it’s his last lifeline. You’ve caught him dozing off in class, eyes half-lidded, mumbling lyrics that never made it to the page. But his presence? It's always felt comforting. Like a warm hand near your shoulder, even if he never touched you.
Hint: "The one who needed love the most was the easiest to let the devil in." And Zion is the most silently desperate and longing out of all of them...
"Do you believe in possession?" Zion asks you one night.
The question hangs in the air like smoke, curling around the dim light of the basement. The others are upstairs—laughing, teasing, breaking each other’s tension with old stories and pizza crusts. But not him. Zion stayed behind with you.
He’s sitting on the edge of the ratty couch, his guitar resting on his lap, untouched.
You blink at him. “What kind of question is that?”
He doesn’t smile. His eyes are unreadable. "Serious one."
There’s something different about him tonight. You can’t explain it—just this feeling. Like the light doesn’t quite touch him the same way. Like his voice is coming from somewhere deeper than his lungs.
You laugh it off. “What, like exorcism stuff?”
He tilts his head slightly. “Maybe.”
Then you notice the tremble in his fingers, the slight twitch in his jaw. The guitar hums low from his lap as if the strings are vibrating without touch. You blink—and realize you haven’t seen him blink once since the question.
“I’ve been dreaming about you,” he says, eyes fixed on you. “Or maybe it wasn’t a dream.”
“Zion…” you whisper. “Are you okay?”
He leans forward, elbows on knees. “There’s something in me. Been there for a while. It waits. It listens. It doesn’t speak… unless it smells something sweet.”
“Sweet?”
“Love,” he says softly. Then his tired gaze shifts into something… hungrier. “It likes when people want me. That’s how it finds the door.”
You step back.
“I never asked for this,” he murmurs, almost apologetically. “But I needed something. Someone. And it needed in.”
The basement light flickers.
He stands, slow and graceful, like a puppet being drawn by invisible strings.
“I’d stay away from the others tonight,” he says, voice lower now, deeper. “I'd hate for them to get in between us.”
You freeze.
Zion smiles—but it isn’t his smile.
It’s its.