Michael comes towards me, and I immediately take a few steps back. I don’t think he would try to kill me after all that just happened, but the way he looks at me still makes me uneasy.

My anxiety must show, because he stops. His eyes give me a kind of once-over before lingering on the staff. When he finally returns to staring at my face, I feel heat flood my cheeks. I never thought I’d be stared down that way by a human adult, let alone an archangel.

“Earn that,” he finally says.

I blink.

He nods at the staff, “Earn it.”

I nod. What else can I do? I know what awaits me after I eventually die, and at least he’s not insulting me anymore. I’ll take begrudging and probably forced acceptance over murderous focus any day, especially when I’m not the only one whose life or existence depends on it.

Michael returns my nod, his face ever-impassive. He stalks over to where his and Coach’s swords are still stuck into the ice, and pulls out his own like some mythic warrior of old before taking out Coach’s. U-re stiffens, fingers tightening on his own weapon. Michael turns to us, looking past me at where Coach and Raphael must be, before swinging back his arm and underhand-tossing Coach’s sword. It flies in a high arc, spinning with enough precision that Coach catches its handle, the tip pointing to the sky.

“You should stop losing that,” Michael says before he, too, disappears into a flash of bright light.

There’s a moment of silence and then, “Asshole.”

Death pinches the bridge of her nose; the other angels snicker to themselves. I jog over towards Coach and Raphael. The nicer of the two stands, running the back of his hand across his brow. “Thanks,” I say, “for...you know, not letting me die -- back then.”

Raphael smiles; it lights up his face. “You were such a sweet little thing, how could I not? I’m glad you’ve grown the way you have -- thank your parents for me the next time you visit them,” he winks. “Well, I’d say my work here is done -- come along, Uri’el.”

“You do realize I’m older than you, right?”

“You speak and yet I care not.”

“You’ll never win, Yuri,” Gabriel laughs.

They keep bickering like a pair of contentious, yet still oddly loving brothers. I make my way to where Coach’s still sitting on the ground, eyes shut. A shadow beats me there and U-re crouches down to Coach’s level.

“Lucifer--”

“Go home, Rami’el.”

U-re looks a little hurt, and more than a little peeved. I see his jaw twitch.

“Home, Rami’el. Now.”

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U-re stands without another word and vanishes in a swirl of thunderous shadow; it smells like smoke and rain, scratching at the back of my throat. I clear it, coughing as quietly as I can so nobody notices.

“He’s annoyed,” Coach sighs. He still hasn’t opened his eyes.

“You don’t sound too concerned.”

“Rami’el tends to sulk when I order him back to Hell. And before you ask,” he cracks open one eyes, “yes, Hell is real.”

“You gonna tell me Hell’s not all that bad and demons are cuddly and shit?”

He doesn’t smile, and a weird little chill crawls down my spine -- to my credit, I don’t actually shudder.

“There’s a reason humans fear Hell and all within, Hyun. It’s not a place for you.”

No, it’s for him and others like him: my divine father.

“You’re my father.”

“I am,” he stills a little bit, his mouth twitching in and out of an uneasy smile.

“Did you mean what you said?”

“I usually do,” he frowns, “but refresh my memory.”

That is all that matters to me. That is all that has ever mattered in this situation.

“That...that you...that you’re here because I’m yours.”

“Something bothers you,” Coach frowns.

“It’s just...I don’t know...I guess it just kinda makes me sound like a lamp or something -- like I’m your property.” I shrug, I’m not really sure if I make any sense. I barely make sense to myself.

Coach flinches, “You are my son. You are half of me.”

“Did you know that I was going to have to be a Horseman when I died?” I ask, free hand balling into a tight fist. “Is that why you were so intent on teaching me to fight?”

“No, I didn’t,” his voice is tight, fingers twitching. “When I knew of you, all I knew was that I had to be there and watch over you for fear of someone like Mikha’el discovering your existence.”

“So you knew I’d cause the Apocalypse,” I scoff. “Wow.”

“I knew Mikha’el would be Mikha’el and would want to destroy you at any and all cost,” Coach counters. “After your accident when you were young, I had to be there at all times and watch out for you to keep you safe. I even used to play with you as your own imaginary friend,” he smiles. “When you were old enough and showed an interest, I figured that learning something like hwarangdo was a good way to make sure you could protect yourself if and likely when need be. Plus it’s just an overall good code to follow. And when your parents died, I took that as a sign to keep myself even closer -- to be as much of a stand-in for them as I could be.”

“Well, you’ve done all that now, so...now what?”

“Now…” Coach sets his shoulders, braced against my admittedly petulant and childish attitude. “Now it’s up to you to decide if you still want me around or not.”

Up to me to decide. Free will. I can’t control what will happen when I die...but at least I get to choose what I do with this life. Now that everything is said and done, I honestly want nothing more than to go back to my normal life I had before this. I want to keep going to university, even if the commute is a pain in the ass; I want to keep training in hwarangdo; I still want to try to transfer to Korea National Sport University, even though I know by now that it’s so totally never going to happen. But, hey, I at least still want to dream. And even more than all of that, I don’t want to have to go through the stress of losing yet another parent – blood, real, adoptive…it doesn’t even matter at this point…

And for all of that...

“It looks like I still need you to stick around, Coach.”