Angel set a brisk pace as she led me out of the woods and into the of the city. It didn’t take long for me to figure out what the strange smell was that I encountered when I slid on my face across the parking lot had been. In front of me the city lights spread out towards and away from a shoreline. A tanker ship lay at anchor in the harbor with its lights on as well. Across the harbor more lights spread out into the night. There was so much light the clouds above me were bathed in the light. The sounds of the night city were much louder here than they had been in the wooded area. Combined the lights and noise had a dizzying effect on me. This was something I was definitely not used to.

I found that I remembered little of my previous life. Only that I had done some very nasty things and that I had paid for them, in fact I was still paying for those crimes. What exactly those crimes happened to be was lost to me. Forgotten like some horrible dream.

I followed Angel only because I had a ton of questions, and with any luck she might have an answer or two for me. It also occurred to me to wonder what her motives were for even talking to me in the first place. What she thought of me was immaterial, it was the why of what she was doing here talking to and helping me.

She walked down streets, through alleys, past parks and across highways. I followed as I tumbled over everything that had happened in the last few hours. Well, at least everything I could remember of those hours anyways. Those memories amounted to little enough even with the little bits of information I had learned.

I knew I was a demon. More correctly, Angel had called me a demon. Given what I could glean from my memories of that time just after I had skidded on my face across that parking lot, I was inclined to believe Angel. Then add in that demon fire I was able to call upon and what I had done to that man in the trees. I didn’t think there was anything else I could be.

Then there was the fact that that I knew what angel fire was when it was launched at me. I had never seen anything like it before, so I didn’t know how I knew what it was. It also didn’t need to directly hit me to hurt. A near miss hurt bad enough for me, I didn’t need to experience a full-on hit.

When I realized Angel had stopped walking, I was barely able to stop from running into her back. We were on a hill well outside of the city. The lights of the city were just a glow on the horizon. It was startling to see how far we had walked without me knowing it. The hilltop was bare, except for a rotting, moss-covered stump of a large tree. The nearest living tree were at least a hundred yards away at the bottom of the hill.

“We should be safe enough here,” she said. “At least, nobody can listen in while we sort out happened to you.”

“What do you mean?” I asked. She had revealed a little bit of information with that statement, but I wasn’t sure if that was intentional or not.

“One, we know you are a demon,” she held up a finger. “Two, you didn’t become a demon the way most of us become demons. So that’s where we need to start. What do you remember of your life before dying?”

“Its hazy, like I am trying to remember a dream. I know I did some bad things and hurt a lot of people. I know I was condemned to die for those crimes,” my eyes had glossed over as I told this story. “Then there was nothing. A nothing that had no end. It was empty and desolate. I remember two voices. One was so angry and full of hate; the other was bursting at the seems with happiness. There was so much power in those voices. Hearing them turned me inside out. There was talk of me having to find something.”

I stopped there trying to find the best way to explain what I could remember happening next.

“Then it felt like I was being pulled in every direction and crushed all at once. After that I woke up in the parking lot near those apartments.” A shudder went through me as those feelings came back to me.

Angel looked thoughtfully into the distance as she pondered what I had said.

“That place of emptiness sounds like what we demons call the ‘Reception Area’. Its where souls of damned people wait to be collected and taken to whatever hell awaits before you become a demon. As far as I know, there is no other demon that has heard the voices you spoke of.”

I could see the distaste cross her face as she spoke of being ‘collected’. Could that feeling of being stretched and crushed have been my personal hell? It didn’t seem bad enough, but I didn’t have anything else to compare it to. Even getting hit by angel fire didn’t feel quite that bad.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Collected?” I asked, prompting her for more information.

“The demon that tempted you, made you do bad enough things to damage your essence, finds you after you die. You are then taken before the Great Tormentor, a demon you never want to meet. The Great Tormentor then enjoys torturing you and driving you into madness. It seems to last forever, but when he is done you are so very different. You are a demon and then let loose so you can in turn tempt and terrorize more people. You do it because it is the only way to get your madness to abate even a little bit. The things the Tormentor does to you can’t be forgotten or buried. Hurting someone else is the only way to make your pain go away for even a second.”

It was her turn to shudder, and I could see both pain and madness etched in the lines of her face. I could see those emotions boiling in those red eyes of hers that had looked so dead earlier. What had been done to her to cause that kind of reaction. I couldn’t begin to imagine the torture a person could endure before breaking like that.

“Why help me then? Wouldn’t it be better for you to have killed me?”

“I was nearby when the sky opened and spit you out. I watched as you thundered across the sky like a comet. Your aura was that of a demon as you hurtled towards the ground. That isn’t how it typically happens and was different enough to arouse my interest. If I could see and sense you at that point so could any other demons or angels in the area. So, I needed to get to you first. I didn’t expect you to create as much…noise as you did.”

I thought about what Angel had said, and how she had said it. There was no doubt she was leaving important details out of what she was telling me. Whether that was bad or really bad for me was something I needed to work out on my own.

“The incident at the apartments is what you were referring to when you said ‘noise’?” I made air quotes with my fingers with the word noise.

Angel nodded agreement before she spoke. When she did speak, she was looking off into the distance and not at me.

“The release of that level of energy reverberates for long ways. Both angels and demons will detect, most will come and investigate. Normally, it tends to end badly for the one at the center of it.”

Was this another evasive answer on her part?

“Demons crave power above everything else,” she continued. “If they find a someone or something with power, they have an obsessive need to control it. They would rather it be destroyed than let another demon get it. Power can come in many forms.”

“This little meeting, here in the middle of nowhere is you deciding how to control or destroy me?” I asked with my arms waving to indicate the hilltop we were standing on. The irritation was evident in my tone as she flinched slightly when I asked the question.

“No!” she replied a little too quickly for my liking. “I told you; you are an oddity to demon kind. There will be demons, many of them stronger than either of us who will want to control or destroy you. There are one or two trying to find you now because you are an unknown and could bring all sorts of trouble to their plans.”

She had turned back to look at me, she had her arms folded across her chest. There was a defiant look about her face. Another little tidbit had slipped out of her there. Angel was aware of other demons looking for me. That meant they had sensed what had happened at the apartments. Whoever was hunting for me terrified her. Plus, there was the hint that she didn’t consider herself a powerful demon. More correctly, she was aware of the limits of what power she did have. On top of that, she was unsure of just how powerful a demon I was. Which meant I needed to be afraid of whoever was looking for me.

“How do you know I am being hunted right now?” I demanded. Why had she waited to tell me this? Was this part of some plan to lead me into a trap, and had I already fallen into it?

“One of them is my progenitor. He was torturing me when you came hurtling out of the sky. Your appearance distracted him long enough for me to get away. I found you first, but a demon can always find those whose fall they caused. He is probably angry enough to destroy me when he finds us.” The words came out in a whisper and a visible shiver ran through her body. Whoever her progenitor was seemed to be a nasty, brutal individual.

Well damn. She gave me a whole lot to chew on. The first thing that came to mind was that I…we needed to run. Right now. Run as fast as we could, as far as we could. Would it really matter though if he could track her down?

“Then we better get out of here,” I muttered, voicing part of my thoughts aloud.

There was a flash of hope in her red eyes. I’m not sure how I saw it, but it was definitely there for a brief second before fading away.

“I doubt we can run fast enough,” she muttered as she glanced back in the direction of that nameless city.

“We won’t know until we try. I don’t give up easily,” I retorted. I turned and started moving away from the city. I stretched out my long legs in a pace I knew I could keep up for a long time. Apparently, it was something I had a lot of practice doing when I had been alive. My walking pace was helped somewhat as I started out by the fact I was going downhill. Once I reached the treeline it didn’t slow down all that much. I seemed to be comfortable moving across country even at some speed. Angel let out a soft curse behind me and jogged to catch up.

After some time at that pace, she put her hand on my arm and came to a stop. I halted beside her. She scanned the trees around us with a hint of fear.

“We have been caught,” she sounded dejected. “Don’t give him your real name when he asks.”

I was caught off guard when a voice boomed out of the trees around us. It didn’t seem to come from any particular direction, but it felt heavier behind us. We turned just as a tall shadow came into view.

“Oh, my little Angel, trying to run away again? You are so going to regret fleeing our little game. First, though what little toy have you snared for me now?”