The albino tough's arms shake as he holds the rock over his head, poised to bring it down onto my skull, or the skull of the six-foot gecko sprawled belly-up on the street. I'm a spectator here like everyone else, only I'm a ghost, and invisible. The pallid rabble have already killed the intruder in their midst, had their fun and made their point, but that's not enough for them—now they've got to desecrate my corpse. If the young hoodlum crushes my skull beyond repair, then I'm stuck here as a spirit haunting this dreary, depressing neighborhood. There were three hundred raggedy albinos versus one gecko, and yet this dumbass has got to celebrate like he's an all-star in an underdog victory, and he's about to do a Michael-Jordan-goes-to-the-hoop on my head with a rock nearly as large as a basketball.

The wiry young man turns to the fortune teller, still hoisting the stone above his head, struggling to speak. “God the Empowerer has delivered you.”

The crowd becomes silent in its confusion. They look at each other as if to ask, “What did he say?” The fortune teller, an adolescent girl with drool trailing from the corner of her mouth, looks at him quizzically as she wipes her mouth with the back of her alabaster arm.

“No demon in hell is a match for God the Empowerer, who will restore you.” The young tough's arms are trembling, animating the crude tattoos on his pale skin. He is struggling like a paralytic lying on his bed as a fire sweeps through the house, and beads of sweat roll down from the bird's nest crowning his head.

His arms abruptly spread wide, causing the rock he's struggling to hold aloft to fall onto the top of his head. He collapses, with the back of his head hitting the pavement, and the rock smashing his head again before it rolls off of his skull and strikes the stones paving the street. I have possessed him, and in a battle of the wills, although he thought he was tough, he had nothing on me, because I've literally been through the fire. He was weak, and I turned his body against him.

Yes! In an instant I am back in my body, and the lizard lying on the pavement before a puzzled crowd springs to its feet, causing the throng to sweep backward in surprise.

“Those that would stone me have fallen and will not rise again.” I stand on their midst, quoting from Psalms of Wholeness, the Lament of Persecution, but I suspect that few in the crowd are familiar with the scriptures. “Baal is a false god and will be stripped of what he has stolen.”

“He's dead,” several in the throng mutter, gawking at the hoodlum lying on the street with a bloody stone beside his head.

I look at the young medium, who has staggered forward from the table that she destroyed during her convulsions. “You are free,” I tell her.

“KILL HIM!” several voices in the crowd yell in unison once the shock has worn off.

I bolt across the street, throwing my hips forward and swinging them from side to side with my tail whipping behind me. I zip right in front of a horse-drawn carriage clip-clopping down the road, which causes the horses to rear in alarm, rising up onto their hind legs and churning the air with their front hooves. The mob behind me is cursing, frustrated that they are blocked off in their pursuit. The albinos pound on the carriage doors, alarming the nobles within, while the young toughs slip behind the carriage and chase me.

I know my pursuers are confident, because they are hundreds, and I'm just a gecko without even the benefit of opposable thumbs. Furthermore, I am trapped between them and the tenements on the other side of the street, where vacant tables and stalls are lined up because their occupants all rushed to see a gecko get killed.

At last the carriage thunders down the street and the throng closes in, expecting me to turn to face them, now that I'm trapped against the brick wall of the tenement house. The cleverer ones among them expect me to overturn tables in their path, or to fling items at them, but the rat butcher has taken all his knives with him.

But now it's my turn to play Michael-Jordan-goes-to-the-hoop, and I leap, sailing over the overturned stools lying in the street, and an empty stall with a tattered awning overhead. The crowd gasps, because I am soaring high above it all, and land with all four feet on the brick wall, sticking a soft landing. Sticking, ha ha. I cling to the sides of the brick wall and climb upward, scampering up the side of the building. The albino mob is too stunned to react, so by the time they gather their wits and throw stones at me, I have already slithered over the edge of the roof.

I scramble across the rooftop on all fours until I reach the other side of the building. I leap, soaring through the air high above the street, and land on the side of the next building, a warehouse storing fabrics and rugs. Scrambling up to the roof, I repeat the process, flying from rooftop to rooftop until I am far from the mob and that God-forsaken part of the city.

This is a nicer part of town. I'm resting on a beautiful blue tile rooftop, which is comfortably warm, where I can see the nicely dressed people stroll along the streets. The women carry parasols and the men walk with canes capped with decorative figures like boar heads or bull horns. The city is situated between a mountain gorge, so not only do the mountain tops look majestic high above the city, but a cool breeze sweeps through the canyon. I think I'll rest for a while and take inventory.

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Well, I'm supposed to deliver the city and conquer the dark gods, but I'm off to a slow start. Maybe I just need some time to adjust, get in some practice, and gradually fit into my role as deliverer of mankind. I figure I could really go for a moth about now. It seems odd to me, but a moth strikes me as delicious, and I'm craving one. Getting killed and running from a murderous mob really makes you hungry, take my word for it. The only problem is that given my size, I figure I'd need a hundred moths to make a meal.

Hold on. Did I just wipe my eye with my tongue? I wait expectantly, but now that I'm looking for it, nothing happens.

So help me, I will never possess another albino ever again, because I feel like I lost 60 IQ points on that one. The moron couldn't even read. I shake my head from side to side in disgust, and I wonder if that's a gecko mannerism or my human side. I slither forward, throwing one forearm in front of the other like a komodo dragon, alternating sides, with my body swaying from side to side, moving to the edge of the roof for a better view. I realize I'm not a komodo dragon, but it sounds cooler than a gecko.

The nicely dressed people of this neighborhood are strolling to the park stretched out before me, where the grass is neatly trimmed and otters swim in the ponds. I recognize weeping willows and maple trees shading the walkways. A crowd has gathered in front of the stage, where actors are performing a play. In the play, the characters are searching for a hidden treasure, so they must go to the wisest man in the city. Entering from the wings is an albino, who strolls into their midst like a sage.

“O wise one, we beseech you to aid us in our quest,” the actor proclaims in a strong baritone.

Wait a minute. The characters in the play are stumped by a mystery, so they seek “the wisest of the wise,” who is an albino? The actor is wearing a basket of twigs interwoven with his hair, and he appears to be a real albino. He keeps forgetting his lines, so the other actors must whisper them to him. With lots of help from the cast, he gradually announces a very clever solution to the mystery, much to the amazement of the other characters, who are fawning in his presence.

Before the wise albino leaves the stage, he turns to address the others. “You must beware a merciless killer who is....” The albino pauses, frozen.

“Shadowing you even now,” one of the actors whispers to him while remaining in character. “Uh, shadowing you even now. He will do anything to stop you.” The albino raises a pale finger in warning, then pauses.

One of the actors whispers to cue him, “Tortured soul.”

“What?” the albino asks with his head down.

“Tortured soul,” the actor hisses, keeping his lips tight like a ventriloquist so it's not obvious he's cueing the albino.

“Oh yeah.” The albino resumes his heightened posture and raises his head dramatically “He is a tortured soul, consumed by hate...”

The actors draw back, raising their hands upward, fingers splayed in alarm. They anticipate what he will say next, but are afraid to speak.

“...and a follower of Janith.” The sage albino concludes with a menacing tone, prompting the crowd to boo and hiss.

How cheesy is that? I'm betting later on in the play that the follower of Saint Janith sports a handlebar mustache and ties a young lady to the railroad tracks.

It's at this moment that an albino lurking at the fringes of the crowd grabs a lady's purse and yanks it off of her shoulder. She shrieks and turns, reaching for the albino teen who is running barefooted over the grass. The victim is wearing a hoop skirt, and her partner, once he realizes her purse has been snatched, raises his cane and shouts, “Stop him! Somebody!”

The albino teenager is skinny and quick. I've seen his neighborhood, and I'm certain you've got to be quick to survive, but geckos are even quicker. I spring through the air, vaulting off of the roof and soaring through the air toward the spot where I calculate the snatcher will exit the park. The punk with the purse in his hands looks behind him, but doesn't look upward.

I miss him as I land, but I whip my tail into him. Like a thick hemp rope, my tail whacks him across the shins, which causes him to fall face-first. Normally he'd use his hands to catch himself, but he's clutching the stolen purse, which he tries to bring up, but he hits the stone street with his forehead and skids, out cold. Ripping the purse out of his hands with my snout, I rise up onto my hind legs and offer it to the victim, who is winded from hurrying across the park. She recoils in disgust, which forces her companion to yank the purse out of my beak and hand it to the victim.

“What have you done?” the man asks.

“I've only done what any other gecko would have done, helping out a fellow citizen in need.” I hold my hands outward in an “aw shucks, it was nothing” gesture as I bow my head.

“Speaking of need, don't you realize that this desperate youth stole only because unemployment is so high in disadvantaged neighborhoods?” The young man points the end of his cane at me as though he's delivered a bon mot, and there are murmurs of agreement among the gathering crowd.

“Whatever the scythe bites, that shall it eat, and every man shall keep that which he harvests.” I'm quoting from the scriptures, Precepts of Abundance. I'm scanning the crowd, and not only am I seeing a total lack of recognition, but sense growing hostility.

“Every man?” a woman asks, and I'd hate to wake up next to that face. I'd take purgatory any day.

“It seems to me that neighborhoods are disadvantaged when they're inhabited by hoodlums,” I shoot back. “I was nearly killed by a mob of albinos.”

The man's eyes grow narrow and angry. “What did you just say?”

“Someone send for the daywatch!” a voice shouts.

The group encircles me, with the men raising their canes. I realize that for the second time today I'm confronted by an angry mob, surrounded and outnumbered.