Under The Moon: Skeletons
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"Are you here to kill me?"

The shining angel standing before Melany stared down at her with burning eyes. She smiled, unleashing a brilliant light that almost blinded Melany, causing her to cover her eyes with her hand. Everything around them lit up gold and white, chasing the shadows even farther away. The evil that had long consumed this place was being purged just by the angel's presence. Or perhaps, more than that. Perhaps, despite looking like she was simply standing there, she was battling them in a more real way that Melany just couldn't perceive.

"I don't kill people, Miss Snow." She reached down and grabbed Melany under her arm, lifting her off the ground and onto her feet. "I guide people. Usually, after they're dead, but on occasion I get the chance to help someone who still has time left in this life."

Melany didn't really understand, and she wasn't sure that she was ready to accept help right now. She wasn't sure she wanted help. In fact, she was pretty sure she didn't. But here someone was offering it, and not just anyone. An angel. The enemy of the beings she'd served. That begged the question. "Why?"

"Every human being has a certain level of potential, both good and evil. It's the same, by the way, for every person, human or not. Your potential is no different than hers." The angel turned and looked back to where the hat lay on the ground. "But someone, and I'm not gonna tell you who, has made a decision about you, Melany. That they want you to reach your full potential. Don't think of this as a second chance, or an opportunity. It's not. I'm just pointing you in the right direction. Sending you towards something that someone with more authority than me is demanding that you reach."

"I don't understand. What are you talking about?"

"Mm, I never said I'd explain it so you could understand." Stepping back and walking away, the angel stopped and pointed to the hat. "Pick that up. You're going to need it."

Melany nodded in acknowledgement, not even able to think enough to argue against it. Suddenly, the light disappeared, and the angel was gone. Her presence was still felt, and the night didn't seem so dark now, but it still felt a bit empty without her there. Even so, Melany knew that someone was expecting something from her. Someone who wasn't willing to let her go so quickly.

The shadows were still there, hiding in the cracks and crevasses. She'd coaxed them out, and they'd been seared by the presence of a holy angel. Even if she was inclined to try to call on them again, which she wasn't, she doubted she would have the nerve to do it anyway. On top of that, it didn't look like they'd be willing. They'd listened to her and been burned. In their eyes, she'd probably tricked them, and they'd expect her to do it again now.

As a result, the ruins were probably mostly safe for her to walk through now. She walked over to her hat and stooped down, taking it off the dusty concrete and placing it back on her head. Continuing on, she went deeper into the building's rotting corpse. It had been a while, but she could recognize the place enough to find her way around. There was more dried blood on the walls than there had been before, and a couple new bullet holes here and there, plus a few drug drop spots looked like they hadn't been used in a long time. Those were just decorations, though. The building itself hadn't changed so much.

She found what she was looking for. A square of the concrete floor had been cut out, or maybe just never put in, so the workers could do something in the ground underneath. That never happened, obviously, and the dirt had been left open to the air since then. Melany jumped down into the dirt and walked over to a slightly raised portion in the corner. It wasn't enough to draw the attention of someone who wasn't looking, but it was enough to make a difference.

She knelt down next to the mound of dirt. Now that she was here, she wasn't quite sure what to do, so she started talking again. "So, I guess, in case you didn't hear me before... I am sorry about what I did to you. The good news is you'd probably be dead now anyway, but at least I saved you the horror of having your father turn on you." She shook her head. "Sorry, I didn't mean that. You trusted me. You thought we were friends. If I... If I had been the friend you thought I was, maybe I would have been able to save you, and we would both be alive right now." Melany felt her eyes beginning to water. "I'm alone and I'm scared. Please... if there's a reason for me to stay alive, then I need someone to help me. I can't do whatever it is you want me to do all on my own."


John felt the Four of Spades tugging, trying to go where he was directing it. Melany was down there, below him, in the unfinished bones of some apartment building or casino or something. She had some answering to do, but more importantly, he was concerned about her. If her father had let it get that far, she was bound to be in a dark place right now, and she looked pretty beat up already when he saw her before. He didn't know that she could be an ally, but she wasn't an enemy yet.

He knew, for one, that if she saw him right now, it might very well scare all fight out of her, which was part of why he was doing what he was. As the supreme master of cards, he had decided that it made sense to use them like this. If they would fly at his command, and couldn't be moved if he didn't want them to be moved, then why not? He'd used the particular quirks of his suit and positioned several cards in the front and back of his suit. Two cards in each of his shoes, and suddenly he could fly. It didn't look like The Greatest American Hero, though. It was more like he was just standing, and then moving around in the air. John thought it was pretty intimidating.

He called out the rest of the cards, gathering them in a circle under his feet. He made sure it was wide enough to protect him first, then took out the cards stabilizing him so he didn't fall over while moving through the air. He didn't need them now that he was only going to be moving down. Genuinely impressed by how still they held in the air when he told them to, he took a deep breath and gave the command for the cards to start going down. There was no reason, as far as John could see, to go in with too much speed, so it was a slow descent. Once the card platform he'd made lowered him to the top floor of the building, it kept going, not even slowing, pushing its way through the concrete and rebar, shattering steel and bending pipes like they were blades of grass. John was quite a fan of what his cards could do.

Of course, the noise announced his approach long before he reached the bottom floor. When he finally punched through that last floor, creating a cloud of dust that filled everything in sight, and stopped on top of a heap of rubble, Melany was already well aware of him. When the dust cleared enough for them to see each other, she lowered her defenses and sighed in relief.

"I thought one of those demons was coming for me. How did you survive all of them?"

That was a silly question. John motioned around him. "You ask that after an entrance like this? Have some faith." He stepped off the cards and jumped down from the debris, then down into the pit where Melany was standing, the cards quickly reorganizing and slotting themselves into his suit jacket pocket. "Better question." He reached out and poked at a tear in her clothes where he was sure she had been bleeding before. "What happened to all your injuries. You looked half-dead before."

She covered the tear, holding her hand over where the cut used to be. "My friends... one of them healed me."

"That's pretty impressive. Are your... friends around?" He looked behind her, eyeing the dirt mound on the ground. "Mind telling me who that was?"

Looking down at the mound, Melany felt fear begin to claw at her heart. If she told him, what would he do? Could she trust him to believe that she wished she hadn't done what she did? That she wanted to try and make up for it? She took a deep breath, let it out, and faced him. "That's Melanie Angel."

He straightened his sunglasses, blocking off any way for her to see his eyes. "I see." He hadn't moved yet, but it didn't look like he was happy about this development. Stepping off to the side, beginning to circle her. "So you never were her. Which begs the question, how did her father not notice?"

It was luck, really. She had never expected it, but when she caught the young daughter of the casino owner out and about, it had surprised both of them. They were identical in appearance. Melany didn't know how that had come about, but it was the truth. She reached up and took off her hat, trying to find the words to answer him. "We look exactly the same. But while she was born in luxury, I was born here, in this awful place. My mother is still upstairs somewhere. She died when I was very young."

That seemed to disturb him, not just that someone had been born and raised in this building, but that their mother was presumable a skeleton somewhere just laying around. "That's... wrong. Why stay here?"

"I don't know. She was raped and left to die. She didn't tell me that herself, but once I was able to understand, I figured it out. The only thing I can think of is, maybe someone powerful was my father, and my mother stayed here out of fear. Afraid they'd do something to her, or me, if she ever appeared in society again. That or the demonic force that inhabits this building."

John stopped at that. "Demonic force?"

"Yes. There's a powerful demon that owns this land. I don't think it's actually here, just a shadow of it, but hundreds of smaller demons live here, drawn to its power. They infest the whole place."

"Melany." John took her hand and started leading her out of the pit. "We have to get out of here."

"What? Why?" She briefly tried to pry his hand off of hers, but it was a futile attempt. "What's wrong?"

"You're kind of an idiot."

"Wha- Hey!" Stopping, he turned and put his hands on her hips. She inhaled sharply, a tingle of excitement shooting through her body. "John..."

He just picked her up and practically chucked her over the edge of the pit. "Listen, idiot. You can do math, right?"

She got up, brushing the dust off her clothes. "Math? Why- yes. Of course I can do math." She grumbled, disappointed that he had no intention of doing anything with her. Not that this was somewhere she would want to do that.

"Listen to me." He climbed out of the pit and stood up, straightening his tie. "Do some simple addition here. You look just like her. You were born here, with your mother, who never left. You think your mother never left here because your father is someone powerful who would be a danger to the two of you. There's a powerful demonic force here. Which one of you is older?"

"I... I don't know. We're about the same age."

"Alright. So, I ask you, who do you know that is rich and powerful, has major influence with demons, and is the father of a young woman who looks just like you, whose wife died more than twenty years ago?"

Melany stopped. "What... what are you saying?" That wasn't possible, was it? Melanie was her sister? No, if that was it, then... "No... you're right. We... we're twins? I... murdered... my own sister."

"Melany, it's time to go. So long as you're in Vegas, you're in danger. We're both in danger now. If you come with me, I just moved to Detroit, you'll be safe there. I won't let anything happen to you."

"No, he... my father..." Melany crumpled to the ground, clutching her head. "He bred us for that sacrifice. There weren't supposed to be two of us. Our mother was trapped here by a demon, to make a sacrifice for my father to use. She hid us. She hid us both, but he found her!"

"Melany!"

"No!" She looked up at him, tears streaming from her eyes. "I was born to die! That bastard took everything from me!"

The black shadow closed in around her, feeding on the sorrow, grief, and rage flowing out of her, its claws poised to consume the sacrifice promised to it.

"Melany, move!"

Fangs dripping the blood of thousands of sacrifices opened wide behind her, waiting to feast on her flesh and her soul.

"I'm going to kill him! I'm going to kill them all!"

The demon struck.

Its claws stopped on a wall of shimmering purple energy. Suddenly aware that something was behind her, Melany turned to see the nightmare trying in vain to reach her. The shield clearly wouldn't hold for long, but it was enough to give her the time to escape.

Elena looked over her shoulder. "Looks like I'm just in time. Get out of here." John jumped forward, grabbing Melany and starting to haul her away. The demon stabbed its claws at Elena's shield. She winced. "I didn't think this through. John..."

He stopped and looked back at her. "Hurry up and let's go!"

"Tell Madine I'm sorry."

She disappeared under a column of living shadow, arcs of her purple magic flying off in every direction, shattering the support pillars. The entire building started collapsing around them.

John picked Melany up and ran, huge chunks of concrete and steel smashing to the ground around them and breaking apart. He didn't stop running until they were out of the building and clear from the collapse, crashing against the side of his car and dropping to the ground with Melany in his arms. After they had a second to rest, he put her in the passenger seat and started up the engine. They had a long drive ahead of them.

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