Droplets of rain softly tapped my head as I slowly trudged home from school. The sun’s light had faded, covered by quickly approaching storm clouds, but thankfully it was more than bright enough for me to safely follow my normal path home. If I was lucky, my dad might pick me up on his way home from work, assuming the oncoming storm was evidence enough for his boss to let him out early. If I was really lucky he would still be working his normal hours, and I could get at least two hours to relax before he and his buddies ruined my day.

Growing up, I had been forced to prioritize being normal above all else. I had to keep my head down, listen when spoken to, nod my head at all the church sermons, and be my father’s perfectly adequate son. It was a role I was fairly certain I’d mastered. I knew how to say and do all the right things to keep him from bothering me. Yes I saw that touchdown (I didn’t), yes I appreciated the pastor’s lesson on angels all being masculine as a sign of the male sex’s divine right to lead (I really didn’t), and yes I was still trying to ‘fix that damn dyke’ (my best friend, and I despised his use of that slur).

Despite my intent to remain normal, I kept a few dangerous objects around, things that I on a whim decided I needed and couldn’t tell anybody about. The biggest risk was a set of ill-fitting girl’s clothes I hid under my dresser. Clothes that I so desperately yearned to wear when I bought them, but once I had them I just felt shame. I hid them away so that I didn’t need to worry about Dad finding them, and tried not to think about how much worse I felt looking in a mirror.

The second risk was a weird cube puzzle thing I’d found at a garage sale a few months earlier. It was definitely demonic in nature, and if anyone found out about it I was dead. Even Aria, my closest friend for years, didn’t know about this. The church was the law in our town, and the law said consorting with demons was a death sentence. Not legally, of course, but anything could be ‘legal’ if you owned the police in a town of a few thousand people. 

I should have thrown it out and pretended it didn’t exist, but I just knew there was something important hidden inside. It was probably demonic, of course, but what if it was angelic? The puzzle itself was made by demons, or at least inspired by them, so there was a nonzero chance that inside was some relic of the angels that could help fix some of my problems.

I felt a constant layer of anxiety as I played with the box on my walk home. I rarely took the chance of openly messing with it, but after months I knew I was so close. It was almost there, it needed maybe a few readjustments here or there, and I’d have it open. I just needed to figure out exactly where I was going wrong. 

I had to hope that it was worth the risk. If I was lucky, maybe the angels would reward me for my achievement. Or I could turn it in to the nearby city’s Magical Warrior team, who might thank me or give me an autograph (an autograph from Alys ‘Skreamer’ Clearwood would probably cause me to die of joy on the spot.). Or—

Oh shit. It was open. When did I do that? I was just fumbling around with it mindlessly as I thought of—what was I doing, I needed to focus on what was inside!

Inside was what looked like a piece of… rock? A pink rock. It glowed a slight red, like an item imbued with magic. I felt the urge to just touch it. Just once, just to feel it. 

I reached my hand out, almost lost in thought as I tapped the stone with my finger and… nothing. The glow faded as soon as I touched it, leaving me alone with an open puzzle box and a pink rock. I felt incredibly dejected, like all my build-up was for nothing.

I let out a sigh and found a spot in the grass to sit down as disappointment overtook me. I knew I shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up. What did I think would happen? That some angel from on high would float down and fix what was wrong with me? That a bunch of superheroes with so much better to do would recognize me? What kind of an idiot was I?

I threw the rock down the street and shoved the puzzle box in my backpack. I couldn’t believe I’d let myself get so excited, I should have known it was just a worthless box when the old man gave me the sales pitch. What a waste of three dollars. 

I increased my pace as the rain increased in intensity, but oddly the drops that hit my face and hands didn’t feel as cold to the touch as they normally did in the late winter. If anything, they felt kind of nice, like a shower at the perfect temperature. I didn’t waste too much time thinking about it, the weather got weird on occasion. Some sort of magical fight in the town over had probably just increased the temperature of the rain, or something. It wasn’t nearly as odd as the illusionary twister that had terrified our town a few months earlier. 

Dad was convinced a demon did it despite one of the Warriors coming clean on the Internet about it being an accident. Then again it wasn’t too much of a stretch to assume that Dad just believed Magical Warriors were demons. The church wasn’t exactly jumping up to counteract this belief, despite how much of a help the Magical Warriors were in the fight against actual evil things.

——-

“I’m home!” I yelled out to a thankfully empty apartment as I stepped inside. It looked like Dad was stuck working his full shift, which left me a few hours away from him and his friends. I was tempted to call and ask Luigi’s, the restaurant I worked at, if they needed me to come in. It would mean going all week without a day off but it also meant an excuse to avoid watching one of the many sports programs he usually wanted me to watch with him. 

In the end I decided against calling, and headed to my bathroom to change out of my school uniform and dry off. The rain had soaked my clothes, and I hated the stuffy guy’s uniform anyway. The tie made me feel like I was being strangled, and everything else was just too stuffy. The girls were lucky they got to wear skirts; if I could, I’d have traded pants for a skirt in a heartbeat.

I grabbed a towel to dry my short hair, but as I lifted it I realized that my hair felt dry already. I knew I had been soaked, my damp clothes were evidence enough of that, but it was like my skin and hair had been untouched. Did the spell affecting the weather also stop it from making skin contact? 

I didn’t waste too much time thinking about it. Since I seemed to be dry, I put the towel back and changed in my room, thankful for a chance to continue avoiding the bathroom mirror. I didn’t understand why, or didn’t want to understand, but ever since I was a kid I’d hated mirrors or cameras. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong. I took good care of my skin and hygiene, I used my own money to make sure I ate right, and I had no real marks or blemishes to detract from how I looked. The only real blemishes of note on my face were my fading freckles, and I didn’t really want them to go. 

Once I was changed into jeans and a t-shirt, I spent my remaining free time lounging on my bed and reading. I had homework to do, but my favorite author had posted a new chapter to her newest story and I had to absorb it as quickly as possible. I loved her works, and had reread most of her shorter stories at least four times each. Besides, it wasn’t like what I was doing would make a difference when Dad got home. Homework or fun, it was never more important than getting him beer from the fridge, watching some guy throw or hit a ball, and cooking dinner. 

I thanked my luck when two hours passed without Dad getting home. I became suspicious when four hours passed and he still wasn’t home. I refused to let myself get too nervous about it; occasionally on Fridays he would go to the bar with his friends and drink. Sure it was a Wednesday, but maybe there was a special at the bar. 

I started worrying after eight hours passed without so much as a call from him. Dad hated staying out past 10pm on weekdays. I tried calling him, but the phone immediately sent me to voicemail. Okay, what was going on? Dad was stupidly paranoid about keeping his phone on and with him at all times. I immediately began dialing the non-emergency police number. Maybe he’d got arrested again.

I had the number dialed and my thumb hovering over the call button when I stopped. Did I want to do this? If Dad was with the police, I had the chance to get a few days of relaxation before I had to deal with him again. Sure he would be angry at me for never looking, but he was going to be like that no matter what. A few days away from him meant I could catch up on all of my homework, or actually read some of  my favorite books without interruption. All I had to do was not call, and I had a short vacation.

Wait, no, what was I thinking? This was my father. He’d raised me, taken care of me. Sure he was a little much, and I planned to move out as soon as I turned eighteen, but he was still my dad. He always told me I owed him everything for taking care of me, so I at least needed to give back when he needed my help. I hit the call button.

Call failed.

I furrowed my eyebrows and checked my signal — still good. I redialed the number and tried again.

Call failed.

I could feel my breathing get more difficult as panic began to set in. What was going on? Why weren’t the police answering? They had to have just had their phone number changed, right? That was the only real answer. I called Aria next, in the hopes that her luck would be better.

I was almost surprised when the call actually went through, and my panic began to fade away. Everything was fine. I was just worrying about nothing.

And then I heard an incredibly loud crash through my phone, sending me right back into my downward spiral. What was happening? “Ari! You okay?” I yelled into the phone, my voice breaking as I panicked.

“The fuck? Art? How did you..? No, fuck, doesn’t matter! Art, stay in your house. Don’t leave, understand? I’ll talk to you later.” Aria sounded like she was shouting over incredibly loud wind, and the crashing noise appeared again right as she hung up. What did she mean when she said not to leave? What was going on?

I needed to find something out, I couldn’t just let myself sit still in my room and do nothing. Aria sounded desperate and I had to be there for her.

I sprinted outside without thinking, and took in a breath as soon as I stepped one foot out of the door. 

The air was filled with a rapidly moving purple mist, so thick I couldn’t see the sky above it. The street lights were all off, but oddly it seemed I could see in spite of the lack of any source of light. In fact it felt like I could see better than I normally could, like the blurriness I usually had to deal with if things were too far away was gone. That was nothing short of impossible; there was no way my vision would improve that much so quickly without surgery or glasses, and I had neither. And I wasn’t aware of any magic that could easily and quickly clear up eyesight like that. What was going on with me? 

I didn’t have time to think about that as the sound of a distant explosion took my attention. Was that Aria? Was she okay? Where were the police or firefighters?

I ran towards the rising column of black smoke, concern growing as I realized just how far away it was. It had to have come from the center of town, and I didn’t live anywhere near there. I was going to be exhausted at best once I got there, but did I really have much of a choice? Aria was down there and probably desperately needed help. I kept running.

The smoke was getting closer and closer with every step I took, and I was surprised to find that I wasn’t even out of breath as I made it to my school and the halfway mark. I was concerned that something was wrong with my body, but I wasn’t about to waste time worrying about why I felt better than usual. I had to keep running, get to Aria, and help her. 

To the left of the original explosion came a second blast, causing me to jump back in shock. “Aria!” I shouted before I continued running. Where was she? What the hell was going on? 

I was only able to run for a few more minutes before I was stopped by someone standing in the middle of the road. They looked feminine and somewhat humanoid, but only barely. They had incredibly long grey hair and skin nearly the same color, four thin arms with nails that looked more like claws than anything a human had, and they stared at me with four black, empty eyes. My instincts were screaming at me to run, to get away from her before she pounced, but something in the back of my mind told me that I would never be able to outrun her. 

I didn’t have a choice. I stood my ground, holding up my hands in some pathetic mockery of a fighting stance. If I was going to die, then at least I would die trying to fight. I chuckled a little at that. Guess Dad had something to be proud of, after all. 

She tilted her head a little to the left as she seemed to inspect me. I continued fighting every urge I had to run away, with the help of the voice in my head growing louder with each passing second. 

…you’re going to die if you don’t listen. You’re not strong enough; just agree to merge with me and we can beat her. The voice, I realized, wasn’t mine. It wasn’t even close. It sounded like the voice of an adult woman, one who was used to being in control. Who was this, and why was she talking like that?

The four armed woman suddenly smiled and licked her lips, stopping me from questioning the voice in my head. I was probably just hearing things, this whole situation was crazy enough to make me believe that. I prepared myself for her attack, as if I had any chance of stopping her. 

My eyes widened as she began moving, her legs propelling her so quickly that I never had a chance of dodging. I didn’t want to die. 

Idiot! Listen. To. Me. I can save you, save both of us. Take my hand, now. 

Time seemed to slow to a crawl as a spectral woman appeared before me, standing just in front of the pouncing monster. She had to be at least seven feet tall, with incredibly long horns extending from her forehead. Her skin was a crimson red, her eyes were a beautiful gold, and she had two massive wings extending from her back. I would have had to be an idiot not to realize that this was a demon of some kind; she fit the description to a T. She was exactly what my father and the church said never to trust or make deals with. 

I took her hand.

The world trembled.