Among Us: A Supernatural Novel written by Carver Edlund

What is Necessary

An angel.

A smite-first ask-questions-later holy memo jockey of the Big Guy Upstairs.

The demon who now thought of himself as Vahe darted through the polished wood and glass doors that led into the Tattered Cover bookstore. He lost himself among the haphazard shelving, navigating to the center of the maze of flying staircases so that he could reassemble his wits.

A fucking angel. Not a cherub either, no, not one of those simple-minded cupids, but a bleeding seraph! He'd heard the recent rumors about Alastair's run-in with one. Or had it been three? Hard to tell because no one sat down over a pint with the Grand Torturer. Alastair had been evicted from his vessel—a vessel disintegrated simply by being in the presence of one of the harp-and-halo crowd's true form—and sent hurtling back into Hell. Before that, no one had seen a seraph in over two thousand years. So, what the actual fuck was this one doing on Earth?

It couldn't know about the seal. Could it? Lilith had laid hundreds of false trails across the planet. There was no way the angels could have picked this one as the real deal, one of the sixty-six necessary to free Lucifer from his Cage.

When Vahe had seen the girl interacting with the soul of the dead redhead, he'd known she had to be one of the sacrificial keys. Right age, right gender, right place. However, the angel had taken her before Vahe could, simultaneously adjusting the memories of every human on the block to erase its presence, and hers. The damn thing hadn't shed a single feather doing it, either.

That kind of power, a grunt like him didn't stand a chance against it.

Vahe gulped a breath, staring at a row of travel photography collections featuring Australia, Italy, and Finland. The sweat continued to roll down his temples, collect in his armpits, and stick his shirt to his back. The angel had left him alive but hadn't done him any favors by doing so. When she heard what a cock-up he'd made of this simple fetch job, Lilith was going to suck his guts out of his borrowed body like a child slurping spaghetti noodles off a plate. She would make sure he couldn't smoke out before she was done, too. Let him feel every moment of exquisite agony.

Vahe began to shake. The sweat dripped off his chin like tears. He couldn't let her know. He had to fix this.

His boss, Kittney, should have arrived at the gate by now with the other keys. He considered contacting her to ask for new orders, or to request assistance, but she would turn him over to Lilith faster than he could jump ship. Anything to save her chunky ass.

Vahe swallowed the last of his cowardice with a mouthful of air that hurt his gullet on the way down. He straightened his posture and raked a hand through his hair, then smoothed his goatee.

Right, then. He was on his own.

He was still holding the girl's bag. He considered it; it looked like it had been fashioned from a cheongsam, the buttoned collar flattened to create the front flap, a motif of sinuous dragons embroidered with shiny thread. Rummaging through it, he came across her ID and a crumpled envelope containing a pay stub.

Putting those back, he dug deeper for the heavier objects, like keys. Her black myTouch Slide fit in his hand. Thumbing the smartphone so that it powered on, he smiled. Though he hadn't gotten the girl, she had handed him everything he needed to find her.

Vahe repacked the bag and swung it over his shoulder. He exited the store with a new purpose in his step.

..::~*~::..

Dean selected a bottle of Landlocked Ale from the minifridge and then flopped onto his rickety motel bed. He wiggled his denim-clad glutes into a more comfortable dent of the mattress. Then he sighed in contentment. Stupid confining monkey suit. Good riddance.