The Gate Keeper

Chapter 1

"A hand reaches out into the darkness, so small and fragile. It's amazing how something so pure could ever be the salvation for something so corrupt and vile."

*

While the Customs office was buzzing alive with people running about back and forth, one worker was fast asleep. Melody, a Gate Keeper in charge of application approval for the great city of Elysium, is snoring softly at her desk. Her friend and coworker, Alexandria, notices Melody is out cold, and goes to wake her up before their bosses see her sleeping on the job. Alexandria, popular for her dark, fair skin, and her mother-like personality, had been friends with Melody since they were kids. They had became neighbors shortly after Melody's parents passed.

"Melody... Melody! Hey!" Alexandria nudged the sleeping girl awake. Melody's dark eyes snapped open, adjusting to the light. She sat up, looking about.

"Oh?... hey... sorry, did I pass out again?" Melody asked, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. She stretched, making a small groaning noise while doing so. Her thick, wavy brunette hair fell down in tangles around her shoulders.

"Yeah... again. You really should go see a healer about your sleeping problems. Maybe one could prescribe a serum or something to help." Alexandria sat next to her in the cubical, pushing papers on the desk to the side to create a place to sit momentarily.

"I know... but you know how much a healer costs now? I might as well take my flat and give it in exchange for sleep... Look, I'll be fine." She rubbed her face, taking in a deep breath. "How long was I out?" she said with a sigh. Alexandria shook her head. Her long black curls bounced off her shoulders and upper back, making her hair flail about.

"You were out for an hour. You should get back to work before the supervisor sees you passed out again," she remarked in a hushed tone. She hopped off of the desk and walked out of Melody's cubicle. Melody knew she was right, but their pay as gate keepers wasn't enough to pay for a physician.

"I hate this..." she muttered to herself as she grabbed the papers and sifted through them. She looked over the different profiles, seeing who fit under the parameters to being accepted into Coelum. It seemed like every residential demon in Vacuus was trying to get accepted and transferred into the world of the light, what with the gates being sealed left and right.

Melody's job as a gate keeper was to file through the different personal applications and see who, or what, could pass the background checks. If a demon from Vacuus wanted access to Coelum, they had to have a clean history. No record of murder, theft, or anything of the sort, which was rare for creatures made up of darkness and temptation. If the situation was reversed, and a human or angel wanted access to Vacuus, they'd only have to go through the re-birthing cycle. To go from one world to another without causing a shift in the balance, the applicant would have to be re-birthed either as human or demon, depending on where they were going. Sometimes, but very rarely, did a demon get to become an angel. Those were referred to as VIPs.

VIP demons and angels were easily distinguished from the normal. The normal, everyday demon looked like a fuzzy shadow. They were a walking, out-of-focus silhouette. The VIPs were more defined. You could see details, like facial features, body mass, and hair.

Normal angels looked like normal humans, except they never aged, and no matter what race, their hair was always ghostly white. VIP angels actually had wings.

After finding viable applicants, she put them in the "Go" shoot, which air delivered the applications to the Birthers, those who transformed the dark demons into creatures of light, and vise versa. Not many people had the power to rebirth, and of those who did, not many could birth a demon into an angel. So as a result, the human populace grew. The humans who were once dark were tagged with coded chips, and given licences and passports, proving they weren't smuggled in.

Not that many people from Coelum renounced their light and were re-birthed into Vacuus, though almost any applicant for Vacuus was accepted. Getting into Vacuus was easy, getting out was next to impossible. If you were a former angel or human from Coelum, your chances of coming back from Vacuus were greater than the native demons getting through the gates. However, some were getting through, without the whole process Melody was employed at.

A smuggling group known as the Revisionists had gained the ability to create make-shift gates and let in unaltered darkness. These dark demons went about causing mayhem, scaring the populace, possessing humans, and killing those who had left Vacuus to join the light, or at least, that's what the news said.

What frightened Melody was the fact that so many people were leaving the light due to the fear of being killed by unpurified darkness. Melody lost her parents that way, leaving her alone to take care of herself since the age of 15. She was given this government job by the council and has worked it since. That was 10 years ago.

She sat there, remembering her first day here. She also remembered the first night she began to have the nightmares. At first, the nightmares consisted of when the demon ripped her family apart, limb from limb. All she could do was sit in the closet and watching in silent horror. She remembered how empty and black the creature was.

She would never forget the face of the one that murdered her parents. It was a VIP, and she could remember the few features it had. Its eyes were grey, like a storm, and lips as puffy as clouds. She watched as it leaned over her parent's bodies, a bright smile on its dark face. Like an animal, it sniffed the air, able to smell her fear. Unlike many, this one had a voice, and she remembered the words it said. Its voice was like a loud whisper, and sent chills down her spine to this day.

"I know you're here. Your scent is like no other. Don't worry, little one. No matter where you hide, I will come back, and find you."