Story Stopper

Part XII: Outside the soulless

"Child of the lord! You question god in your heart and the nature of your position gives you great strength.  It is here that you must witness the power of the lord that shown to you may make you a believer and save your angelic soul as well as what remnants of your human soul are left.  Perhaps darkness will deliver you unto the light."

With that, the angel Michael swept down upon my wings and the feathers on them burnt so I could no longer ascend to the heavens.  Without wings, I could not even exist in heaven.  I grabbed my scythe as I fell and saw Deviel ascend and she cried out as she watched me and reached out for me as my fingertips brushed hers until there was nothing but the vortex.  In there, I was tossed and spun and disoriented until I fell to the earth in front of a statuesque man in a long overcoat.  He was well dressed and looked well bred.  He stood in front of me and looked down at a golden pocket watch as if expecting me.

Looking around and trying to determine where and when I'd landed, I noticed that the nice clothes I'd been wearing were now in shambles and I seemed to be in England some time around the mid to late 1800's.  The man in front of me spoke, "Hello, Mr. Dolph.  We've been expecting you.  Please, if you will."  He motioned to a carriage near by and headed towards the double doors.

As he handed me new clothes, I stepped in and began to change. Getting in, what I saw was an ordinary carriage but as I bulled the shirt over my head and the door shut, it was much roomier than the outside made it seem.  There was a grand, white room and a long satin couch in the middle of it.  Outside the windows, all one could see was fire and the walls of a great pit.

"For all intents and purposes, you are in a carriage in London traveling White Chapel where I will dispose of another whore a little later tonight, but a deeper game is afoot as you may well know by now."

Coming out of nowhere, a broad chested and beautiful man with flowing golden hair came across the room toward the couch.  He had to have been at least equal height with Michael and yet as it was obvious to me that he was an angel, as he got closer, he shrank and developed into a fine looking, proper English gentleman.  He was around six feet even with longer, dirty blonde hair; his eyes were green and his nose very properly sat on his face indistinguishable from any other one might see in any time period in English history.

"Lucifer!" I said.

Sitting down on the satin couch in the middle of the room, he responded, "In the flesh, my dear boy."

We sat for a while, looking at each other with differing glances.  I looked at him as if waiting to hear a speech but he looked at me as if he did not care what was said by whom, if anything was said at all.  It was as if he were studying me.

"You're a fascinating creature, Dolphiel.  Do you know that angels consider you to be neither man nor angel?  You 'fit in' nowhere.  Why, with such nomadic proclivity, and such astronomical raw power, one such as you could be a creator of an entirely new existence..."

"...or its destroyer..."

"Ironic, my friend, that I am the one with the glass half full attitude and you with the tragic ennui on your breath."

He laughed aloud, which scared me at first but once I realized where our conversation had gone, I tried asking some questions of my own.

"What do you mean, 'power'?  You should know by now that I am no longer the angel of death."

"Oh really?  I hadn't noticed," he laughed.  "You were never the angel of death, Dolphiel.  You were the Grim Reaper.  A position that has its own set of rules.  Your angelic status has been revoked so you are no longer the Grim Reaper but make no mistake of it, you are still, in every way, granted the ability to reap souls and once you regain your strength, you will be able to walk through the walls of fire outside this room and travel to any point in time you wish to go.  The only difference is you're in my domain now.  You've fallen."

"...but what power is it to reap souls?" I asked him

"It is a great power, my friend," he replied.  "We have the power to offset the balance of god's creation.  You have the power of an imagination that's imbued with the image of god himself.  Being part human, makes you part god! Or did you not understand what He meant when he said, 'made in his image'?"

At this, I grew visibly uncomfortable and began to question, in my mind, just how far from God's decree I was prepared to go.  Lucifer, sensing my discomfort, asked if I preferred a more complacent setting than hell and with a snap of his fingers, we were traveling in an aircraft of some sort, over a city I did not recognize."

"Where are we?" I asked.

"We are in London, I've just changed the year to 2,338."

"You can traverse time?"

"I'm the devil, son, I exist in every instance of time just as god does.  It is how I am his equal and yet, his opposite.  He represents the rules and devotion to him.  I represent the devotion to nothing and to no one."

"How can one be devoted to no one?" I said.

"I'm glad you asked," said Lucifer.  "We have much to talk about."