Young Writers Society

The sound of the screams made terror shoot through his terrified body, but Azazel still managed to give a nod. "You can make a deal," he confirmed. His gaze wandered to the direction of the screams. "But first I gotta see why there's screaming."

A small part of him said that he should wait for Sevy to come to a decision; he ignored it. He didn't really know him, and Aegeas was staying behind, but he knew himself, and he knew he could handle something like that. And he was good at helping people, too, so maybe he could make a deal with whoever had screamed and make them feel better in return for a good story or some yummy food!

The source of the screams wasn't far away. He managed to get there in a little less than a minute - he was really fast when it came to running - skidding to a halt when he saw the group. There was a vampire up against a tree, a furry kid nearby and a boy with beautiful, beautiful white wings sitting next to the sad vampire.

"Are you an angel?" he blurted.

The boy looked up at him and stared with bright blue eyes.

"I've never met an angel before," he added. "I've heard about them, of course, but I don't think they like people like me that much. But you're different, aren't you? Because angels are supposed to be kind of mean, according to other demons, but you're hanging around with a vampire and a furry guy who might be a were-wolf."

The angel stared at him long and hard.

"Do...Do I know you?" he hesitantly asked.

"I don't think so!" Azazel chirped, though the idea of them being friends made him feel happy. It felt right. "My name's Azazel. I'm an Earth demon, and I'm the best at making deals!"

The angel perked up a little. "I'm Saentiel."

He grinned. "That's a pretty name!"

"Yours is pretty cool, too," Saentiel said, now grinning as well. The grin faltered for a minute. "But for some reason I feel like your eyes should be a different color."

"I can make my eyes go all black," he said. He did it to emphasis his point, just for a quick moment. "If that's what you mean!"

Saentiel shook his head--

--"So your name is Azazel?" Gabriel asked, studying him as he leaned across the deck's balcony. He could hear Quinn softly snoring in the hotel room; it had to be the first decent rest she had gotten since he was taken.

He nodded.

"It is," he confirmed. "Quinn's known for awhile, but we weren't sure if we could..." He didn't finish the sentence - didn't want to. Finishing it would be admitting that Gabriel still wasn't part of their group, even though the rescue had proven him worthy of their trust.

"I get it," Gabriel admitted. He turned his back to the door and looked up at the stars, arms draped over the side of the white railing. "Trust doesn't come easily to people like us."

He gave a small nod.

A smile danced across Gabriel's lips. "I can't believe I know someone so famous - no wonder you have so many people in your favor." Gabriel glanced over at him, the smile turning into his signature smirk. "I admit I'm a little jealous. I just have little old me to rely on, and I'm nowhere near as close to you when it comes to power. At least, if Supernatural is anything to go on."

There was a pause. He couldn't tell if Gabriel honestly underestimated himself or was trying to play the weak card; he was powerful. Very powerful. He had realized the very first time they had met, back in that bar what seemed like an eternity ago. He knew Gabriel was hiding his real identity. There was no question about that - there was no powerful demon named Gabriel. There wasn't a demon who seemed to be regularly getting in trouble with a whole host of powerful beings, most of them being angels.

(Part of him wondered if Gabriel was once one of them, but he was too afraid to ask. If he was, then he would have to question why he fell - and he didn't want to lose the man he was slowly falling in love with.)

Gabriel folded his arms and looked him over. "You don't have yellow eyes, do you?" he asked. "If you do, you might be able to sue the Supernatural writers for copyright, though we'd probably have to wait until you get out of that."

He shook his head and gave a small smile. "Unfortunately, my eyes aren't golden."

Gabriel frowned. "Well that's a shame - we'd be set for life if they were-"

He was cut off by a snort and a laugh, much to Gabriel's apparent confusion.

"Are you-Are you laughing?" he asked, incredulous. He managed a nod in the middle of his laughter, and soon Gabriel was laughing as well. "I can't believe I finally got you to laugh, Azazel - I thought you never would!"--

--The world came back into focus. Azazel frowned and suddenly grabbed for his bare arms, weirdly grateful for the feeling of soft skin underneath his fingertips. He wasn't sure what he had just witnessed, but the nice demon with the pretty face had liked his name, and that had made him weirdly happy. He tried to ignore how restricted he felt - it made him feel nauseous and uncomfortable now, especially when he didn't even know the reason for the feeling in the first place. But no matter how much he focused on Saentiel - and how weirdly warm his face suddenly felt when he looked at the angel - he still couldn't shake the feeling that something was horribly wrong.

"Do you wanna make a deal?" he abruptly asked.

Saentiel stared at him.

"Please?" he added. He wasn't really sure why he was so desperate for a deal, but it seemed like a deal was going to happen after all - Saentiel gave a hesitant nod. "You just have to tell me what you want, and I'll help you do it! I just don't do kidnapping, murdering and bad things, unless there's a really good reason for it. And then you give me some kind of payment that's about the same, and we're all good! Or I ask for favors, and that might work really well because you're an angel and don't die as quickly as humans."

Saentiel thought for a minute. He used it as an opportunity to ready his stylus and scroll.

"Could you help me figure out what's going on in these woods?" he asked, watching as Azazel scribbled down his name. "They're...weird. I've been getting visions that might be memories, but they can't be because I'm too old in them, and something feels really, really wrong."

He stopped writing down the request of the deal, a chill running up and down his spine. "I've been having the same thing, too," he said. "I just saw one of those vision things! There was another demon in it, and he made me laugh! It gives me a happy feeling, but I didn't feel...right. Like something was keeping me from moving easily. Was yours like that, too?"

Saentiel shook his head. "Mine wasn't...Mine wasn't nice..."

His face fell. "Oh."

"It's okay," Saentiel reassured him. There was an awkward pause. "What do I have to do for our deal?"

Azazel thought long and hard for all of a minute.

"Could I-Could I stay with you?" he hesitantly asked.

Saentiel stared at him with his pretty blue eyes.

"You make me feel good," Azazel muttered, shifting uncomfortably. But then Saentiel nodded, and his face broke out into a big grin as relief flooded him.

"You make me feel good, too," Saentiel said. His gaze dropped down to the ground. "But you don't...you don't hate me, right? I feel like you might..."

He shook his head. "Definitely not! I really, really like you!"

Saentiel slowly looked up, a small smile dancing across his lips.

Wait; the otter was pretty sure running away wasn't supposed to be the deal. But here Azazel was, speeding off in the direction of the screaming. Gritting his teeth, Aegeas mustered what little confidence he had, shook himself free of Sevy, and ran after the demon. It was a stupid idea. He was stupid. This was dangerous and risky and he really didn't feel like he had any other option if he wanted to keep himself safe.

He leaped over logs, tripped over roots, and panted for breath in the huge, humid forest. It was hard enough to see without the mist, but at least he had his hearing and sense of smell to rely on. Azazel smelled like parchment and something vaguely inhuman. Which made sense, if he was one of those 'demons,' but it was a bit frightening.

That didn't stop Aegeas from picking up the pace when he spotted Azazel in front of him. Rushing the demon, the otter leaped into the air, aiming for his feet. "You were going to make a deal!" he said, crashing into Azazel.




This place was getting crowded. A white-robed man had shown up, talked to the winged man (who looked really happy now, which was relieving), and had just been tackled by the otter boy. Oh yeah, the otter boy. Hadn't Taber chased after him-

"Hi!" Taber said, leaning over the hospital bed and holding a hand out, "You must be Aegeas. It's nice to meet you!"

It was hard to read the otter's expression. Since he'd just woken up (as far as Taber knew), it was probably just tiredness and surprise. Aegeas blinking and squinting was a good sign of that. Yet, as the otter pulled a blanket over his chest up to his eyes, Taber couldn't help but feel like Aegeas was hiding some fear behind his blank expression. He did have good reason to.

"Are you okay?" Taber said, tilting his head to one side.

Aegeas reached into the blanket. Probably looking for his scimitars, Taber guessed.

"Sorry," Taber said. "We kinda had to take those. I'm sorry if this is rude, but do you remember what happened? You looked kinda out of it."

The otter froze.

Biting his lip for a second, Taber looked away. "Yeah, you kinda did a number on Kendrik. They're patching him up somewhere else in the hospital, but it looks like he's going to be fine."

An awkward silence settled over the hospital bed.

"Do you need anything?" Taber said.

Aegeas opened his mouth to speak. "I-

Ohhh, that's who otter boy was.

"Hi," Taber squeaked, copying his dream self's voice. It was odd to be speaking in this language, but not as boring as he thought. "It's, nice to meet you. You must be Aegeas."

Ciaran hugged himself tightly, only vaguely aware of the conversation going on around him. There was a hand on his back and he cringed away from it, pulling in a startled little gasp—

“—aran

Ciaran.

Ciaran, you need to do this,” his sire said, gripping his shoulder hard so he couldn’t run away. He looked like at adult, and Ciaran wasn’t sure why. “Are you listening?”

He nodded. “Yes, father.”

“Good. Now pay attention.” There was a pause and then a hand was pointing towards a pretty young lady. She was barely older than he was. “See the peasant girl? She’s your meal tonight.”

Ciaran turned towards his sire, looking up at him pleadingly. He really didn’t want to hurt her. He didn’t want to hurt anyone! His sire’s face was blurry, even in his memories of him—and why did that sound so familiar?

“I don’t want to hurt her, Father—“

“Ciaran, sometimes hurting people cannot be avoided. It’s best you learn this early.” The grip on his shoulder tightened to almost painful. Long, sharp fingernails dug into his collar bone, making him wince. “Now, go.”

His sire shoved him forwards, making him stumble for a moment. Ciaran righted himself and glanced around but his sire was nowhere to be seen, and when he turned back to the peasant girl, she was watching him with wide eyes.

Almost as if he weren’t completely in control of himself, Ciaran drifted forwards. The closer he got, the more distant he felt. It was like a haze had descended over his mind. He knew he spoke to her, knew he flirted, but she just seemed terrified. And then she ran. He followed. Ciaran was faster—

“—no!” he exclaimed, shooting to his feet. He pressed back against the tree and dug elongated fingernails into the tree. That hadn’t happened! That had never happened! He didn’t hurt people! And he certainly didn’t kill them! “I would never hurt someone like that!”

When he felt he’d calmed down a little, he turned back to find four people watching him. Two of them definitely hadn’t been there a moment ago. An otter boy and was that a demon? He didn’t like demons, and he wasn’t sure why.

“Who the hell are you?”

"I'm Azazel! I'm a demon, and I'm really good at making deals - I can make one with you, if you want!" the demon chirped, trying his best to shake Aegeas off of his feet - he was good at balancing and pretty strong, so the furry kid hadn't been able to knock him down.

He looked down at the boy that had just slammed into him. "I'm sorry," he apologized, "but I was really worried about the screams, and I knew I'd be able to handle it. We can make our deal now, especially since I just made with Saentiel! I just gotta know what you want!"

He looked back up at the vampire and at his new angelic friend, then glanced back down at the boy near his feet. "This is Aegeas," he said. "I don't know what he is, but he's furry and nice."

Saentiel crouched down and waved at him. "Hi, Aegeas!" he said, a grin spreading across his face. "I'm Saentiel. You look kind of funny - are you like a werewolf, but with a different kind of animal?" He glanced back at the vampire, the grin fading when he seemed to notice how frightened he was.

"Did you...Did you just have a vision?" he hesitantly asked.

He looked at the angel and grimaced. “I... don’t know? I think so?” he muttered, shaking his head. “It wasn’t a good one...”

Ciaran shrugged and then realised he was impaling the tree. He quickly pulled his fingernails free and stared down at them, dirt and little shards of bark lodged beneath them. He shook his hands with a disgusted look on his face.

“And I definitely don’t want to make a deal with you,” he spat towards Azazel. “I don’t make deals with demons.”

And whyyyyy did he know not to do that? Ciaran frowned, still staring at his elongated fingernails. Why did he know anything anymore? He glanced up, taking in each person in turn. Aegeas was, by far, the oddest out of all of them. He could handle werewolves and he knew not to mess with demons or angels, but the otter boy? That was new.

“I don’t understand,” he said slowly, frowning deeper. “What’s going on here? Why am I having such weird visions?” He delved into muttering something in an ancient Gaelic language; something about faeries and tricks. He switched back and added with disgust; “Faeries.”

Sevy let out a squeak of alarm as Aegeas ran after Azazel, leaving him alone in the dark forest. Immediately he started running after the two. He gained a few feet, only to trip over a root and land hard in the leaves.

It was there, on the forest floor, that his first vision hit him, sucking the breath from his lungs.

A man with a sad expression and crumpled clothing had pulled him into a back alley, looking for the life of him like a man with bad news.

"It's Samantha. I haven't- I haven't had any contact with your father, but-" the man broke off, most likely to regain his composure.

He felt his heart sink, his face growing pale, and then he was gripping the lappels of the man's coat and pulling him closer, snarling into his face.

"What happened to her!? Goddamn it, Watson, if she's-!" he stopped talking as his voice broke, and he numbly loosened his grip. He could aready tell by Watson's face that any number of his fears could be true.

"Sevy, I'm sorry. Your sister... she's been captured." Watson's eyes lowered, brimming with a stew of emotions.

Now eerily quiet, his hands dropped completely, and something in him collapsed.

"No." He whispered hoarsely. "No."

"NO!" Sevy choked on the tears pouring down his face and wrapped his arms around himself, still curled on the ground.

His head swirled, the man's voice playing again and again in his head. It couldn't be true! It must just be a bad dream. It had to be. He had just seen Samantha playing in the backyard with her toys.

...Hadn't he?

Azazel wisely nodded in agreement, completely ignoring how he had been treated earlier by the vampire - people were sometimes kind of weird when it came to his deals, even though his deals were pretty good. "I've heard stories of faeries from travelers before," he added, wanting to show his wealth of knowledge. "They have wings so they look funny-"

Saentiel frowned. "I have wings."

Azazel froze.

"They don't look funny," he hurriedly added, and the frown immediately vanished. "But faeries like creepy forests, right? So maybe faeries are the reason for why there was a bunch of trees in the desert!"

"That's weird," Saentiel said. He glanced around at the trees, then looked back at Azazel. "I was in Heaven, and Heaven's not supposed to be a desert or have not-angels in it."

Azazel thought long and hard on this, crossing his arms and stroking his chin with his hand like he had seen some of the humans he met do. He finally came to a consensus after studying both the forest and Saentiel for another moment.

"Faeries," he simply said

They had to be at fault for that, too!-

Wait.

Where did Sevy go? Aegeas was here, but Sevy wasn't! He wildly looked around to make sure he hadn't missed him; Sevy was nowhere to be found. In the distance, he could hear the sound of crying, and he knew immediately that it was Sevy who was upset. He darted over to Saentiel - finally breaking free from Aegeas - and grabbed onto the angel's wrist. "I can hear Sevy crying," he said. "I bet he saw one of those vision thingies, too!"

"Who's Sevy-"

Saentiel never got his answer. Azazel pulled him off towards the source of the crying, leaving the werewolf, Aegeas and the vampire to go check on Sevy. It only took a minute for them to reach Sevy's side. Azazel promptly plopped down right in front of him, leaving Saentiel to stand awkwardly behind him.

"What's wrong, Sevy? Can I make you feel any better?"

He let out an excited gasp.

"Maybe we can make a deal!" he exclaimed, grinning. "I can take care of whatever's making you sad, and you can tell me what it's like to be an angel."

"I don't know if he's an angel," Saentiel warily said. He glanced behind him to see that the angelic boy had crossed his arms. "His wings are a funny color."

And of course Azazel had run off again. Aegeas pulled himself onto his feet, grumbling about being called funny and nice. No, he was supposed to be serious and tough. He was the one who had the guts to make a deal with Azazel (though he wasn't quite sure why other people were upset by it, even if they did seem to know more about demons than he did). It didn't matter that he really wasn't sure what he wanted; he'd figure that out when he actually got to make a deal. "When" being the key word.

He looked between the two people standing around the tree, pointing to the wolf first. "I don't know how you knew that," Aegeas said, "But that's my name, yeah."

"It was in a dream!" the wolf said, raising a hand.

Aegeas paused, scowling - the wolf's voice was awful. Still, he turned and pointed at Ciaran.

"And I'm pretty sure it's not faeries, whatever those are," Aegeas said. "I know I wasn't in a desert."

Sevy's head slowly rose as Azazel sat in front of him, and he scrubbed at his eyes. He slowly pulled himself into a sitting position and tried to stop the flow of his remaining tears.

With an uncertain glance over at a boy he hadn't seen before- one with white wings, he noticed with a little shock- he looked back over at the demon.

"I- I'll tell you what it's like to be an angel." He hiccuped. "But- but I don't think you can fix why I was crying. I'm- im not sure if it's real- I don't think so, at least- and- and if it is, it hasn't happened yet."

He looked back to the boy with the white wings and frowned a little in concern.

"I am too an angel! And m- my wings aren't weird, yours are!" He hiccuped again, and then his eyes widened when he had a chance to think about what he had said. "I'm sorry- that was mean! I just... what happened to your wings? Why are they white?"

"You must have had a vision, too," Azazel decided, giving a wise nod. "The vampire thinks it's faeries. I think he might be right - faeries are really tricky and like creepy forests, from what I've heard in stories!"

Saentiel still wasn't convinced that faeries were at fault, but he didn't argue. Azazel didn't seem likely to budge on his belief, and something made him want to avoid arguing with the demon. Maybe it was because he seemed so nice and gave him butterflies in his tummy? He looked at the supposed angel in front of him and frowned.

"Angel wings are supposed to be white," he said. "Yours are the one with the funny color - the wings of every angel in Heaven are white like mine!"--

--If it looked like a duck and quacked like a duck, it should have been a duck, but he wasn't quite convinced that God and his little friend were being entirely truthful. The purported angel may have passed his test with flying colors - and made the performance quite entertaining - but it was something that could have easily been coached ahead of time.

It looked like he'd need to get a little creative.

He gave himself a paper cut on his menu, and wasted no time in getting a bit of his blood on the supposed angel. If he was what he said he was, he would recoil in pain or show some sort of reaction when his blood touched his skin.

God, ever the gentleman, handed him a napkin.

"Thanks," he said. "I hate when that happens."

The angel failed the test by wiping the blood off. "Are you alright, miss?" he asked; he had no idea that he had just failed Angel 101.

"I'm fine," he said. He gave a smile that didn't reach his eyes, and it was when he began to stir his holy water around with taking a single sip that God finally put the pieces together. One uttering of Christo and a flash of black eyes later, and God looked thoroughly worried. Apparently his disguise was even better than he had thought it was.

"You were trying to see if he'd react to your blood," God whispered.

He smiled. "Bingo."

God let out a sigh. "What's your name?"

He withheld the urge to raise an eyebrow - God could read souls. He was supposed to be able to figure something like this out without him having to dramatically reveal his identity. He'd have to draw this out a bit to mess with him; he already knew just what to say. "Well," he said, resting his head in his hands, "I suppose Jo works well right now. Wouldn't it, Dean? I'm surprised your little brother isn't with you. Is your Sammy stuck with angel wings?"

God looked like he was ready to punch him - maybe the comment hadn't been as smart as he had thought. "What do you want with my brother, Jo?"

He pushed up his glasses, trying to look as nonthreatening as possible. Stuck as a cartoonish demon or not, God still was far more powerful than he'd ever be. "Just checking. It's really you, isn't it?"

"Why wouldn't it be?"

He glanced over in the supposed angel's direction. "Because he's not actually an angel, and anyone that's ever met one can tell that a mile away." When God continued to give him a look, he sighed and threw himself back in his chair. Did he really not get it? He doubted God knew that many demons, and few of them shared his personality. "Dean, it's me. Real life Team Free Will member, though my name's a bit of a touchy subject right now."

Now God had the smart idea to glance at his soul. "Nice one, Gabriel," he said, his voice low. "I didn't realize it was you."--

--As the vision came to a close, Saentiel stared down at his hands. He had been older in it, too, but it wasn't exactly the same as the previous ones. He was a demon. He was sure of it, now - that man, Dean, had done everything he was supposed to do to check if someone was a demon. That made him afraid of the implications, but he also couldn't get over how weird his hands had looked. They were bigger than they were now, but they were weird. The proportions were all funny.

He glanced down at the rest of his body, trying to compare the two to figure out what was off-

Oh. He got it now. His gaze stayed down on his chest. He had been a girl in that vision. Why had he been a girl? Older him had looked kind of different from him now, but at least he had been the right gender! It wasn't like there was anything wrong with it - he could change his form, after all. But it was weird how he'd decide to do that all of the sudden, especially since he'd never done it before.

"Saentiel?" Azazel asked, worry in his voice. "Are you okay?"

He looked up from his chest and stared at the demon. "I had another vision," he said. It still felt like a memory, but that didn't make any sense.

Azazel perked up. "What was it about? You don't seem sad about it." He thought for a moment, and then added, "Maybe knowing what it is can help me figure out what's going on and complete my part of the deal, Saentiel!"

He hesitantly nodded. That did sound like a good idea, especially since it wasn't one of the bad ones. "I was in a place with a lot of humans," he started, thankful that he wasn't there anymore. "There was an angel that wasn't an angel there, and a man I kept calling Dean-"

His eyes widened.

"Oh my God," he whispered. "I met God!"

Azazel was positively beaming. "You met him?"

He eagerly nodded. "I did! I saw him in my vision! He was sitting right across from me and I-I think we were friends! I was annoying him, but I don't think he minded that much when he realized it was me. He didn't recognize me at first because I was a lady, but then he called me a name that was mine even though it's not Saentiel."

"What did he call you?" Azazel asked. "Also, you were a lady?"

He shrugged. "Yeah - I used the name Jo, I think? But then God called me Gabriel."

Azazel stared at him.

"It's not weird," he hurriedly muttered. "I-I can change my form, like any angel can...Even though I was a demon in the vision..."

Azazel frantically shook his head. "That's not it! It's just that I had a Gabriel in my vision, and he was a demon. And he made me feel really good right here-" He placed a hand on his chest. "-just like you make me feel right now, Saentiel."

Saentiel looked him over. He recalled one of his previous memories - the one who the crying girl, and when he talked about how powerful a demon named Issac was - and he hesitantly went out on a limb. "Did you use the name Issac in your vision?"

"I didn't say it," Azazel replied, "but I feel like it's my name. Do you...Do you think we know each other?"

Saentiel slowly nodded.

The others were taking just a bit too long, especially given the deal Aegeas planned to make with Azazel. At least the screaming had stopped. Which didn't necessarily mean good things, if he thought about it. He chose not to think about it too much.

"Should we go over there?" Aegeas said, pointing a claw behind him. He wasn't all that happy about bringing the others along, but he didn't like the idea of going alone.

As he expected, wolf boy bounded over. "Sure!" he said.

Eugh, it was still strange hearing him talk. But Aegeas turned and began walking through the forest, the wolf in tow.

Azazel heard the others approaching, and he eagerly awaited their arrival - he couldn't wait to make a deal with Aegeas! The situation with Sevy was taken care of, and he had discovered that Saentiel was the nice demon in his vision. He guessed that meant Saentiel had fallen, despite his very beautiful wings, but that didn't really matter much to him. Saentiel was nice, and made him happy, so why would he care if he did something to make Heaven mad someday?

He reached over and grabbed onto the angel's hand. Saentiel's face turned red, but he didn't let go - he liked the feeling of skin against skin, though he couldn't quite figure out why--

--The world should have been dark. The lights above him were off, and the only light were the candles surrounding the pentacle he was in. But he could still make out shapes surprisingly well in the dark, despite decent night vision being something he had never possessed. He groggily tried to reach a hand out, but found that he couldn't move it - his arms and legs were bound to a wooden board.

No. That wasn't right. He could move his body ever so slightly, but never more than a few inches. Even when he could move it, everything felt wrong. His limbs were heavy, and the feelings he had taken for granted were missing. Instead, everything felt cold and unnatural, and there was a soft whirring in his ear.

He glanced at his wrist.

Wires were digging into his flesh. His eyes widened. He desperately tried to pull himself free - despite the pain that would inevitably follow - but he quickly discovered that he was unable to. His limbs would freeze up anytime that he tried.

The door opened.

Light flooded the room. He waited to be blinded by the sudden light, but his eyes adjusted far too easily. A group of humans swathed in lab coats and armed with clipboards entered. They were all chatting as if he wasn't there - as if he was nothing more than an experiment.

"Subject #1 is operational," a woman commented. They were all fiddling with the wires, fiddling with him, but he couldn't do a single thing to stop it.

"My name is Azazel," he said, his voice little more than an angry growl. This wasn't how something like this was supposed to go! People were supposed to summon him to make deals, not to turn him into something like this!

"It apparently has some control over the robot still, sir," a man said from his left. He turned his head, narrowing his eyes into a glare. He wanted to turn his eyes black - make him afraid to the point of letting him go - but nothing happened when he tried.

"We'll have to remedy that," someone said in the doorway; this had to be the person in charge. He struggled to tear his arms out of the wires, but now the scientists were beginning to hold him down - they had realized how insistent he was. "What about its abilities? Can we tap into those?"

"My name is Azazel-"

"We'll have to test that once we separate the soul and the controls," the woman from earlier interrupted. "What should we do with it in the meantime, sir?"

He thought for a moment.

"Lock it away," the man said.

Then he turned and left, a small group of scientists trailing behind him as a few began to fiddle with the wires. Azazel hadn't cried in a very long time, but the urge was great - he was absolutely terrified. He couldn't access his powers. He couldn't escape. He couldn't even threaten them into making a deal.

He was helpless.

But even though tears should have been sliding down his cheeks, he realized with horror that they weren't. That was when understanding dawned on him, and eyes that were never meant to be his widened with horror.

They had trapped his soul inside of a robot--

--He fell to the ground, sobs wracking his body as the memory ended. His own arms wrapped around him in a self-inflicted hug as he tried to stop thinking about how terrified he was. The visions had to mean something. What if that was his future, and he was going to be stuck in that-that-

He sobbed even harder.

As another threatened to break free, he felt arms suddenly wrap around him. He glanced behind him to see that Saentiel was giving him a hug - and, a moment later, his wings also enveloped him. "It's okay," he promised, his voice quiet and reassuring in his ear. "It's just a vision. It can't hurt you, Azazel."

He turned around and threw his arms around Saentiel, sobbing into the chest of the boy who should have been a stranger but was somehow someone far more important to him.

Poking his head through a bush, Aegeas glared at the scene in front of him. "What's all this?" he said, looking at the three people in front of him. Two of them looked particularly messed up - the demon he was supposed to make a deal with was now crying into the chest of the winged man. Not a good sign.

The wolf followed, skipping into the clearing. "Oh no!" he said, running over to Azazel and hugging him from behind. He switched to growls and hisses, which, if Aegeas had been able to understand them, he would've picked up, "Did something happen?"

Sevy watched Azazel and Seantiel warily, concern making his brow but not wanting to intrude. He wrapped his arms around himself, his eyes wide.

When Aegeas and a wolf burst through the clearing, he startled, dropping his arms. On instinct, he scooted closer to the otter.

"I think Azazel had a... a vision." He said, quiet and somber. "at least, that's what Seantiel called it. It must have been a scary one, or a sad one."

"Is that's what's going on?" Aegeas said, throwing up his paws. "You've all been having these 'visions?' I'm kinda skeptical here - I haven't had any of these things happen to me. What are like they? Why haven't I had any? Isn't it just easy to say you're scared of this place? I am!"