The Fall, Part Five

30 May 1989

I sighed as I knelt down to close the boy's eyes.

"They never repent. Why do they never repent?" Nevertheless, I always pray for the soul. Maybe it will have found its way to Purgatory after all, and from there, who knows? One can hope. I was in the middle of giving last rites when the door was kicked open and the sheriff charged in, pointing a gun at me. I tried to explain what I was doing.
 
"Luke is free of your God now, priest," he barked, training the gun on me. "Now I'm gonna need you to stand up nice and quiet." I raised my hands and stood.

"You should know that he came in here to kill me." I motioned toward the axe laying on the remains of the bed. "That is your jurisdiction, is it not?"

"I know you Frenchy types think you know so damn much, but don't you think I'll be taking work orders from you!" I wanted to be surprised that this man did not know the difference between a German and a French accent, but it seemed there was little benefit to exploring that now.

"Officer, I'm simply trying-"

"Shut your hole and come with me!" I took a deep breath and nodded. "That's more like it. Now, move!" I walked out of the room as he followed me, gun aimed at me the whole way. He gave me directions, and it was a short time before I found myself staring down a stone stairway leading into what seemed to be a basement.

"This seems highly irregular, officer." I felt the gun press into the back of my head.

"I told you to shut up and move, priest." I descended the stairs, and found myself in a rough-hewn room with a large red spiral engraved into the floor and a small drain set into the center. Two cloaked figures stood on opposite sides of it. Whatever this place was, the wall between worlds was certainly more thin than the surrounding area, so I braced myself.

"I suppose this explains the reaction time in this town. You knew Luke was coming."

"Luke was a good kid, but he weren't gonna think of this on his own."

"Was?" one of the cloaked figures asked in a feminine voice. "What happened?"

"Seems the Pope ain't all nice and gentle after all. He sent us a damn killer," the sheriff replied. "We knew there was something off about you when we sensed you in the cave, priest, but I must say I was surprised to find you standing over a dead body."

"He...he killed Luke?!"

​"Nevermind that now, woman! We got a situation!" The woman pulled out a dagger, and the other figure copied her. "Now, you, priest, there's something weird about your blood. We can smell it. And I think it's gonna be even more useful for our needs than the people we'd been planning on."

"Good to know," I said, "but I really must decline." There was little need to hide my gifts from these people. They may not know exactly what I am, but they knew enough. It had been a while since I'd stepped into the spiritual realm, but I knew the way, and I only had to get there before the sheriff thought to pull his trigger. As far as they saw, however, I was standing before their spiral and then I was gone. While the cloaked figures began rushing around and demanding to know what was happening, the sheriff lowered his gun and began muttering in a language I had never heard. I felt the power in the air and knew things were about to get complicated.

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