• Book One - Escape

    "Put your hands on your head," the Chaser said, his gun pointed squarely at my head. "Now."

    I responded obediently to the man, slowly bringing my hands to rest on my soft, silky brown hair. "What's wrong, Sir?" I asked, innocently.

    As he cocked his firearm, taking aim carefully, he laughed. "What's wrong is that you think you can trick me. I saw your wings, Angel," he said, spitting the last words at me bitterly.

    I gave the man a small, dark grin and threw myself at his chest before he could react. With little effort I dragged him into the air, rising thirty feet before stopping and tearing the handgun from him. "Two things you missed, Chaser. First, bullets can't kill me," I said as I tossed the useless weapon to the pavement below. The metal hit the ground and clanged sharply, but the noise was quickly eaten up by the sounds of the city rushing into the grimy alleyway. "Second," I continued, "I'm no Angel."

    The Chaser fell, screaming, to the unforgiving concrete. I landed by his head, picking up his gun and tucking it into my belt. As I began to walk away, I smiled and turned back. "The name's Lucie, and I'm your worst nightmare."

    .....

    Five days later, I revisited the alleyway I had killed the Chaser in. The investigation had quickly been dismissed as a suicide on the man's part, a background check revealing that he was currently unemployed and single. In the dirty alley, a dumpster on one side radiating what smelled like dead fish, I smiled and leaned against the side of a brick building. The Manhattan traffic resonated through the shaded alley, and I closed my eyes to better hear what was going on.

    Three hundred yards away, someone in a Starbucks was ordering a espresso. Fifty yards east of him, the tinkering of a bell alerted a store cashier to a homeless man entering the shop. In the public school thirty-four yards south of that convenience store, a fifth grader entered the girl's bathroom and let out a piercing scream, shouting "Wings! Wings!"

    My eyes shot open almost as fast as my jet black wings, extending nearly nine feet to either side of me. As I drew myself into the air, I concentrated all of my exceptional hearing on the unfolding scene in the bathroom. I could hear the screams repeated throughout the hallways, teachers and security frantically trying to calm the chaotic children. With the students making it difficult for the security to locate the Angel, I streaked across the sky to the brick, prison-style school.

    As I landed on the opposite side of the girl's bathroom window, a gunshot rang in the hallway. I ripped up the window and dove inside as a security guard rushed past, his gun drawn. He failed to notice me as he ran by, and I took what little time I had to scan the green-tiled bathroom for the young girl. When I heard a muffled sniffle from inside the stall nearest me, I realized that the Angel must be inside. I smiled, thinking, "Good, she's still here."

    The door to the stall opened inward slowly as I crept forward, and a young girl peeked her head out, her blue eyes fearfully looking around and seeing me. For a moment she froze, but calmed when she noticed the wings on my back. I motioned for her to come out quietly, and as she slowly made her way to me another security guard ran past. I ducked out of view of the doorway, but too late as a bullet cracked the tile behind where my head had been. "Watch out!" I yelled to the Angel, who threw herself back into the stall.

    The guard rushed into the bathroom, and aimed at me with his pistol. Angry at his intrusion, I growled and rolled to my left, a second bullet missing me by inches. Using my wings to give me momentum I launched myself at the guard and, grabbing the overweight, stereotypical 'mall cop' by his collar, pushed him to the ground. He brought his gun up to point at me, but I angrily grabbed his arm and forced it back to the tiled floor. Shouting in the hallway meant that more of these fat guards were on their way, so I quickly knocked out the one on the ground with a punch to the forehead.

    "Come on!" I shouted to the Angel, dragging her from the stall and heading to the window. Without hesitation I jumped through the tall opening and turned around, grabbing the girl and pulling her out after me. I flew, hard and fast, through the sky as I heard more of the guards enter the bathroom. One of the guards, unlike the others, calmly walked to the window and looked out, searching for the small dot in the sky that I was.

    'Oh, crap,' I thought to myself. 'They're following me.'

    ----------

    Chapter 1 - "Chaser"

    "Are you okay?" I asked the young Angel as we landed in the yard of a large, mansion-esque house in Old Westbury. The girl was silent as I led her through the tall, unkempt grass, and as we entered the house through the worn back door, she let out a small sniffle. "Are you okay?" I repeated.

    The girl shook her head, wiping tears from her sad eyes. "What am I?" she asked, her voice small and afraid.

    "You're an Angel," I said calmly, smiling as I met her eyes.

    "Does that mean I did something wrong?"

    I gave the girl a confused look, not sure whether to find that funny or scary. "Angels are beautiful people, full of goodness and kindness," I said. "No matter what anyone says."

    "But-" the girl started. I cut her off and sighed.

    As we walked through room after collapsing room, I finally stopped in a rotting kitchen and opened a cupboard, picking up that day's newspaper from the counter. "July 7, 2007," I said musingly. "How lucky." With a small smile, I turned to the Angel. "Angels are called bad by people who don't even know them. We're different, better than normal people, and that scares them."

    "My dad told me not to show anyone my wings. He said they would cut them off and-" Again I stopped the girl.

    "Your dad knows about your wings?"

    The little girl nodded. "He promised not to tell; he said he loved me more than he loved Momma..."

    I raised an eyebrow at that, not believing for a second the girl's father had said that truthfully. "That's nice," I said. "But he was lying when he said they would cut your wings off." I saw a look of relief on the girl's face. "If a Chaser caught you, he would just chain you up and keep you locked in his house to do whatever he wants."

    As a look of horror crossed her face, I grinned. "They're no stronger than any other normal person though," I said. "All you need to do is just hit them with all your strength, and they'll go down as easy as anyone else." I gave a light giggle. "The only thing you need to worry about are guns. They really do hurt."

    "What about you?" the Angel asked. "You have wings."

    "Yes, I do. But not like you." I opened my black wings, shaking them gently for an added effect. "Mine are black. I guess that makes me a Devil."

    "Is there a difference?"

    "I don't care much for being nice. But I think that's just preference," I said, winking. The girl gave a small smile. "Anyway, why were you showing someone your wings in school?"

    The Angel looked away, her face growing red. "She was my friend," the girl said. "I thought she would accept me."

    'Look how that turned out,' I thought, rolling my eyes mentally. "It's hard for people to understand that we're really good people."

    "I know," she said.

    Changing the topic, I asked, "What's your name, anyway? I'm Lucie."

    "Courtney."

    Courtney lifted her eyes and met mine, smiling slightly. "Are you feeling better now, Courtney?"

    "A little."

    "Good." Before the girl could blink, I had spun her around and pulled her hands behind her back. Pushing her through the next door, I forced her against the far wall and picked a pair of thick handcuffs off a nearby table. Swiftly cuffing her, I connected the chain between her hands to a longer chain attached to the wall. Courtney slumped to the ground in shock as I took a neck cuff off of the table and fastened that on her.

    "What-?"

    I laughed darkly. "I'm a Chaser, Courtney. Welcome to your new home." Her blue eyes searched my face, scared to death as she tried to comprehend what was happening. As I stepped aside, sweeping my hand across the opposite wall, I grinned. "Meet the family."

    Against the wall, chained the same way as Courtney, were four other angels, all older than her. One of the angels, awoken by my entrance, raised her head and stared at the new captive. The Angel shook her head slightly and laid back against the other, still sleeping angels, her eyes never leaving Courtney's face. "That's Grace," I said, smiling at the girl. "She's almost eighteen. The others are Serenity, Miracle, and Seraph." I pointed to each in turn, and as I called their names they woke. "Serenity, the blue-haired one, she's sixteen. Miracle's fifteen, she's the one in the pink shirt, and her twin sister Seraph is in the white shirt."

    "Why..."

    "Why would I capture Angels and keep them for my entertainment?" I asked, finishing the girl's question with a dark grin. "Because you're so beautiful, Courtney. All of you are. So much cuter than dogs or cats, and you Angels follow orders better, too."

    Before Courtney could recover from her shock, I leaned down and kissed her lightly on the cheek. With a final grin, I left the room.