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Chapter -4-

Demon's Folly

December 9, 2023 - 04:00 am AST Somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean ...

** Karla eased from Rufus' hips,** shifted her weight then leaned up against a bulkhead and pulled her panties up her legs. She smoothed the wrinkles in her shirt then fixed the lay of her skirt. "Have mercy. You sure you're not ready for a nap? How's your back?"

"Fingernails dun' bother me," he murmured, sitting up. He pivoted on the base of his tail and sat up against the bulkhead across from her with a grin. "I tol'ja my metabolism is different than a human, especially when I'm in this form. But you're right - I'm tired. I could use a bottle of that 'Five-Hour Energy' stuff." He dropped his head back against the wall, breathing deeply. "Why'ja act so surprised?"

"Never met a guy who could go twice in a row," Karla chuckled. She used her thumbnail to clean the fur and skin out from beneath her fingernails. "Werewolves. Check."

"Bucket list?"

"You know it." She grinned then waggled her eyebrows. "Good lord."

"Hmm?"

"I expected it to be like espresso but ... It's more of a regular high. But damn. Twice in a row. Without passing out. That's impressive. You deserve a medal." She fanned her hand in front of her face. "Feeling flushed, though. Haven't worked for a romp like that in ages."

"Ayup. Yer a lil red in the face 'n chest, doll." He offered a weak grin then closed his eyes.

Karla watched him shift back into his human form, lying without clothes on the deck. She reached for the stretched underwear and pulled them up his legs. He reached down, eyes still shut, and pulled them the rest of the way up over himself.

She reached for the satchel by his hip and pulled his clothes out and put them over his lap. Rufus grinned up at her. "Thanks, darlin. Gimmie just a sec to get at myself."

"You've earned a short nap. Stay here. I'm going to scout ahead real quick and see what's above us. Make sure this tunnel stays safe, so we can go back the way we came."

"A'ite. Sounds like a plan, beautiful."

An impish grin found its way to the corner of her lips. "Compliments will get you everywhere." She got up and slid her feet into her flats then stretched. "Okay. I'll be back." She disappeared.

The succubus reappeared on a ladder twenty-five feet up the corridor and ascended it.

She placed a manicured fingertip against the metal cover and telekinetically guided it open, making the heavy object appear extremely light. She made her way up then looked around at a collection of boots circled about her. "Huh," she murmured then continued up to the surface.

Karla used her foot, again powered by telekinesis, and nudged the manhole cover back into place. "Well, then." She smoothed her skirt with her hands and looked around at the circle of rifle barrels pointed in her face.

"Lower your weapons," said someone behind the mercenary soldiers. "They will have no effect on her." The rifles lowered and two men on the left moved. Karla turned towards the new gap in the circle. She tilted her head as a man in an all-black business suit approached. "Karla Howard I presume?"

"Now that _was cliché. How do I even respond to that? Oh, wait, I know: '_We meet at last!' So! Doctor Aris Falcon, I presume?" She smirked and looked him over. 'Interesting,' she thought to herself, 'he's not aged a day since I met him all those years ago.'

"Indeed, you presume correctly." He folded his hands in front of his pinstripe vest then brought them upwards, in front of his chin, index fingers together, thumbs together, creating a triangular shape between his palms. "You've come alone _and _unarmed?"

"Sure did. That's how I roll. So, what's up, Doc? God, I've been waiting for months to say that to you."

Falcon smirked. "Why are you here? Have you come to rescue Donovan?"

"Are you serious?" She ran her fingers back through her hair, combing it down. "If I knew I'd be coming down to meet you so soon, I'd have put myself together better. Yes, I'm here to rescue Donnie-poo. But I'm also here to kill you, take your precious artifacts and hide them from your 'peeps'. Damn, you're a piece of work. How long did it take to build this place, Aris?"

Falcon folded his arms. "From what I understand about you, girl, you don't age so long as you have sex. You've been seducing my mercenaries since this last summer. What can you possibly hope to do to hurt me? I'm not interested in having sex with you. You're filthy. You're undoubtedly diseased."

"Oh. My word." She mock-fanned herself, waving her fingers in front of her face. "Filthy? Diseased? You sure know how to talk to a lady. God, that's hot." She moved her hand back to her hair, combing it with her fingers. "You know, you're not what I expected."

"Is that so? What did you expect, succubus?"

"Your hair to be longer. For you to be sexy and good looking. I mean, don't get me wrong. You dress dapper. You're not ugly or anything. But I expected some sort of perfect looking man."

Falcon tilted his head as he approached. His mercenaries opened their circle a bit more. "Why on earth would you think I'd look like some sort of GQ model?"

"You're obsessed with perfection."

The doctor brought a hand to his chin in thought. "Well, yes. That is true. I suppose it only seems natural for people to think I'd change my outward appearance to reflect my continued exploration of mental and genetic perfection." He voice suddenly changed, becoming more demanding. "Is that seriously _what you think of me? You think I'm on a quest for some sort of personal perfection? Girl, you cannot fathom what I'm doing. I'm not on some mission of _vanity! I'm trying to perfect the world."

Karla threw her hands up in disgust. "Seriously!? All this mystery and stupid enigma shit was just a veil of crap over some 'New World Order' dogshit? Please tell me you're joking! Newsflash, people have tried taking over the world since long before Genghis Kahn, Alexander the Great or Hitler. Boy. Please tell me I'm mistaken. Please don't tell me you are _that _small minded."

"I'm not trying to rule the world. I would want nothing to do with whatever governments are in place. Did you know that humanity has already traveled among the stars? Before modern recorded history."

"Oh, well then." Karla moved her hands to her hips, standing akimbo. "That changes everything. You wanna better the world. So how does stealing people's abilities concern you?"

Falcon folded his hands behind his back. "Miss Howard, did you know that I'm older than I look? You should understand this since you, too, are apparently immortal. I'll let you in on a secret. A piece of space debris landed in Nevada. Edwards Air Force Base began construction in 1933. The military maintained their presence in the area while constructing the Groom Lake test facility."

"Oh dear God, now you're going to tell me this has something to do with Area-51? Dreamland, or whatever else it was called...?"

"Yes, very good. Do you know the difference between the CIA and the FBI?"

"Yeah," she looked around herself at the itchy-fingered mercenaries then back at Falcon. "FBI investigates in-house. CIA works abroad. More specifically, they work on anything foreign. Why?"

"So why would the CIA need to have a focused concern in Nevada?"

"Because that's where they test their stuff before deploying it abroad. No big deal. When I first got really good with teleportation, I peeked in. It doesn't live up to the hype unless you're a technology enthusiast." She waggled her brows suggestively. "You're lucky. I could have teleported you into the floor then kicked your head off your shoulders. Although that's still a possibility if you don't treat me nicer than you have so far."

"Hmm. How imaginative," he murmured. Aris waved for her to follow him. He turned around and began walking. Karla disappeared from the group of men and, upon reemergence, began walking adjacent to him.

He cast a wry smile sidelong in her direction. "For a moment, I didn't believe you when you said you could teleport. Most impressive ability. I didn't think such would be capable by the human mind. Seems somehow impossible."

"You don't know very much. Nathan used to be able to turn himself into a bolt of lightning and zip from point A to point B. Way flashier than my method. Pardon the pun if you will. And yeah, I saw your expression when I suggested what Area-51 is for. Go on, humor me, Aris."

"In 1932, a piece of debris fell from space and struck the ground near Groom Lake." Falcon shifted his gaze forward as they walked. "It didn't burn up in the atmosphere. It was made of artificial material. It had writing on it. It was made of a material and coated with an alloy that protected its integrity and kept it from being marred during atmospheric reentry. At first, everyone assumed it was of extra-terrestrial origin and, to this day, people still think an alien space craft is at that location."

"...But?"

"But after further study, the origin of the piece is from this planet," he replied. "But the piece was dated from before the Pyramids, Stonehenge or anything else you think of when you ponder the word 'old'. And, of course, there were skeptics. What if those similar resources were available on other worlds? What if this, what if that. Along comes a man named Methos and another called Isaac. They've changed their names since last I knew them. Unfortunately, I know not what they've decided on, nor do I know where they are now. They recognized the debris and they were able to explain very clearly how the writing, syntax and lettering could be translated. Everyone thought they were simply geniuses because they could understand it."

Karla's expression changed, looking quite serious. "But they translated it because they recognized it. Right?"

"Isaac did. Methos translated it, took it to Isaac for confirmation and when Isaac recognized it, he became deeply obsessed with it. He wanted it removed from the Government but they kept it in Nevada, heavily guarded. It's still there to this day, stored away underground. I was almost forty years old at the time."

The demoness blinked. "Oh! That's a twist, so you were there. Hmm, why didn't I see that coming?"

"Are you being sarcastic?"

"No, not this time. I actually thought you were a lot less interesting - that you were nothing more than the creep that helped Jon Parker steal stuff in the early sixties."

Falcon smirked at her. "So that confirms it. You really _are _the same girl that helped us on that heist for the EC. That was a long time ago. I thought your ability was something else."

"Telekinesis. Still do that trick. So, you lied about your age back then, huh? And why change your name, Aris Sokolov? Weren't you, like, a doctor for supernatural people or something? Now you're going to war with us? But you, yourself, are apparently immortal. So, if you'll pardon my French, but what the fuck?"

"As an aspiring genetics researcher in the thirties, Isaac was my ... how should I word this," he mused.

"Your first stolen ability. Okay, so you were human, you stole your first ability, and you stopped aging. You know, Isaac and Methos became interested in your scientific prowess but didn't take you seriously until later, when you'd not aged," she deduced aloud. She began skipping as they walked together.

Aris glanced at her with his eyes but kept his face forward as they walked.

"Y'know, Sokolov, I think I've figured it out now. They arranged for you to work with Jon Parker. You learned there are people with abilities other than immortality. You learned about the artifacts. You learned everything you'd need to become who you are, now. I get it. But Methos said your obsession will change things for the worse, not for the better." The skipping stopped and she sauntered instead.

"Did he now? What else has he said and where can I find him?"

"Psht," she scoffed. "Fat chance I'm telling you, Doc. But I will tell you that what you're doing will bring about the changing of ages. That's what Methos thinks. The thing that you said wound up in Nevada ... that's apparently from the First Age. I've been learning a lot by spying on people now that I've learned and mastered teleportation. Guess what? We're in the Second Age."

"You're smarter than you look. And you're more knowledgable of the situation than I gave you credit for."

"Yup. So, there's a barrier between the Second and Third Age, which your actions may bring about. Know what that barrier is? The Revelations. Ragnarock. Gehenna. The Valley of Hinnom below Mount Zion. Everything is fucked. Do you understand?"

"Time of Judgment is a myth, succubus. Just because the First Age ended with a cataclysmic catastrophe, which led humanity into the current age ... it doesn't mean the Second Age ends with a 'Time of Judgment' scenario."

"I've learned the First Age ended violently and the survivors created the Second Age. They told stories that turned into reinvented stories. And so human history, like the bible, has a blurry outline of what is to come. But the Esoteric communities of the past had oracles. Some of them predicted that time, like a river, would repeat itself. History will cycle. And people who know more about this than I do ... they think you're going to bring it to a head like an infected pimple. I'm here to deliver the antibiotics."

"Don't be naive, girl. If an asteroid struck the earth and created an Extinction Level Event, the survivors would emerge from the ruins of Earth, start the Third Age, and claim that the asteroid was the 'judgment of God.' There would be a thousand years of planetary peace. Just like the prophetic words predicted. Skirmishes would exist as they always will, but it wouldn't be on the scale of Kahn or Hitler." He shrugged in a nonchalant way.

She shrugged back. "Go on."

"But after a thousand years, supposedly, violence would return. Hmph. Yes, another enormous, global war. Eventually it will happen because violence is in our nature."

"But?"

Falcon smiled and turned to her. "My, look at you. I can't believe I didn't recognize you from all those years ago at first. I wonder how Methos is able to retain things from so long ago."

She stopped and turned to him, arms folded. "Because he was born immortal. His brain doesn't deteriorate with age, like yours is more prone to doing. So big whoop, you forgot my face at first. Go on with your story. I'm almost interested."

"Very well. So, if we jumpstart the Third Age by rediscovering the technology of the First Age _before _the mathematical probability of an asteroid striking Earth occurs, we could develop the technology to protect ourselves. According to Isaac, we as a people are not supposed to rediscover the First Age until we're well into the Third. It would be used to rebuild the world and bring about peace. To hell with waiting."

"Excuse me?" She furrowed her brows.

Aris shook his head and sighed. "No one has to die. I want to rediscover the technology of the First Age so that no one has to die. Mathematically, it's only a matter of time before this world suffers another Extinction Level Event. With the technology of the First Age, we could prevent that from occurring. We could feed the hungry become immune to diseases, possibly even terraform other worlds and spread out. No one would have to die needlessly. We could simply skip the Book of Revelation and step into the Third Age. A golden age of enlightenment."

Karla eyed him suspiciously. "You see yourself as the good guy, here...?"

"I do."

"You let Justus use your men to kill our kind. You didn't stop him."

Aris shrugged again. "Guilty as charged. I failed to stop it." He began walking again.

She folded her hands behind her back and began walking alongside of him once more. "What if the technology of the First Age is unstable in your hands and you accidentally bring about a cataclysm similar to how the First Age ended ... not with an asteroid, but with war or a virus or some other serious shit that you'd_'fail to stop.'_ Ever think of that?"

"Would you rather that millions die to war or a dormant germ...? Or billions die from the mathematical eventuality of something we could avoid ... simply by using technology that would take us back to the heavens. Well?"

Karla frowned and ran her hands through her hair again. "You're as good as Sire. You sure you didn't steal his ability?"

"You'd have agreed with me without any explanation if I had."

"Touché."

"Bless you, Karla."

She smirked. "So you _do _have a sense of humor."

"I have my moments. So, are you going to try and kill me?"

"It's my job. I promised Methos, and the man that is most likely Isaac, that I would remove you and return the artifacts to their rightful place."

"As I recall, you've never had a sense of duty in the past."

"Sure I did. But only to myself. Since end-of-the-world crap affects me, you get the short end of the stick. I'm not trying to have the whole world get jacked up, along with me, just because you have delusions of grandeur."

"Karla, we don't have to go down this route."

"Are you begging for your life? That's not exactly the way to do it, y'know." She folded her arms then glanced over her shoulder at the men with the guns. "You told them they couldn't hurt me. You knew that much. So why play coy with me when we were back over there? You being dramatic for your buddies? Now I'm seeing the real you? Is that it?"

"You've gone up against my people before. They never beat you. No one ever escaped to report your full abilities. I have virtually no intelligence on you. I didn't even realize I already knew you. I assumed you were a siren, much like Sire, and couldn't be attacked at first. And no, I don't beg."

"I call bullshit. Your pal, Krys Monroe, was teleported from an SUV to a curb, to a rooftop back in August. Don't lie. So ... how are you going to stop me from killing you?"

"Perhaps I have something you want."

"I already have what I want in life. To be me and to enjoy the hell out of being me. So, what else have you got?"

"Karla..." Falcon sighed as though annoyed and turned to her.

She, in turn, stopped walking and faced him again.

"Try to throw me with your abilities."

Her palm flashed pink and she waved her hand, using all of her energy in one hard push. The group of mercenaries flew across the room, hit the far back wall and became halfway embedded. Falcon, however, appeared completely unfazed. She blinked, eyes wide. "What!" She tightened her jaw and waved her hand back the other way. Nothing happened. "I can't throw you, nor can I teleport you. What the actual fuck?"

"Language, dear. Goodness. As you can see," he turned to look at the men across the room and frowned. "Your powers are still active. Impressively so. That wall will have to be replaced. It's sad that you've killed them all."

"Yeah, I hope you feel like shit when you call their families."

Aris shook his head. "Karla, I don't select men with families to work as my personal guard. It takes away from their training and it distracts them from the dangers of the position. Dangers like _you, _Karla Howard. So ... you're the girl that Krys mentioned. She said you attacked her in Millbrae."

"They attacked _me _in Millbrae. I defended myself accordingly." Karla looked him over then cracked her knuckles.

"Just because I can't throw or teleport you does not mean I can't fight you. I throw a mean right hook. Allow me to demonstrate what it feels like to be punched in the face with a telekinetically charged fist."

"Yes," he said with a firm nod. "That would work against me. But I'm curious about one thing: Remember what you said when we worked together all those year ago ... when I asked you about love?"

"That was decades ago." Karla froze then narrowed her gaze. "I said that I dislike the fact I'll never experience love without cheating on a lover. So I refuse to seek it out."

"You're not the first demon I've met. I tended to an injured incubus. He said the same thing. Grass is always greener on the other side, hmm? He expressed the desire to know true love, even if only for a while. While studying him, I had to help him cure sexually transmitted diseases."

"Then he was a hybrid," Karla snapped. "Our bodies destroy impurities. We cannot spread STDs. We can't even contract them. Hybrids are a myth." She paused then groaned. "You created him!"

"I did," Falcon admitted with a slow nod. "This happened only a few years after meeting you."

She balled her hand into a fist. "You created him from _MY _fucking blood? How _dare _you!"

"Yes, I did. But I didn't know that an incubus of true origin could defeat diseases. That's why I assumed you would have STDs and spoke to you in such a way when I first saw you, earlier."

"Get to the point. Where is this bastard creation?"

"He succumbed to HIV. But he'd contracted it years earlier. I'd helped him defeat other sexually transmitted diseases but didn't know to test for that one until it was too late. Back then, the virus was largely misunderstood. I discovered he'd contracted it ten months before his death. It was a sad state and it was a shame he died. However, there's a silver lining."

Karla drew her fist back. Her forearm and shoulder glowed, charging herself with telekinetic energy. "Yeah? You're running out of time."

"For the last three years of his life, he didn't need to feed. He lived without sex, completely."

Karla glared at him but kept her fist cocked back. "Oh yeah?"

"I synthesized a pill that allowed him to use sex as a pleasure, not as a vice to ensure health. Even without sex, his body didn't age. That ability is within your genetic composition. It simply lacks something found in bodily fluids. Haven't you ever asked Isaac or Methos about your kind? The incubus and succubus bloodline goes all the way back to the First Age."

She opened her fist and squinted at him in confusion. "What? No we're not. We're demons. I'm mythological hellspawn, asshat."

"You're an aggressive bloodline," Falcon told her. "Your family was punished by having their immortality stripped from them. Their genetics were altered. A governing body of the First Age used technology to remove something that would cause you and your ancestors to age. Something went wrong. Your family members began to age rapidly."

"Why haven't I heard about this before?" She lowered her hand a little further. "Keep talking."

"One of the largest families of the First Age, you were looked at as neighborhood trash. Sexual deviants. Incest, random trysts and other things of taboo nature ran rampant in the ranks of your ancestors. Isaac said he had a very low opinion of your kind because he knew your family during the First Age. The founders of the family house died in just a few weeks after the government punishment. But your lineage was resilient as trash genetics often proves to be. Look at the Neanderthal, Karla. Trash genetics compared to Homo sapiens. But they had an extreme resilience to sickness. Just look at Australia's origins: a penal colony. Now they've built their society up. They're cultured and intelligent despite once having a genetic disposition towards crime."

She lowered her gaze then lifted it. She looked him over, carefully examining his posture and facial expression. "So, you're saying we were altered as a punishment ... and that, somehow, someone figured out how to genetically repair our blood but not quite enough. What I have gathered, thus far, was that we became able to survive off of sex and evolved the other traits, later on, that would sustain us."

"Precisely correct. In time, your bloodline cleaned itself up. And now I learn that your bodies can defeat viruses and bacteria dangerous to the population? I would love to study you. Perhaps something in your genetics could be used to wipeout _all _viruses and harmful bacteria."

"Don't you get it?" she exclaimed. "You're screwing with nature you dumbass! If you take away nature's pests, you mess it all up! Bees pollinate - without them, plant life would be seriously hindered. Without the mosquito, we wouldn't have chocolate or coffee. Without flies, decomposition would have darker consequences on the living. You can't just take away something that life has deemed necessary because you want to experiment on shit! You don't know what kind of effects it will have, you moron."

Falcon appeared unfazed by her insults. "Are you still interested in considering my cure to your sexual crutch?"

"I'm _not _letting you experiment on me," she said, backing away subconsciously. "You're not going to _ever _get near enough to me to steal my blood a second time, you weirdo prick."

"Karla. The study on the incubus hybrid was successful. I solved your need to have sex in order to maintain your immortality. See that? Demons aren't the enemies of angels. They're just a family from extremely aggressive stock. You didn't change from being evil to being good - you simply grew up and stopped being aggressive towards the undeserving. There's no such thing as angels and demons. Science has taken the mystery out of your existence."

"That's real swell. What happened to your hybrid test subject? He died."

"From natural causes because he contracted a disease with no cure. Karla, he went three years without needing to feed. He even had a wife."

Her brows furrowed. "He had a wife?"

"Sadly, she contracted HIV from him. She passed away in the 1990's. He'd already had it when they met. He didn't show symptoms until they'd been married for two years. But he was happy. You can be happy. You can help me and I can help you. We can have a working relationship and you don't have to worry about dying the way he did if what you've said is true."

"It is. I can't get sick. I can't even catch a cold," she murmured softly. "I know where you are, now. I'm going to confer with Methos and Isaac. You're right; they've both changed their names. I know them, and where to find them and you can't follow me. I'm going to find out if you're being honest with me."

"So you're not going to strike me down?"

"By the time I come back for you, someone else most likely will have already done the job for me. I won't mourn you. But I need to know if you're telling the truth and I..."

"I have something you need, Karla."

"If someone else kills you, it's no longer my problem."

"But then you'll never solve your Achilles heel. The pill isn't a permanent solution. But it can be used as a permanent substitute."

She balled her hands into fists and began pacing. "Dammit. Great! A pill to fix all my needs! Does it cause cancer? Does it come in cool freakin' flavors like Chocolate and Cool Ranch? God dammit!"

"Calm down, let's talk about this. We're in the secondary warehouse just outside of my lab. I was headed there when you came up from the sewer access hatch."

"You're _NOT _going to study me or get a sample. Stop trying! I don't know the long-term effects. Aspartame is linked to Alzheimer's for Chri'sake! Sucralose is linked to cancer!"

"Karla, it's a vitamin supplement. It's a combination of synthesized sexual release that you take orally as a substitute for your random trysts. The only noted side effect I've found is that it made him hyper after he took it. That was it."

Her eyes widened briefly. She grimaced and bit her lower lip. "Dammit." Karla started pacing again. "Jesus, God dammit." She pivoted on her heel, pacing back the other direction. "Did he have any powers?"

"No. Nothing beyond the inability to age. I combined your DNA with a stock adult human. He was already fully-grown but his aging stopped completely. However, he never developed your telekinetic ability, or anything else."

Karla turned again, walking back the way she came then whirled about once more. The pacing succubus ran her hands back through her hair again. "I'll have you know I am proud of my demonic heritage. I'm a sex demon. That's who I am. I don't need you taking that away from me with science, okay?"

Falcon lifted his hands semi-defensively. "Fair enough. You're a sex demon. But I'm trying to help you. I studied the hybrid clone to try and find a cure for your ailment. My subject died for you to finally have happiness. It would be a shame to waste all the research. I did this because you were the first Esoteric person with an active ability. Studying you became one of my larger projects back then. Consider the pill."

"Just ... shut the fuck up while I think." She glared at him but continued to pace while sizing him up. After another two laps, she turned and stalked towards him. "Okay, listen up. There's a gorgeous redhead coming your way. You can't kill her. You've already killed everyone who could ever even try to mortally injure her back when you let your people take down the entire esoteric community. Oh, and newsflash, I think Justus is innocent."

"Why are you telling me about this redheaded woman?

"She's not from this world and she's on MY team. Get me? She's coming for your ass and you'll die because she's literally a demigod. Yes, they're real; no you can't study or kill her. All she wants is the artifact you _STOLE _from Japan. So if you have it for her, you MAY get to live. But don't tell her we spoke. She's a pacifist per se. I'm confident she won't assassinate you unless you refuse her that artifact. Again, do _not_tell her we spoke. Got it?"

"I understand. You've shown me a great deal of faith, Karla. I'll return the gesture. I'll let your people leave after your friend finds me. I'll give her what she desires, rest assured. But trust me. Demigods are no more real than demons or vampires, both lacking simple chemistry components to remain ageless. I've already proven that you're not a 'demonic creature from beyond the earthen realm.' I'm sure I could prove that she isn't a..."

"Shut up! Science may prove or disprove a LOT _of shit, but TRUST me ... this chick is NOT from this planet. I don't know if she's an alien, and maybe science could prove or disprove that ... but she's _not from Earth. Your one super soldier attacked Evan and Johann. He was able to render their abilities ineffective. But he couldn't stop this chick. She creates fire that can burn underwater. She talks to other goddesses in mirrors and consorts with them. They're on another plane of existence. She's the legit shit. You got that, Jack? Now, when she comes for your sorry ass, you'd better give her the artifact she wants. Understand? And this doesn't get you off the hook with me. I very well may still come and kill you. This is a one-time offer of letting you go so that I _can study _YOU. Now where are those stupid pills?"

"I understand." He held his hand out, with several capsules in his palm. "Try it if you like. Try it when you're ready. Just consider it."

Karla sneered. "Good." She disappeared.

Falcon glanced down at his palm; the pills had disappeared with the succubus. A smile tugged at the corners of his lips. "Very good, little girl."

X

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Next chapter: https://www.sofurry.com/view/649125