Prologue

"Hey! Hey Filia, wake up."

The girl rose groggily as she looked at her surroundings. She was in an alley on the ground... and her head felt heavy. Not like she had a headache, but as though there was actual physical weight on her head.

And who was Filia? ...And who was she for that matter? And where was that voice coming from?

"Who are you talking to?" she asked.

"You." The voice said. "You see anybody else?"

So she was Filia. She guessed. It made sense, even if she didn't ever remember being called Filia... or anything to contradict it... or anything at all really.

"Okay..." Filia said, slowly getting up. "My name is Filia I guess... who are you then? ...and where are you?" Filia looked around in all directions, but no one was there. "..hello?"

"I'm here." said the deep gravelly voice. "Right on yer noggin kid." Filia felt up on her head and gave quick squeak as to what she felt.

There was another mouth and set of eyes on top of her head.

"Wh-what are you..." she said, trembling. Her knees felt weak. "I-I-I-"

"Calm down kid... listen, I know this is gonna be hard to accept, but I'm a demon." strangely that wasn't the worst thing he could have said. "I was summoned here... I don't know why. I needed a host. You were the closest one around."

Filia took a few minutes to let that fact sink in. She felt at her hair, which went down to her back. She picked it up and it felt less like hair and more rubbery, as though it were a mass of tentacles. She got a look at her odd hair, which still at least looked more or less like hair and it was a deep black color, almost mesmerizing.

"A-are you the reason I can't remember anything?"

"Could be." the demon replied. "I mean I just jumped on the nearest host I could find."

Filia tried to hold herself together, but it was no use. Her knees went weak and she began to sob. "W-what's going on? I just woke up... and I have n..no id-idea w-what's hap-happening!"

The creature on top of her seemed to be at a loss for words. "Erm... there there..." he said unconvincingly but Filia didn't hear him over the sound of her own hysterical sobbing.

Her sobbing was so loud she didn't hear the man coming up behind her in the alley.

"What do we have here?" said the man, and finally a red-eyed Filia looked up to see the shady looking man at her. "Lost little girl, huh?"

"Go away." Filia said, her voice sounding dead. "Leave me alone. Please."

"Oh that's fine little missy." said the man. "Just cough up whatever you got and I'll be on my merry way."

"I don't have anything." Filia said, in the same dead voice.

"Well then I guess we have a problem." the man said. "C'mere little girl."

"I said..." Filia's voice was rising, anger and tension sounding through it. "LEAVE ME ALONE!"

and her 'hair' jutted forward into the man's body, piercing him in ten different places. The robber groaned and fell forward, blood falling into the alleyway.

"Oh... oh no..." Filia said.

"Hell yeah, that kicked ass!" the demon on her head said. "You've got a natural talent, kid. We could go far together."

"I... I killed a man..." Filia had no idea if she had ever killed someone before but she dearly hoped she hadn't. "What am I going to do...?"

The demon paused. "hmmm... we probably want to get out of her before any cops show up. I know a perfect hiding place, but first see if the guy has any cash on him."

Filia blanched. "C-cash... you mean rob him?"

"You're right." the demon replied sarcastically. "Because he's definitely going to use it and it's certainly not like he was going to steal from you. Look, you don't have anything and if you want to eat you're gonna need money. So see what he has."

It was hard to argue with that logic so she began nervously frisking him and eventually found a wallet with some money in it. About two hundred Canopian dollars. So they were in the Canopy Kingdom. Was Filia a member of the Canopy Kingdom? And how did she know about that, even though she couldn't remember anything about herself.

"Okay," she said, standing up. "Where should we go?"

"Just run, kid." the demon said. "I'll lead you to where you need to go. The name's Samson by the way."

Her hair was named Samson... and now she had an odd, almost godlike strength with her hair.

The joke wasn't lost on her.

.-

Samson's hiding place turned out to be a small apartment that seemed oddly luxurious. There was a bedroom, a kitchen, and even a working radio there.

"Is... is this your place?" Filia asked.

"The place of the guy who summoned me, anyways." Samson replied. With a dark chuckle he added. "He won't be using it all that much."

Filia shivered at that comment. She sat down in the easy chair and looked herself over. "Samson, how did you know my name?"

"It was the only thing about you I could get out of your head." he explained. "Everything else... poof. A blank. I mean, I could get basic stuff, but stuff everybody knows. Important historical dates, names of streets, that the moon ain't actually made of cheese, but nothing about you specifically."

Filia nodded. That was what she basically knew what anyone was expected to know. She knew the names of cities and how to brush your teeth and how to work a radio, but when anything about herself came up... she drew a blank.

Filia looked herself over. "I must have been relatively well-off. This looks like a uniform for a private all-girls school... and even though it's dirty it looks like it was in relatively good condition... weird to think there's a school with skirts this short though..." Filia looked herself over. "I'm wearing running shoes too. Must have meant I was relatively athletic."

"Wow." Samson said. "Yer a regular Ms. Marple, ain't ya?"

"...who?"

Samson sighed. "I'd ask what they teach you kids in school these days but I don't think I'd get any explanation."

Filia laid back in the easy chair. "Ugh, and for some reason I'm really tired too." she leaned over and turned on the radio. "I hope something good."

"Next up on RKO is... The Shadow!" came the voice from the Radio.

Filia's eyes lit up. "Ooh..." One of the few things she knew and remembered was this show. And she knew that she loved hearing it every night it came on.

"Oh are you kidding me?" Samson said. "You like this shlock?"

"Samson, shh!"

"Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of man?"

"They're so fake." Samson continued. "Nothing in the real world works like that."

"Samson, shush!"

"The Shadow knows."

"You know it's just people with microphones right?" Samson added. "It doesn't actually happen."

"Samson, SHUT UP!"

And then Samson was miraculously quiet for the rest of the show.