On Friday morning, Leslie jogged as usual, taking a considerable detour to meet Angel Dust outside Porn Studios. Though he'd had a busy night, he seemed fresh enough, as if from a recent shower. Meanwhile, Leslie was damp from sweat, and sported a skinned knee after slipping on some ice. Winter came early in the Pride Ring.

"Shoulda changed shoes," Angel muttered as he minced around a frozen puddle. "Warnin' ya now, if I go flyin' in these heels, I'm takin' ya down with me."

She nodded. According to Angel, he never went barefoot due to insecurities about his 'weird spider feet'. He'd show everything else, he told her, just not those. Leslie knew it was true, because she'd scrubbed through some of his adult films, out of morbid curiosity - cringing all the way - and sure enough, the shoes stayed on. Even now, she regretted searching those videos. Knowing Angel as well as she did, to see him so exposed felt like an invasion of privacy… and the hyperbolized moaning didn't exactly help her discomfort.

Leslie returned her thoughts to here and now. Anecdotally, she said, "I looked this up on Voogle. In those heels, you're almost as tall as the tallest human who ever lived."

"Fuck, really?" Angel seemed to like this fact, picking up the pace as they walked on. "Guess I got used ta it. Hey, you're shootin' up. What, ya gotta be 5'4" now?"

She nodded. "National average for US women." When Leslie considered her growth of six inches in one year, she thought of Mr Hyde: hadn't he begun as small and underdeveloped too, representing Jekyll's unflexed evils?

"I thought ya was half-English," Angel said.

"Yeah, my mom's side. Never been, don't know the average," she responded. As they passed an office block with tinted windows, Leslie caught the reflection of an apparent zombie, lumping along with its head low. It was wearing the same greyish tracksuit as her, and had the same infernally stupid ears. God, how pathetic. Time was, a brisk jog would leave her revitalized, not complete the picture of total exhaustion. Leslie tried to keep her head raised, and focused on the clop-clop-clop of Angel's shoes against the sidewalk.

"I dunno any fun facts," he said. "Uh… lemme… wait, I got one!"

"Oh?"

"Yeah. So 'pparently, don't quote me on this, ya can bite a guy's finger off with the same force it takes to bite a carrot."

A stab of dark surprise. "Really? Jesus," she said.

"Gruesome, ain't it?" Angel japed, giving her a playful push. "Someone like you can handle that pretty good, huh?"

Another stab. "Ummm…" Her chest tightened, and she took a far-too-shallow breath. What? Someone like her? There was a bench coming up; Leslie started speed-walking, and yet doubted she would make it.

"Les, wh… whazzamatta?" The clopping slowed and Angel's voice grew worried. "Uh, I'm sorry. Hey! It was a stupid joke, I take it back."

Again, she felt Alastor's beartrap teeth in her flesh. That hard shoulder-punch with irregular shards of pain. The trickle of blood down her neck. The pull and snap. Having reached the bench, she dropped into the crash position, and she skipped right over being embarrassed because she had to breathe first, she had to breathe or she'd die.

"Woah, woah, woah! What the fuck, Les? Ya OK?" Angel trotted over and placed a hand on her back; she flinched away. Angel removed the hand just as quickly. "Hey, hey," he said, "don't panic, it's a'right. You're doin' jus' fine, ya hear me?"

No, no no no. She wasn't fine. And she had to come up with a lie, quick. "Had a nightmare last night," she stammered.

"Nightmare?"

"Uh-huh. It's still…"

Frowning - possibly unconvinced - he walked in front of her and crouched, rubbing her arms. "Hey, you're OK now. Deep breaths," he said, demonstrating. "In for three, out for four, yeah?" They breathed together, and Leslie tried to stop shaking, tried to ignore the new, cold sweat that came over her. For a good minute, they ran through this breathing exercise, and Leslie wondered where Angel picked it up. Just the kind of thing that could help Husk through a flashback… that would explain it.

"Sorry," she said.

"Don't worry 'bout it, hun, I've heard ya havin' night terrors. They suck," Angel consoled her. "Fuck, that hit ya fast!"

As Leslie regained her breath, she was struck by the silence of the deserted early-morning street, and the looming pink radiance of the building they'd come from. That inciting remark… she had to know. "What does that mean, 'someone like me'?" she asked.

A self-conscious wince, and Angel cast his gaze to the floor. "Ahh, y'know, the fuckin'... the bunny thing, carrots? It was a stupid fuckin' joke." Then he looked up, saw the flash of understanding in Leslie's eyes. "Wait, what the hell else didja think I meant?" She couldn't answer, and started rapid-blinking to hold back the tears, and prayed the teeth wouldn't come back. Somehow Angel knew. His face hardened. "Les," he said, "did somethin' bad happen with Bambi?"

"What? No! No, nothing!"

"I'm gonna kill him." Angel stood, ready to stomp back to the hotel in a hundred steps or less. "That's it, I'm gonna kill him."

"Angel, stop! Wait!" Leslie called, and she grabbed one of his arms. Clearly nothing about her demeanor suggested things were fine… but she had to smooth this over. She couldn't let Angel do something drastic when there was so little contracted time left. "Angel, sit with me. I have to tell you something."

With an odd, slack-jawed stare, Angel let her drag him back to the bench. Two arms crossed, two on his hips. Now she had to pull herself together for the purpose of reassuring him, and so soon after a panic attack, it was a strange position to be in.

"OK," Leslie began. "Last week on Hallowe'en night, Bambi and I went for a walk, by the bayou."

Angel draped his ridiculously lank legs across the sidewalk. "What bayou?"

"He has that door-portal in his office," she reminded him, "and it can open onto someplace in Louisiana, apparently. He was in a good mood that night, so we paid a visit."

"He's got…" Angel shook his head. "A'right, puttin' a pin in that," he said, miming it, but immediately added, "Fuck, imagine goin' back upstairs! Even if it is the South. I'd give my left nut for that!"

Leslie shrugged. "Guess it's just an overlord thing-"

"Ehhhh, not all a'them. Likely not even half."

"Or, uh, the I.M.P. guy? He has access. I didn't think it was unusual..."

"Nah, I doubt Bambi's that fuckin' powerful. Maybe it's simulated, or… wait, hold up, was this like 30s Louisiana, or the here and now?"

"How do I know? All lakes look the same to me. The frogs croaked with the same accent."

"Yeah, I gottit, stupid question," Angel said, then lightly slapped his own face, possibly for getting derailed. Perchance he was buzzed. "What I'm gettin' at is… draggin' ya ta some bayou for real? Sounds more'n a little dangerous, 'specially if he still had his weird whateva mojo."

Of course, Alastor had kept his powers in the human world - at the very least, he could shift into that demon form, the one Leslie felt more than she saw. She feigned ignorance, not to alarm Angel further. "I dunno. Anyway," she said, "we took a stroll to the least muddy spot we could find, and uh… we fucked, basically."

It sounded strange in the morning air with a panicked tear running over her lip. Angel's eyebrows lifted. "No."

"Yeah."

"That early?" Angel said. "I figured - I know it's dragged on for months a'ready, but..." Again, he slapped himself, put his agenda aside. "So… what happened? Why're ya in this state?"

"It's a lot," she admitted, "to process, but it wasn't bad. It went well... really well, in some ways. I mean, thank God I wrote what I did, right?" and she gave a nervous laugh. "So yeah, that happened… it's a lot. It was a whole thing, but I'm fine."

"And?"

"And?"

"You're bein' cagey. What else? Les, I'm sorry, but there's no way that's all he did to ya."

"Why not?" she challenged him, stupidly, pathetically. "I mean, just maybe I'm desirable to someone. Maybe that hadn't occurred to you."

"Don't even. I'm not sayin' you're undesirable, I'm sayin' you're fuckin' delusional if you think Al gives a flyin' fuck about ya! Bambi, I mean. Shit. But he don't care about ya, Les, besides the stuff that directly benefits him. Maybe it's good sometimes, maybe he makes ya feel special or whateva the fuck, but I know in my fuckin' bones he's got ulterior motives. And now all 'a sudden, you're comin' off fuckin' shell-shocked! So what else happened in that fuckin' swamp?"

The tone of Angel's voice honestly scared her. Still she resisted. "Any more F words?" she quipped, even as the shaking resumed.

"For the sake'a piss, just tell me what he did!" Angel cried, quite flippant in his frustration. "You're my friend, Les, I gotta know. Was it just mental, like freaking ya out, or'd he bite chunks outta ya?"

Leslie's emotions betrayed her, and she buried her face in her ears. "Stop yelling at me, please! I can't fucking bear it." The tears came: loud, sobbing, shameful. "Fine, yes, yes, he did, but I wanted it! I asked for it, no, please, please, don't- don't talk to Bambi," she begged, holding the hem of his jacket. "Don't do anything. It's three weeks. I don't know what he'll do if we confront him. We'll get in trouble!"

Now she was a blubbering mess, Angel had to let some of the anger go. He stooped to hug her, but still he muttered close to her ear. "I knew Bambi was up ta somethin' rotten," he said. "Fuck, Les, I'm so angry. He makes my fuckin' piss fizz."

"Three weeks," Leslie repeated, "I'll be fine."

Angel broke the hug, meeting her eye with earnestness. "Stay in my room," he said, "in the studio."

"Huh?"

"I ain't wild about ya bein' in the same buildin' as Val, but… it's safer'n my hotel room, in terms'a where Bambi'd check. Ya can sleep, ya can keep some distance."

Leslie shushed him. Across the road, a street lamp flickered, drawing her attention to a vagrant imp, huddled in a doorway of a drugstore, and she was staring right at them. Leslie was struck with a nasty thought: could Alastor have a network of homeless informers working for him? It sounded ridiculous, but surely someone like him needed his ear to the wall at all times.

And oh God, Angel had slipped up. She backed away from him. "You called Bambi by his name," she said. "Oh shit. Oh fuck, what if he heard? What if he knows now?"

Before she could dissolve into tears again, Angel took her shoulders and bent down, closer to her level. The pink light of Porn Studios barely crested over his (also pink) coif of hair. "Listen," he said, "I will make sure - don't look at her, look at me - I will make sure Bambi don't bite ya like that again. We ain't gonna get ourselves killed, but we'll keep ya safe. There's no way he'll come anywhere near—"

That was the last she heard, before the ground was shook by an oddly familiar echoing blast.

Then another. Then several. Breaking glass.

"Whaaaaat the fuck?"

Startled, the two of them twisted round and saw clouds of black smoke, and pink shards raining in the distance. The skeleton of Porn Studios, its metal and stone, was collapsing. The sound of it was tremendous, like an ocean wave, and so loud. Leslie and Angel jogged backwards as the structure slowly toppled; the homeless imp, too, was on her feet.

"—GOTTA GO, C'MON, WE GOTTA MOVE!!"

Leslie backwards-jogged faster, but her eyes fixed on the building in frightened awe. With increasing momentum, it crumbled to earth. Debris chunks the size of her fist flew from the smoke. One hit her collarbone. She squeaked, tumbling onto the asphalt. More smoke. More debris. The building's topmost floors smashed into the place opposite, and then the cloud obscured her view. It was so thick, she couldn't breathe.

"LES! LES!"

The final almighty crash which seemed never to end. Then, faintly, a sound of wires whipping to and fro. Angel came to her, grabbed her waist, and she felt the elastic potential in his legs - jumping-spider legs. They sprang impossibly skywards. Leslie shrieked as broken power lines slashed by, barely missing her and Angel. They landed on somebody's fire escape, and pressed themselves against the brickwork until gravity finished having its way with the skyscraper.

When it was over, Leslie had tinnitus, and the blaring car alarms around them were muffled, practically underwater. She hugged the wall, gingerly tried to move her shoulder and hissed. Nope, no no no. Broken collarbone. Take it easy. She swiveled - carefully - to check on Angel, as he untangled his limbs and settled on the steel grating like a sack of coal. He began scraping micro-debris off his tongue.

"Fuck," Angel lamented, eyes streaming, "ahhh, Jesus, Mercury was in there! What the hell just fuckin' happened?"

Leslie had no answers. Just another day of senseless destruction in Hell. All she could think to do was take Angel's hand and squeeze it, as they stared at the ruins of Porn Studios.