Once upon a time, there was a little girl named Christine Day. And what Christine wanted, more than anything else, was to live a famous, yet safe, and normal life. What Christine Day had was ambition. She thought that this was going to give her what she wanted. But what she did not know that she had was this: a guardian angel. This Angel, of heaven and hell, of heaven and earth rather, preferred to remain unknown. But what this Angel would do for her was limitless.

I smiled as I loaded my equipment into my car. Who was he to compare himself to an angel? Though, with his intimate acquaintance with heaven, he could not help but assume that an angel was nothing special or beautiful indeed. Willing toadies to a vicious, careless, omnipotent God. I was better than the angels; at least I had more influence.

But either way, a guardian angel is still a romantic concept, and one that she, devout Catholic that she is, chooses to cling faithfully to.

The evening was coming on, as slowly as it ever did in Connecticut. It was halfway through June, and the evening was as breathlessly humid as the interior of an oven. I placed the last thing I would need in the trunk of my car, and checked my watch. 7:47. I was right on time.

With the professional detachment and methodical motions that always accompanied me before an operation, I ran over my procedure for the night. Charles Day was being kept in the stable wing of the hospital, which, luckily, was on the other side of the building from the emergency wing (the only place besides the psych ward where doctors would be likely to patrol the corridors) and facing away from the road. It was also located right near a loading platform, which meant that I was entirely free to break one of the chains on the fences and have a perfect access route. I would find some place to conceal myself—residents' recreation rooms were perfect for this, since they always had sizeable coat closets and no one to use them—and I would wait until the hospital shut down for the night. Then, with cover of darkness, I would go to Charles Day's room, and…

Well, the fluid that I had prepared to go into his IV line had three benefits:

It was practically untraceable. Forensics experts would have to be looking for the compound specifically, and once the fluid had gone into Day's body, it would leave no residue in the bag.

It caused a completely natural-looking heart attack. Mr. Day's heart was on the fritz, the doctors would accept a relapse. Regrettable, unfortunately, but not unheard of.

It was 100 lethal.

He would insert his compound into Day's IV, and be out before anyone knew he had even been in. Of all the operations he had performed in his day, this was by far one of the less complicated. If there had been security cameras to dodge, well, that would have been a different matter.

But this was an old hospital, in a depressed city. It could barely scramble itself up to code as it was, and somewhere, someone had passed money along to make sure that expensive security cameras were overlooked in the inspections. Things like that not only happened, but they were a lot more common than most people ever assumed.

I started the car and took the back roads to the hospital. I was completely confident that no one would find me, but one could never be too careful. When I pulled up in the abandoned parking lot across the street from the loading bay of the hospital, I resisted the urge to phone Christine's house and verify that she was where she was supposed to be. I assumed that by the time I had gotten back, at around midnight (I wanted to wait until I was certain all hospital personnel had gone home) that she would be asleep. Of course, there were always the variables that I had been unable to account for; perhaps she would be sleeping over at a friend's house, or perhaps she would still be awake. But neither situation had any sizeable disasters attending them, so I had let them slide for the moment.

I checked my watch again, and pulled the equipment from my trunk. A crowbar (it was doubtful I would need that much force), my lock pick kit (never leave home without it), the syringe of compound, which I tucked carefully into my breast pocket, and, as always, gloves.

The chain on the fence outside the loading dock was as flimsy and rusted I knew it would be. With just a twist of the crowbar, the tired old metal shattered and the gate gaped stupidly open. I tossed the crowbar, which I had made sure to be as old as its surroundings, into a pile of sheet metal and rusty tools that rested against the chain-link fence separating the parking lot from the hospital. The next obstacle that faced me was no greater; the door next to the great portcullis of the loading bay was heavy metal, but locked only simply with a key padlock. It was easy enough to pick, and then I was into the building. The lights were still bright, but I knew from the silence in the halls that most of the doctors were gone, and the nurses had only a few more rounds to perform before they too left for the night. I took the stairs to the second floor, since I did not trust the elevator, and right off to the left as I quitted the stairwell was a brightly lit, and completely deserted recreation room. The coat closet was empty, with more than enough room for me to completely disappear into the shadows.

The face of my clock read 8:57. It took quite a while to reach the hospital on back roads, and unfortunately, that was the way I would have to leave as well. I would wait, crouched in this closet, until 10:00. Since 'lights out' was most definitely earlier, I might even have the chance to make my move early. I did not want Nadir to be waiting with my jet on that little airstrip for long, since that would most assuredly raise suspicions. However, I still did not have many worries on that head. The airstrip was in this city, and had been nearly abandoned by government negligence for several long and damaging years. I was reluctant to let Nadir land my jet there, but I knew that my pilot was skillful and could certainly avoid a few potholes.

As I sat there in the darkness, the lights flickered out. I was surprised. Nine was certainly an early lights out, but I was not grumbling. Sizeable as this closet might have been, it was still uncomfortable sitting space for a grown man, especially one curled up in the corner like this. I heard the nurses walking by in the hall outside, chatting and laughing with the relief of another day's shift done. I waited for them to go down the stairs—they did not trust the elevator either, it seemed—and I left the room.

There was one nurse left in the visitors' kiosk, but she was deeply engrossed in charts and patients' records. I drifted across the hall, hidden well in the shadows, and went into room #42, where the name 'Charles Day' had been inked in on a white board that served as a roster.

The room was so silent that it took me a moment to register that they were no longer monitoring the function of his heart. That seemed foolhardy for a moment, but then I realized again what a blessing it was to work in an under funded hospital. I had been ready to race against the nurses' vigilance, but now it was going to be a piece of cake.

Thankfully he was still hooked to an IV, or my plan would have hit a pothole. I was certain that an autopsy would reveal a hole near one of the arteries from the syringe, which would definitely lead to a foul play investigation. But, there was nothing that stood in the way of my revenge. For revenge was what I was after, even though I did love Christine enough to kill for her. But this was exquisite, the chance to bring vengeance down onto a negligent parent. A parent so overwhelmed by grief and anger that they sought to take their own lives, when they refused to realize that their lives were not their own to take. Charles Day, as devout a Catholic as he had raised his daughter to be, should have remembered that suicides were granted no place in the kingdom of heaven. But, moreover, he should have realized that suicide was no choice because he had a daughter depending on him. I felt my uncontrollable fury well up in me, and if I had not had the experience of controlling it, I knew that I would have stabbed him to a bloody pulp right then and there. He had Christine to care for! My mother…

My mother was understandable. She had had me.

But Christine, Christine! Who could abandon loveliness and goodness itself?

I moved up beside him, any sorrow or pity I might have felt for him entirely done away with in the face of my complete loathing, and injected the syringe with professional accuracy into the IV bag. The hole was small enough to leak no fluid, and I watched as the satisfying spiral of clear liquid was absorbed into this traitor's system. I watched as the struggles began, as he tried to make his heart start beating again. I watched in cruel omnipotence as the trickle of blood from a bitten tongue leaked from the corners of his locked jaw. I swear, I was so enthusiastic that I could almost hear the slowing beats of his heart. And then, there was absolute silence. Glorious silence. The silence of the grave.

As I looked at the body, I felt only satisfaction, both for myself and for Christine. Oh, if only I could soften the pain of her father's passing with a look at his face right now. The eyes, so wide, so expressive of agony and guilt, the hands, so white from their tension and from no heart to pump the blood to them. The beauty of a murder was timeless, and I knew, then and forever, that I would never tire of it. There was something so artistic about death by poison, even though it was not my favored method of execution.

I was filled with the glorious euphoria of power, of the penultimate power…the power of death. Now I could look forward to having the ultimate power. The power of life. I could have her now, I could take her and make her grow, make her strong and give her exactly what she wanted. And she…she in return, could grant me that same power. For so long I had thought myself to be only strong in the power of death. Perhaps, she could give me a taste of life.

These musings cleared my head remarkably quickly, and I felt the danger of my situation. Even nurses made rounds of the corridors now and then, and here I was, standing right next to my victim. I had things to do.

Quickly then, I laid the freshly cut rose beside him, and snapped the picture, hopeful that the swift glare of the flash would go unnoticed. Then, slipping the rose into the vase on the next patient's bedside table, I made my way back to my car. My watch read 9:18.

It was nearly an hour later before I reached her home, and at first I was very encouraged by the fact that I didn't see a single light. I took the chloroform that I kept in my glove compartment and dashed a liberal amount onto my handkerchief, at the same time making sure that no drops could fall out. I wanted it to seem as if Christine had, for whatever reason, jumped ship. Her car was in the driveway, and I had already arranged for some of my American contacts to come and haul the car away in the wee hours of the morning. I would take care of her home, removing the proper amount of clothing, etc.

The door was locked, but that was nothing I could not overcome, and approximately three seconds later I was back in her home. I remembered where the creaking stairs were, and I was able to come almost silently to her bedroom door, which stood ajar, allowing for a draft to breathe through the upper halls. But her bed was empty. This was the outcome I had dreaded, and I swore silently, resisting the urge to punch a hole through something. I walked down the hallway, making sure that she was not to be found in either the bathroom or the other bedroom. No luck. And, from the looks of things in her room, she had made the decision to leave very quickly. Clothes were hanging off the edges of her drawers in the very haphazard way that I would have tried to duplicate. I decided not to change anything while I was there, but just as I was about to leave, the cover of her most current journal caught my eye. It was obvious that she had meant to bring it, but the thing had fallen off the edge of her bed and now lay partially concealed. I fished it out from the wreckage under her bed, and flipped to the most recent entry, which was dated yesterday.

She described her decision not to go to school, and her visit to the library, as well as her impressions about me—very revealing—and then she quickly went on to describe, in a very shaky hand, what she was going to do afterwards.

I think I'll go crazy if I stay by myself. Raoul has told me…Raoul has told me, not only the name of my guardian, but also who he is. I didn't want to write it down, because I didn't want to think it was true. But it all makes sense, and I can't ignore that! I learned about it yesterday, during his midnight visit, and the fact that he might be a murderer never seemed more apparent to me than it does today. I've never been this scared before in my life. I don't think I can stay here by myself anymore, which is why I was so glad that Raoul offered me a room in his apartment. He was the one who convinced me that I shouldn't stay here, and I need to pack if I'm going to be ready for him to pick me up at 3.

I had to remind myself very quickly not to be angry with her. She was the victim in all of this, and that was partially my fault. What was the poor girl to think, after all? But that boy, that wretched, interfering boy!

I wondered if, when I went to his home, if I would have enough time and privacy to kill him. I felt my fingers twitch with a familiar, murderous urge. The rage I had felt at Mr. Day was nothing to the fury I felt towards de Chagny. The emotion boiled just on the verge of uncontrollable, its burning poison forcing its way agonizingly through my bloodstream. And at the same time as my anger grew, so did my original resolve.

Raoul would die. He would die horribly and painfully, and at great length. However, the mental torture that I would put him through would be worse than any physical torture thereafter. He would know where I had taken Christine, since he knew of my many holdings in Paris, and I would lead him a merry chase, making him believe that I had only kidnapped her to torture him. If he were really as infatuated with her as I thought he was, then he would be in agony by the time that I finally made an end to his meddlesome life.

However, first things had to come first. Miss Day, my Christine, was in his home.

The guest room that she was staying in was a small room across from the main bedroom, connected by a small hallway. It had no windows and was far from the front door. The closest entrance was, really, Raoul's bedroom window. My heart beat with murderous anticipation, but I quieted it. I would need to be in possession of all my faculties if I was going to pull this off without having to kill Raoul in the process. That would be a shame, especially at this point in the game. But I was confident. I had once spirited away a Turkish minister from under the noses of every single one of his advisors, and this, though far less coordinated, could hardly be more difficult.

His neighborhood was completely quiet by the time I reached it, sometime around quarter to eleven. There were no lights on in any of the houses, and the only illumination was from the glaring orange street lamps on either corner of his road. Raoul's block of houses, set slightly further back along the road than the others, was partially in shadow. I parked on an adjacent street and walked to the back of his home, where de Chagny, true Frenchman that he was, slept with his window wide open. Ordinarily, I would have been able to jump over the sill easily, but this time, since I knew that I would be carrying a body with me on the way back, I brought along a small stepstool.

The innocent boy was sound asleep, and I only made a small detour to check and see whether or not his brother still kept him company. Raoul had made a valiant effort to peel the picture up from the ceiling, I saw, but he'd only managed to shred part of the face off in the process. I saw supplies for wallpapering stacked in the corner of his room and knew that I would have to leave an extra picture somewhere. But perhaps later.

In three steps I was across the hall and staring down at my angel.

I had seen her smiling with sarcastic humor, with a tiny dimple laughing on the side of her mouth. I had seen her eyes both grateful and terribly sad. But she was never more beautiful than when she was sleeping.

Her brown curls were recklessly strewn across the pillow, dark stains against the white pillowcases. Her arms were thrown above her head, and her face rested in the crook of one of her elbows. One of her legs drooped over the edge of the bed, and her left hand was clenched in a fist around the end of her pillow. I can't remember having ever seen a more active sleeper. Once more, my lips twitched, and I wanted to laugh.

The way her face was positioned made it difficult for me to wedge the chloroformed handkerchief over her nose and mouth, but I simply turned her face so that it was gently upturned towards me, and then felt her go limp in my hands. I knew that she would not wake up.

Gently, gently, almost as if she were a porcelain doll, I picked her up, resting one arm on her back and shoulders and the other under her knees. I thanked Raoul then for having a new home, because I did not have to worry about the floor creaking as I carried her into his room. He did not stir as I carried her out of his house, right through his bedroom window.

The night was so peaceful, so still, that I almost wanted to just walk with her, like this, helpless in my arms. Her weight seemed inconsequential to me, and the way that her head rested on my shoulder drove me wild with repressed feeling. I could not believe that at long last, she was mine! The joy that surged through me at this realization was almost too much to believe. At long last, I held the only woman I had ever wanted, the only one I had ever been waiting for, right here in my arms. I knew that there was a long road ahead of me, first winning her trust and then winning her love, but for right now, everything was perfect.

I looked back towards de Chagny's house as I walked towards my car, debating the resolve I had made. Did he really deserve to die? I had Christine, after all, and all his annoyances had meant nothing, in the end. Why did I want to make him come after me, and put myself in the position of prey after finally having found what I needed for ultimate peace?

I was, for thirty seconds, actually on the verge of calling a peace treaty between myself and de Chagny.

And then I realized, where would be the fun in that?

It was nearly half past eleven when I left his house, and I took the highway to the airport, where, as I predicted, Nadir had ordered the jet a little bit early. It was waiting for me when I drove up. One of my attendants took my car keys and was given the job of selling my house in America and making sure that any evidence was cleaned up. I placed Christine in one of the jet's cabins, and injected her with a sedative, just enough to keep her unconscious for another 24 hours. That would give me plenty of time to verify that her rooms in Paris were safe and secure.

I was already relaxing with a glass of brandy while the pilot was preparing for takeoff when I realized that one crucial thing was lacking. I felt anger boil in me again, for I wondered how he would dare to do this?

"Where is Nadir?" I growled to the steward who attended me. "Did he not see fit to join us here?"

The man quaked in his boots, even though he tried desperately to hide it. "Mr. Khan was feeling unwell, sir, when we were departing. He believes that he has the flu."

"In June?" I did not buy that excuse at all. Nadir was doing this to show his disapproval. "Do you think, sir, that one is likely to contract the flu during the summer?"

"M-Mr. Khan wanted me to inform you, sir," he stuttered, "that he would join you at your Parisian apartments."

I realized that it was futile to take out my anger at him. He obviously knew nothing about what Nadir was doing, so I decided to let it drop.

"Tell the pilot that we are to be off the ground at the earliest opportunity."

The man nodded and practically fled to the front cabin.

I was aggravated, to say the least. Ordinarily, Nadir would have been the one to take care of the estate that I had left behind. I usually trusted only him with that. In fact, I had wanted him to do that in this case because, quite frankly, I had not wanted him in my way in Paris.

Nadir Khan had had the unfortunate benefit of saving my life, not once but on several occasions. It was in this memory alone that I allowed him to work for me, and to have the amount of freedom in his speech that I denied the rest of my staff. I would have to modify my memory though, if he angered me here.

Nadir would do well to remember I owed allegiance to no one.