Sorry for the wait and thanks again to all reviewers. Just so you know this next chapter may be considered indirectly offensive by some Christians, if that's the case then I apologise to whoever I've offended.

Chapter 11: Demon

'It was the name of my father, and his father before me' – Frank

It wouldn't be long now, the angel had said this and he did not for one second doubt the word of a messenger of God.

There was no fear, at least not nearly as much as he expected to feel. That was surprising, he was minutes, seconds maybe away from his death, a suicide no less. A death that was condemned.

'It is not suicide', the words of the angel, his guide for the last month, the being that had kept his sanity intact long enough to fulfil the task God had appointed him with, replayed in his mind. 'You will die serving your Lord God, and your blameless soul shall ascend to his kingdom. Sometimes duty to the Lord means the sacrifice of your own life. You should already know that, think upon the Lord Jesus Christ, the sacrifice he made to save humanity, the sacrifice you make shall do so again.'

Despite all he had been taught by the angel, these words still felt like blasphemy in his ears. Throughout his life he had always been taught and had believed with no shadow of doubt that there was and would only ever be one messiah, and it certainly was not him!

Or was it?

When the angel had first appeared to him, and told him what it was he must do, h thought it to be an evil spirit in disguise, come to set him on the path of destruction and lead him to the doorstep of the devil.

But when the angel showed him heaven one night in a dream, when he felt the indescribable good and happiness that it seemed to cast in all directions, he knew that it couldn't be an evil spirit talking to him.

And yet, the things he said. Contradicting commandments and teachings written down by the apostles and disciples from the time of Jesus Christ himself. How can it be that the scripture, that which decent God faring people are taught to live by and uphold, was cast aside by one of the highest of God's servants?

He didn't understand it, but he felt, he knew that the angel was right.

The townspeople didn't see it that way. For weeks he had kept the secret to himself, speaking in hushed whispers whenever the angel was near, never revealing the wondrous and sometimes horrifying things shown to him in his dreams, never revealing God's gifts to others, until the fire started.

The fire had arrived not two days ago but to him it felt like a lifetime. Old man Cromwell was careless with his cooking pot and burned his house to ashes, the fire ad spread over the thatched roofs, burning and destroying everything it touched.

He couldn't let the homes and lives of so many be destroyed, not when he knew he could stop it.

Along with tasks, the angel had given him wondrous gifts, and taught him to use them. With a single thought, he had force the fires to die down until they were nothing but memories.

The townspeople had seen this good deed of his, and had come to the conclusion that he himself would have come to be it not for the angel, that the man who had saved the town, was a witch, a servant of Satan come to bring chaos and ruin to the world.

Even his own father, a man whom he had always looked up to, a man who he had thought to have such decency and wisdom within him, a man whose name he was proud to have as his own as a testament to his father's righteousness, and the righteousness of his father and many generations before him, had hunted him down like a wolf.

Tears began to well up behind his eyes and he pushed them away. It didn't matte anymore, he had escaped, thanks largely to another gift of the angel. He had taken the sword from his room and he had ran from the angered crowds to where he had found it before when he had been tasked with collecting firewood for the house. The time had come at last.

Once he had the sword where he needed it, he remembered the angel's teachings and opened the portal that would send the weapon through time to where it would, somehow, save the Earth from darkness.

Then he had jumped through after it. Just as he had been commanded to do.

He slept then, he was not sure for how long he slept but it felt blissful. There were no demons to taunt his dreams, no memories of loss or sorrow. There was only peace, and a welcoming light.

When he woke the angel appeared to him one more time, he looked almost relieved. He felt the same way, the clouds that had look like darkness itself leaking into the sky, things which could only be the work of the devil, had now vanished, and were replaced by a glorious star filled night sky.

"Its almost over." The angel said with a smile, "God and heaven await you."

Now, as he stood upon the hill to complete his task, he looked up at that night sky, the same one he vaguely remembered before he fell upon the sword, his own sword, with which he had trained with for months in order to become a knight of St. John. God it seemed had a higher purpose planned for it, and him.

The sky cracked open without sound. Light shone down upon him, and looking up, he saw his future selves' work. A portion of his mind again momentarily tried to decipher the riddles of 'time travel' for what must have been the hundredth time, the magic of it made no sense to him, but he didn't need to know it now.

The sword fell from the sky and fell straight through his skull. He died instantly.

"But you didn't go to heaven?" Donnie asked, remembering the watery domain that was now his home, and how he would gladly describe it as anything but heaven. "It was all a ruse to get you to die just before the tangent universe vanished, so you'd become…" Donnie cut himself off and gestured at the demon bunny masked laid carefully on a nearby table.

Frank just nodded, almost mournfully.

"Good, evil, truth, lies, religion," he said in a quiet voice, "They are the tools, not the tasks. The end is salvation."

Donnie simply stared at Frank, confused more then anything else. The person in the story that Frank had just shown him in the same, quasi-movie screen format that Gretchen had used once before looked nothing like the ear ring wearing, clean shaven bunny suited man next to him.

Furthermore, this story seemed to contradict what he had learned. Frank was his name, and presumably his fathers, but was 'Frank' even a name in the middle ages or whatever seemingly ancient time period he had just seen?

Good, evil, truth, lies, religion.

Lies.

Was it a lie? It could be real, couldn't it?

Was that the point?

And in that instant it all seemed clear. As did the term 'manipulated dead'.

It had done what it needed to do, it had shown Donnie what he needed to become if he would be any use in keeping the primary universe intact.

Whether he could become that or not was another matter.

To be continued.

P.S I'm not sure if St. John actually had any knights, that's a vague guess from a computer game. In retrospect maybe i should have left that bit out. Oh well, guess it doesn't much matter.

Right, as promised, here are reviews.

TheAstoundingCopperPanther: Hmmm,I thinkyour new display name's better . Anyway, glad you're enjoying thus far, era's are kind of interchangable in this story as this chapter, (if i've done it right) shows. Thanks for reviewing.

MarkTurner: Thanks, i hope i can keep the chapters as mysterious and not degenerate to inplausible and confusing, oh well, thanks for reviewing.

E.P.O: Thanks, its quite tricky to write someof the time travel/paranormal thingswithout them sounding stupid or implausible, and unfortunatly, (as you'll see from later chapters), the most difficult stuff is yet to come. Oh well, thanks for reviewing.