While Percy calculated all the possible outcomes on how to solve the new problem ahead of him, Estelle had somehow gotten him to stand up and walk with her to her uncle's home.
It was a slow and silent walk, and Percy did not register any of it. In fact, it may have not been neither silent nor slow, he could not testify to that.
Something brought him back to earth once again.
It was the familiar smell of smoke and fire, and the familiar scream of people in danger.
He looked up.
The house, in the middle of the cornfield, had caught on fire and part of it was emanating big huffs of black smoke that rose to the blue sky.
"Uncle!" Estelle yelled starting to enter the house.
Percy's hand reacted without him even thinking it. He grabbed her by the shoulder and stopped her mid step.
"Let me handle this, dear." He said taking the lead and pulling Animus near his chest.
He opened the door without difficulty, and entered the rapidly consumed by smoke building.
The noise of the fire burning hit him immediately, but it did not come from the base floor, rather the upper one.
He walked the stairs as slowly and sneakily as he could, trying to look in every corner before he advanced.
"Fuck off demon!", came a shout from one of the rooms. The voice was timely and grainy but it sounded more annoyed than scared.
He followed it to a wooden door, half opened, half taken out of its hinges.
He took cover to the side, the air around him becoming rapidly dense and polluted. He tried to look through the broken door but could only see hints of a man, a mattress and something moving very quickly.
If nobody stopped the fire, the house would eventually be consumed and that wouldn't be great, so he had to hurry.
He kicked the door in, and entered pointing the gun right to where he could see the creature.
The old man, "Uncle" Percy gathered, had a large stick barely scratched with which he was fending off, or at least intending to, the monster.
The old man tried to hit him with it as a reaction but Percy avoided it without trouble.
"Son, who the fuck are you?" Uncle said, his lungs heavy and tired.
"Doesn't matter, Estelle's right outside, you should go with her, fight of the fire before the whole bloody house is consumed." Percy answered without giving him much of a look.
The old man seemed to be about to object, but then reconsidered.
"A fire?" He said instead. "I'm on it."
He left the room quickly, leaving the gunslinger and his prey alone. That was perfect, as Percy recognized this monster.
"Abbadon?" Percy asked skeptically.
"Ah, my lord, is good to see you again." Abbadon replied while hanging from the ceiling in all fours. "I'll guess this is all part of some convoluted course of action on your part."
"You travelled too, i didn't figure that one coming." Percy said. "This may be useful, come down for a minute."
"No thank you." The devil replied.
"Oh." Percy answered feeling rather strange. "Did you just refuse my command?"
Abbadon dedicated the gunslinger a wide mocking smile.
"By the contract, I command you to prostrate yourself in front of me."
Abbadon didn't move, didn't even flinched a muscle.
"I would prefer not to." The devil said.
"But the contract,"
"It's null my lord." Abbadon interrupted him. "At this moment in time, the one you call Abbadon had another contract going, and as well as yours, that one was exclusive, so the first trumps the second."
Percy didn't say anything. If Abbadon wasn't the only one who had travelled, this could mean a lot of problems in the near future.
"Have you come alone?" He asked.
"To this house? Yes. To this time? Who knows?"
Then the others have come, Percy thought, i should assume they are in the same situation, which means shit.
"Did you start the fire?"
"Yes." The devil answered.
This is taking me nowhere, i either let him go o kill him and finish this off so i can gather info.
Percy started to aim upwards to the devil when he realized.
"Do you, do you know my name?" He asked trying to sound commanding.
"Yes?"
"Say it to me." He commanded.
"Why?"
"Let's call it a favour, you answer and i don't shoot you."
Abbadon started to laugh and he almost seemed human while doing it, ignoring the part where he was hanging from the ceiling and his body was covered in green spikes.
"You have forgotten your own name." His said while laughing.
"I don't see what's funny about that." Percy answered never taking his gun of him.
"But it is, rather amusing for one such as myself coming from my kind." The devil continued. "Poor man, you have given me one last gift before departing, i promise to make it up to you some day."
Abbadon jumped out a close window and Percy shot just one time, hitting him on the shoulder but not killing him.
He cursed into the fire that was spreading slowly now, as if someone was taking care of it downstairs.
Motherfucker, he would have time to think about everything once this whole thing was over.
He ran downstairs and helped Estelle and Uncle finish putting out the fire.
The three of them were sitting in the porch of the house. They were covered in sooth and were exhausted out of their breath. But they were alive.
"So, who you say you was?" Uncle said while arranging himself on his tiny wooden chair.
"Already told ya uncle, he's Victor, Vic between friends." Estelle answered immediately.
"So Vic", Uncle started while eyeing Percy cautiously, "are ya a alien or like a angel from the sky, or some shit like that?"
Percy released a big sigh and pull his glasses to clean them up but found nothing with which to do so.
"First of all, that's not my name." He started.
"So, who are ya?" The old man asked.
"I... couldn't even begin to explain it to you even if a cared to try."
"Do you have a name?" Uncle continued.
"Yes."
"Which is..."
"I can't remember."
"So, Victor it is." He concluded.
Estelle seemed happy about this.
"Second of all", Percy continued ignoring them, "No. I'm not an angel or an alien or anything like that. I'm just a man on a mission."
"From the gods?" Asked Estelle from the side.
"No, from myself and everyone I care about." Percy answered letting himself be honest for once.
"Sounds important." Uncle said.
"Yeah." Percy answered.
Then they fell into silence once again.
"Well, whatever it is you are looking for, you can't do it almost naked." Uncle said. "I'll go see if the clothes didn't burn with that fucking demon, so I can give you something to hide your shame."
Percy thought about saying something about that, and decided against it. Some change of clothes would be good, in fact a bath would really help right now.
What would he do now? Thirty Years was a long time, too long. Maybe he would have to just wait, it would be time to think, to enjoy a world that had not been taken from him.
He could learn about the history of a lot of places and even visit some of them before they were erased for ever. He could even maybe go back to Whitestone to see the old kee...
Percy froze mid-thought. His face must have shown because the girl was at his side at a moment's notice.
"Everything alright?" She asked.
"I could see them, I'd have to wait but I could see them again." He said in a low voice.
"Who? This Vox machine?" She asked clueless.
"My family, my father and mother, my brothers and sisters."
"Oh, they live nearby? We could pay them a visit! Maybe they remember your name Vic!" She perked up.
"I could... I could save them." Percy thought but he didn't say anything.
He could save them, he could change everything. He could truly change it all and create a much brighter future.