Back in his apartment above the bowling alley, John Constantine was in a foul mood. He had started drinking, and was consuming cigarettes at an alarming rate. I hoped that Spirits like me couldn't get lung cancer, because I certainly was at risk of becoming a victim of passive smoking. I didn't bother trying to talk to Constantine. I felt like I had said all I needed to say for now. One good thing was that John hadn't told me to 'fuck off' again. I guess he figured that while he didn't like the idea of me following him around all the time, he would still be able to put up with me until I had to leave. After all, I did help him fight off that demon. Plus I had gotten injured in the process, so it was a sort of personal sacrifice. All in all, maybe he felt that I really wasn't that bad to have around.

Still, he was ignoring me now, avoided looking at me. I wasn't too bothered. I knew it was only a matter of time before he snapped out of this funk he was in. I suppose he was entitled to a bit of misery before he encountered what lay ahead.

I watched, leaning against the far wall opposite Constantine, as he drained the liquor from his glass. He spotted a small spider crawling across the table and promptly trapped it beneath the glass. He sucked hard on his cigarette, leaned over, and filled the glass with smoke from his diseased lungs. The spider, if left there for long enough, would die from the poisonous air it was trapped in. I frowned. I didn't particularly like or dislike spiders. I would never keep a pet tarantula and I would despise having one crawl over me, but I still respected the important part they played in nature. This was a particularly nasty way for it to go.

"Welcome to my life," Constantine muttered to the spider.

There was a knock at the door and a ghost of a smile appeared on my face. "About time she arrived," I muttered quietly.

Constantine answered the door. He only opened it a crack, so I couldn't see the person on the other side. I knew who it was though. The sound of her voice sealed it for me.

"Mr Constantine," Angela Dodson said. My smile widened. I knew exactly how she felt, standing at his door. There was a pause. Angela must have wondered whether or not he recognised her. "I saw you-"

"I remember," he cut her off.

Another pause as her mind did a quick fast forward. "And then I saw you at-"

He interrupted her again. "Regular kismet."

I know it sounds repetitive, but I had to smile again. It was fate that was bringing them together. I had purposely not mentioned Angela before, not even after we kept running into her. Despite this, Constantine must have known that I knew this was going to happen.

"I'd like to ask you a few questions, if that would be okay," Angela said.

"I'm not really in a talking mood right now." He went to shut the door in her face. I heard her hand thump against the door as she blocked it.

"Well, maybe you could just listen, then." There was a pause as she flashed her badge. "Please."

Constantine smirked slightly to himself and stepped aside. "Always a catch," he muttered.

Angela hesitated before crossing the threshold. Her gaze drifted up the door frame, looking at the symbols carved in the wood. They were meant to help protect Constantine's apartment from any malevolent being that wished to enter. I noticed she didn't close the door behind her. I guess she figured she wouldn't be staying long. Constantine also assumed this.

Constantine picked up a fresh cigarette from the packet on the table. Angela watched him. "My sister was murdered yesterday."

"Sorry to hear," Constantine said, lighting his cigarette. I nodded. It was an appropriate thing to say. Would have been even better if he had actually faced her when he said it, but I had to remind myself that Constantine didn't really care about Angela…yet.

"Thanks," she said. "She was a patient at Ravenscar. She…" her voice faltered for a moment as Constantine snapped his lighter closed. "…jumped off the roof."

"I thought you said she was murdered," Constantine remarked. He moved to collect another bottle of liquor, though I knew he had no intention of offering her a glass.

"Yeah, well, Isabel wouldn't have taken her own life," Angela insisted.

Constantine returned with a bottle. "Yeah, what kind of mental patient kills herself?" He stopped and looked at her. "That's just crazy."

I winced on Angela's behalf. She barely faltered, though I could tell that the sadness in her brown eyes became a little deeper.

Constantine grabbed a glass from on top of the fridge and approached the table, settling the bottle down on top of it. Angela also approached the table. She stood directly in front of me, forcing me to move over to the left so I could see them both.

"Look, I've heard your name around the precinct," the detective told him. I began to wonder how many times she had rehearsed this speech on her way over. Constantine uncorked the bottle and poured himself a glass as she spoke. "I know the circles you travel in. The occult, demonology, exorcisms. Just before my sister was committed, she became deeply paranoid."

Constantine sat and took a sip of his drink, studying her. I suspected already that there was something about her that he liked, but he didn't want to admit it to himself, didn't want another girl following him around.

"She started talking about demons, angels." Angela continued. "Now, I think someone got to her, Mr Constantine. I think they brainwashed her into stepping off that roof. Some kind of legion or, um, cult."

"Sounds like a theory, detective," Constantine said evenly. "Good luck."

"Well, I thought that with your background you could at least point me in the right direction," Angela said.

"Yeah, okay, sure." Constantine raised an arm, and with the same hand that was holding both his drink and his smoke, pointed out the open door.

Angela didn't want to give up. "It wasn't a suicide," she insisted calmly. "My sister was a devout Catholic." Constantine shook his head slowly. He could see where this was going. "Do you understand what that means? That means that if she had taken her own life-"

"Her soul would to straight to Hell," Constantine finished. There was a hardness in his voice that subtlety expressed his own fear. He was describing what was going to happen to himself when he died. "Where she'd be ripped apart, over and over, in screaming, brutal agony for all eternity. That it? That about right?"

Angela looked like she wanted to pummel him. She circled around to his side of the table. She leaned close to him and stared him hard in the eyes. "Goddamn you," she stated angrily. Then she released the trapped spider from its smoky prison. Surprisingly, it scuttled away, seemingly none the worse for wear. I cocked my head as I spotted the metaphor this represented; Angela freeing a trapped someone from misery. Angela stormed out of the apartment, slamming the door behind her.

A sigh escaped from my chest. Constantine took another sip of his drink. A wind began to blow, slamming against the windows of the apartment. The wind couldn't quite disguise the sound of scaly wings flapping, demonic beasts snarling. The jugs of holy water rumbled like a freight train was heading our way. I could suddenly detect a faint whiff of sulphur. "John!" I said in alarm, but he already knew. He jumped up with a speed that startled me, grabbed his coat, and was out the door. I was hot on his heels.

"They're after Angela, the detective," I panted as we ran. "You've got to help her understand everything. She's very important in the big picture."

Constantine could only nod, not trusting his lungs to be able to cope with the strain of running and talking at the same time. He knew that if the flying demons had wanted him, they could have easily gotten him before. The fact that they were targeting Angela must mean that she, or her sister, was in some way critical to the 'big thing' that was going to happen. He didn't know how or why yet, but that would come later.

Constantine and I sprinted down the street. Luckily, Angela hadn't gotten far. She was slightly startled by Constantine's appearance beside her. We started to walk with her to her car. "Detective, what if I told you that god and the devil made a wager," Constantine said, glancing around him, looking for the demons. I started doing it too. "A kind of standing bet for the souls of all mankind?"

"I'd tell you to stay on your meds," Angela replied flatly.

"Humour me," Constantine insisted. "No direct contact with humans. That would be the rule." Angela passed in front of us and walked into the street to where her SUV was parked. She looked down the road to see if anyone was coming. The street was totally deserted. "Just influence," Constantine continued. "See who would win."

"Okay, I'm humouring you." Angela said. Behind us, Constantine and I could hear the street lights begin to go out, one by one. We were running out of time. "Why?"

"Who knows. Maybe just for the fun of it. No telling." More streetlights went out. The darkness was creeping closer.

Angela wasn't impressed by Constantine's answer. "Oh, so it's fun. It's fun when a man beats his wife to death, it's fun when a mother drowns her own baby." She stopped in front of her driver's side door. "And you think the devil is responsible?" She shook her head briefly. She had seen a lot of horror during her life in the L.A.P.D. "People are evil, Mr Constantine. People." She went to unlock her door.

"You're right," Constantine admitted. "We're born capable of terrible things."

"And you should know," I thought to myself. "I know that you had a twin too, but your umbilical cord strangled him in the womb." I didn't say this aloud. It was an extremely touchy subject for Constantine, and this was neither the time, nor the place.

"Then sometimes something else comes along and gives us just the right nudge," Constantine continued. I couldn't help but notice how much the darkness had gown around us.

"Well, this has been real educational, but I don't believe in the devil."

"You should," Constantine said. "He believes in you."

Angela searched his eyes, trying to find the joke, or any sort of lie. There was none.

By now, the lamp post we were standing under had died along with the many that already had. We looked up the street. The lights were going out now at a quickening pace. It was the same in the other direction. The darkness moved towards us like a hungry, living thing, a monster in your closet.

"It's a power outage," Angela said, sounding like she was half trying to convince herself. The only light left in the street came from a window display across the road depicting the Virgin Mary.

"Not likely," Constantine said, eyeing the darkness, trying to guess where the attack was going to come from. The sound of fluttering wings could now be heard. Angela's car door locked itself. She looked at it, puzzled.

"What…?"

Constantine grabbed her arm. "We should go. Now."

"Good idea," I said nervously. I knew I had nothing to fear, but that didn't mean I wanted to face the demons flapping unseen above us.

We only made it part way before Angela pulled her arm from Constantine's grip. She stared up at the black, foreboding sky, placing a hand on her gun. Constantine hesitated, wanting to make sure she got to safety. I also had to hesitate, though I wanted to get closer to the still lit Virgin.

"What is that?" Angela asked of the noise.

Constantine listened for a second. "Wings…maybe talons," he concluded as we backed towards the light.

"The shroud," I said. I detected some fear in my voice. "You should use the shroud, Constantine."

"You're kidding," Angela said, amazed and afraid. But Constantine wasn't kidding. She could tell that herself. "Of what?"

John took my advice and took Moses' shroud out of his pocket. He began to wrap it around his hand. "Something that's not supposed to be here."

"'Demons stay in Hell,' right?" I chuckled, quoting Midnite. "Yeah, right."

One of the flying demons swooped at Angela. She ducked and whipped out her gun. Constantine saw this as he headed with me to the statue. "That's really not going to help," he advised her. By now, even the lights around the Virgin were slowly going out. Angela scampered to Constantine's side. I hid behind him. "Close your eyes," Constantine said.

"Why?" Angela asked.

There was no time for Constantine to explain. "Suit yourself."

The last of the lights around Mary dimmed until they went out. I held my breath, but couldn't close my eyes. I had to see it. There was a moment of silence, then the click of John's lighter as he lit the shroud. Instantly a blazing white light illuminated the street…and the flying demons who were swooping down towards us. Angela was forced to cringe away from the sight. My eyes were somehow able to take it all in. The demons screeched and attempted to escape, only to be incinerated by the light. The hell-things turned into embers floating gently down to earth as all the lights suddenly came back on. The light from the shroud faded just as quickly as it had appeared. Constantine shook the still burning remains of the relic from his hand. The air reeked with sulphur, causing me to cover my mouth. Constantine strolled into the street, wiping his hands. I followed him.

"Demons stay in Hell, huh? Tell them that," Constantine said.

I looked around. Everything seemed cheerily normal. It was eerie. I remembered the name of those flying demons, condemned to stay in the air forever due to their lack of legs. My Masters had called them Seplavites.

Behind us came the sound of Angela retching. I wrinkled my nose, having just gotten over the skink of the demons myself.

Constantine glanced over his shoulder at her. "Don't worry," he said, taking out a smoke. "Happens to everyone the first time. It's the sulphur."

"Sulphur," Angela repeated, trying to let it all sink in, that what she had seen was real. Constantine lit his smoke. "What were those things?" Angela demanded.

Constantine took a puff and turned to her. "Demons." He took a few steps in her direction. I thought it best to follow him, not wanting to be hit by another oncoming vehicle. "Scavengers of the damned."

Angela struggled to maintain her hold on reality. Too bad for her that reality was changing. "No, no, that's impossible," she breathed. She backed towards the statue of Christ's mother, not wanting to stray too far from her gentle protectiveness just yet.

"Yeah. And I don't think they were after me," Constantine said. I smiled to myself. He had listened to me before.

Angela looked at him with frightened tears in her eyes.

"You really believe she wouldn't commit suicide."

"Isabel? Never in a million years." Angela was dead-set on this notion. Constantine was developing an idea.

"Well, let's be sure," he said. "Let's see if she's in Hell."

Suddenly a bus zoomed pass behind Constantine and I. I almost jumped. Here was normal life reclaiming its territory like nothing ever happened. I sighed. When I saw Angela, I noticed that she had been startled by the bus. I smirked.

"Do you have Isabel's things from the hospital?" Constantine asked.

"Yeah," Angela said, trying to calm down.

"Can we go back to your apartment?"

Angela studied him for a few seconds, before finally answering "okay."