Dawn had yet to come, but Cassie Collins was wide awake. Having made a pot of strong coffee and taking the whole pot back to her bedroom, Cassie moved to the corner of her room, where she kept what she referred to as 'The Frequencies', an array of ham radios, police scanners, and CB radios that she used to communicate with her own sources around the whole East Coast through the middle states of America that she'd collected from since her military days as a communications officer. These sources worked in coordination with other trackers and bounty hunters, not just for searching for lost children but any missing person they could help. Most did it for the reward money, but they still gave her a lot of good information, and she returned the favor whenever she could. Still, she asked them to send her only information on the serious dangers; that needed someone who wasn't afraid to push the law or break it to rescue those in need.

Yet, it was more than just this set-up that she relied on. She never did tell her brother, but sometimes some of the information she got wasn't from voices over the radios but from a more mystical means. She looked over to her altar, one she had set up shortly after having a vision that connected to a report she'd received from a friend up north that led to Angel's first rescue. Cassie had been a little nervous about it, as her powers had been growing unusually fast and strong. She tempered it by staying connected to the real world of communicating via machines, so she would be able to nurture her power growth responsibly. Time spent with her coven, managing the store, and experimenting with her powders was her way of keeping a steady pace. Still, those thoughts had been pestering her since meeting Charlotte. Up until then, knowing that demons existed was not the same as meeting one.

Then there was her laptop, which she filed the reports on, so that she could trace any links between missions Angel finished to find out if there was a common denominator. This morning, the laptop would serve another purpose. Her thoughts were focused on that nagging tug at the back of her mind about how Charlotte arrived on Earth to begin with. If she was going to help Charlotte jog her memories, it seemed wise to find the answer to that question first.

Typing in her password, Cassie logged into her laptop, clicked on the VPN icon and switched her country of origin. Next, she launched a private browser and signed in to her secret account she used for research, taking on the persona of Chatterbug, her call sign in the army. With her cover established, Chatterbug launched Discord, went to the witchcraft channels, and scrolled to ones that discussed summoning spirits and other entities. She scrolled for some twenty minutes, while sipping her coffee, and periodically entered a chat to see if there had been any talk about failed summonings, especially in Virginia. Finding one chat line, she entered and typed in a basic query asking about Virginia. Yawning and frustrated at the lack of results or even leads, she sat back and stretched, closing her eyes for a moment. She'd nearly drifted off to sleep when her computer beeped. Opening her weary eyes, Cassie leaned forward. An icon with the username 'CosmicWicca' flashed a new message.

"You're looking for information on a failed summoning in Virginia, correct?" - CosmicWicca.

Chatterbug straightened up and typed back, "Yes. Around six months ago. I've been trying to find anything on Google with zero luck."

A moment's pause and a response appeared: "You won't. Our local coven made sure to keep the details of the summoning out of the news. They passed it off as a freak home accident."

Feeling her body tense, she replied, "Can you tell me what happened?"

Silence, and Chatterbug was about to follow up when: "Why do you want to know?"

Chatterbug understood the caution and went for broke: "The summoning wasn't a failure."

A long pause, and now Chatterbug was worried she'd scared the person off, but finally: "That isn't possible."

Pressing forward, "I know the demon that was summoned. I've seen it, and it's unlike any demon that's been written, or tales told about. It has lost its memories. I don't know why or how, but whoever summoned this demon summoned something different. What was the summoner trying to call?"

The response was much quicker this time: "If you're telling the truth, you need to get away from that thing as fast as you can!"

"Why!?"

The words that appeared on her screen next sent chills down Chatterbug's spine: "The summoner was the son of one of our senior Wiccan. He wanted to impress some friends and nearly lost his life in the process. He didn't just try to call up a demon. He tried summoning Lucifer himself."

Heart beating fast, Chatterbug's fingers spun out her next words frantically: "Are you telling me that the demon that was pulled from Hell—that has lost its memories—is the Devil!?"

One word appeared: "Yes!"

Chatterbug sat back in her chair and, for the first time since her military days in the field, felt real fear. It couldn't be. She felt no evil from Charlotte. She leaned forward and typed, "Lucifer was a fallen angel, right? Not a demon? Could that have affected the summoning?"

The reply came: "There's no precedent that I've heard of for summoning an angel. But I do know that if you don't perform the summoning exactly right and you don't call the demon's full name upon the summoning to control it, it can definitely escape into the real world. If this thing you've seen isn't a demon but something else, that fuck-up would have absolutely caused it to enter our world uncontrolled. If it didn't understand it was being summoned or if the ritual was not completed, maybe that could have affected its memory. I'm only guessing. There's nothing in anything I've ever read to cover this."

Chatterbug: "What happens if it regains its memories?"

CosmicWicca: "Again, there's nothing on record about summoning Lucifer or an angel. But what do you think it would mean if Lucifer, or something kin to Lucifer, were to regain its full power, free of control of a summoner, and loose on Earth?"

Hands trembling, Chatterbug had to retype a couple of times: "Can a loose demon be captured, controlled, subdued?"

CosmicWicca: "Actually, yes. One, you'd need to know the demon's full name, and when it comes to Lucifer and the stories, there are two names out there that our community has debated for decades. Magne and Morningstar."

Chatterbug: "What's two?"

CosmicWicca: "Blood. It doesn't need to be a virgin's blood, unlike in the stories, though virgin blood is strongest. Finally, you'd need a talisman of some sort. Something to focus your power as the summoner on to keep the demon in check so it doesn't kill you."

Chatterbug: "If the demon hears its name without the other parts of the spell?"

CosmicWicca: "You'll have its full, undivided attention, and you don't want that."

Chatterbug: "But could it trigger memory?"

CosmicWicca: "I don't know. But if you plan to test this against the demon you saw, I would not recommend trying without the blood, talisman, and summoning circle, or it could be your death."

Chatterbug couldn't think of any more questions, as she had already decided on a course of action: "Thank you so much for your help."

CosmicWicca: "Be careful. If Lucifer is on Earth, it could be the beginning of the end."

Chatterbug acknowledged the concern. Clicking the exit button, Cassie logged out and switched off the laptop. She leaned back in her chair, put a hand over her face, and breathed slowly. Charlotte wasn't a demon at all. She was something entirely different. Something far more powerful. A fallen angel? Lucifer? Lucifer's kin? Could Lucifer have had a daughter? And if she was summoned to Earth, being of Lucifer's blood would have messed up the summoning for sure. Stupid kids playing with things they don't understand, and for what? Likes on social media? That pissed off Cassie. A lot! Still, she didn't know what to think other than that she had this deep, powerful gut feeling that her first sense of Charlotte was real and accurate. She wasn't evil, and she wouldn't turn on Angel if her memories returned. She had to believe this to be true. I encouraged them to fall in love, for God's sake! Or was it for the Devil's sake?

Rolling the names in her head, Cassie let each pass her lips in a whisper: "Charlotte Magne. Charlotte Morningstar."

For decades, Cassie Collins prided herself on her wits, creativity, and cautiousness. In the next few minutes, she was going to throw all of that aside and take a leap of faith. It was time to go find out if she had Lucifer's daughter sleeping in her apartment. With her brother.