Felicity awoke early the next morning. At first she didn’t remember all that had happened the previous day. After a few seconds, however, the memories of Seraph and their conversation came flooding back to her. Felicity didn’t know how long she stayed in bed that morning, watching the sunlight from her window move across her floor. Seraph, no matter his past, was the only one who could help her and she knew it. But she had a hard time believing her parents would have wanted Seraph to help her had they known he was the one that killed Erick. When Felicity dragged herself out of bed her kitchen clock read half passed noon. As she went about getting ready for the day she couldn’t shake the image of how sad Seraph looked when he admitted to killing Erick. Seraph said it himself that it was an accident, but could he be believed?

Her kitchen was a mess. Felicity hand washed the dishes and set them in the rack to dry. She wiped down the counters and then moved on to find her mop and broom. In the back of her closet she found them and went to work on her tile floor. She worked hard, trying to push the image of Seraph’s face out of her mind. Felicity started in on the living room next. She vacuumed the floor and rearranged her furniture. As she was moving the chair Seraph had sat on the night before she found the the bag of sandwiches she’d bought for him. She hadn’t even let him finish eating the first one.

Felicity was down the stairs, across the parking lot and in her car before she stopped to think. Seraph told her he spent most of his time in Purge City, or what was left of it. They’d given up trying to clean it up, let alone rebuild. Every time anyone tried, their machinery would breakdown immediately. Theories abounded as to the causes but no one knew for certain. Felicity thought she might know the reason behind it now. Even still, Purge City spanned hundreds of square miles. She wouldn’t know where to begin. Felicity eyed the seat next to her. Her parents letter lay where she had dropped it after getting into the car.

“If you still want his help,” Felicity said, “help me find him.”

She put all of her doubts and concerns aside and drove to the edge of what use to be Purge City. A constant haze that had nothing to do with pollution hovered over the ruined city and made it difficult to make out the few skeletal skyscrapers that still stood at the cities center. The road came to an abrupt end and a chain link fence marked with signs reading ‘Danger, Restricted Access’ ran around the entire perimeter. On the other side of the fence the ground dropped away into a trough some twenty feet deep that also ran the perimeter of the city. Felicity shuddered as she remembered the news reports of how a couple days after the city was destroyed, the bodies of those who were caught in its fall were found, laid out in the trough, filling it. Images of that were on the front page of every major newspaper and more theories flew around as they tried to explain it. Some called it a miracle while others thought the end of the world was coming. Though, no matter what anyone said or believed, the families of the dead were thankful to have the bodies so they could give them all proper burials.

Felicity grabbed her emergency backpack out of the trunk. It contained enough food and water to last her a couple days along with a small tent and first aid kit. She found a spot along the fence where she could squeeze under and she began walking, looking for any sign of Seraph. Felicity was only nine years old when the city was destroyed. She recalled that night before the city fell, Seraph had visited and spoken to her. He showed her his wings and said that he was looking for Erick. The next day the city was destroyed and neither Seraph nor Erick had been seen again. Felicity always assumed that they’d both died in the city.

As Felicity walked further into the city she entered a maze of debris. Felicity had to pick her way through it and she couldn’t see anymore than a few feet in front of her before more debris blocked her line of sight. As she got deeper into the maze she wondered what Seraph had really done. Aside from the little information she’d gained from Seraph the night before, all that she knew was what had been televised: several storms all converged on Purge City at the same time as an earthquake hit. Felicity’s parents had talked with her a few days following the disaster and told her that while she did know what had really happened, she could not tell anyone else the truth. Now, seeing the remnants of the broken city, Felicity couldn’t imagine Erick having any part in this. He had always tried to avoid fighting and abhorred violence because of his experiences when he was younger. Erick told her once that ever since Sarah died, excepting for the time he had to save his family, he had always avoided getting into situations where he would have to fight or use his abilities to hurt others. Here, buildings were toppled over one another and shrapnel was embedded in the walls. Felicity wondered how she had ever allowed herself to believe that Erick had anything to do with it.

“Oh my,” Felicity uttered as she rounded the corner of a fallen building and found herself out of the maze of debris.

Before her was the vast expanse of the heart of the city. Huge chunks of stone and metal were all meshed together and strewn across the old city’s boundaries. Felicity still had to climb over sections of concrete and steel but, aside from the occasional skeleton of a building, almost nothing stood higher than a few feet off the ground.

Felicity passed broken pieces of children’s bicycles and cars alike, all crusted in dust and ash. The further into Purge she went, the more she understood why Erick couldn’t have had anything to do with its destruction. At last Felicity came into the heart of the city where the few remaining skyscrapers still stood, some of them leaning at dangerous angles. After ten years of decay she was surprised they hadn’t all fallen the rest of the way over. Felicity found her path blocked by a large section of a fallen skyscraper. She climbed in through a broken window and walked gingerly among the scattered desks and office supplies until she found a hole on the other side she could fit through.

Felicity stood on the edge of a crater a hundred feet wide and about half as deep. Down in the very center was Seraph. Floating about fifteen feet from the crater’s floor, Seraph had his broken wings outstretched all beating the air to keep him aloft. Seraph had no shirt on and his back was turned to her. He rose higher and higher into the air and as he did he began to shine white. His wings grew stronger and more pronounced as well. As he came closer to Felicity she could feel the wind picking up. What looked like dust was being drawn in toward Seraph from all around. As Felicity watched more intently she realized that it was actually the haze that covered the city that was being drawn in towards Seraph. As it drew closer it coalesced into a white mist that pooled at the bottom of the crater. The mist swirled and, like an inverted whirlpool, spiraled up toward Seraph. At last, once he drew level with Felicity, the holes in his wings sealed Seraph’s wings reached their previous strength. Seraph spread his wings out as far as they would stretch, the first set reaching out to a wingspan of about ten feet, the second reached almost fifteen, and the third set was over twenty feet from tip to tip. Felicity was immobilized by the strange sight. Seraph turned pure white a moment later and became too bright for her to look at.

Once the intense light had gone, Felicity opened her eyes and Seraph was already back in the center of the crater crouched down absorbing the remnants of the white mist that had filled the basin. Only now did Felicity see that the surface of the crater was like glass. It looked as though the ground had all been melted and then cooled in a very short amount of time. Seraph stood back up and began to walk up the side of the crater. Even with his bare feet, Felicity didn’t know how he could walk on the smooth surface. Her brief attempt to walk down the side of the crater ended with her on her back and a bump on the back of her head. She didn’t know how Seraph was going to react to her being there, especially with her just showing up and seeing him like this. She backed up and waited for him. Seraph reached the top and then walked a short distance to where his shirt lay. Felicity remained as quiet as she could as she watched. As Seraph walked passed, Felicity saw that the scars covering his body were all connected like a giant spider web, though many of the jagged angles reminded her more of broken glass.

Seraph knelt down, bowed his head, and began to mutter something that Felicity couldn’t quite make out. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end and the air around Seraph seemed to quiver, just as it had done when he visited her parents’ grave. At last Felicity couldn’t take it any longer. She stepped as softly as she could toward Seraph, trying to make as little sound as possible. When at last she had reached Seraph, she found that he was, in fact, praying. His wings were splayed out on the ground and were gently rippling every once in a while as he spoke. Seraph’s lips were moving slightly as he uttered his prayer, and at times his hair seemed to get caught in a slight breeze, even though Felicity felt nothing. She was debating within herself as to whether she should continue to wait there or back up again when Seraph spoke so that she could hear. “If you’ll give me another minute I’ll be greatly appreciative.” Felicity waited.

When Seraph did begin to stand, he retracted all of his wings and Felicity was able to see several long scars along his back that had, up until then, been covered. Before Felicity could finally ask about them however, Seraph was already answering her, “The scars,” he told her, “are from when I tried to kill myself after destroying Purge.”

Felicity stared at him in disbelief. “You what?” Felicity was taken back by his answering her before she could even ask him her question. She was forced to recall that Seraph could enter into other people’s minds and read their thoughts, as could Erick before he died. Seraph looked down and began fumbling with his shirt. “After I killed Erick,” he said, “I came here to the center of the city. I took all of the rubble and raised it into the air with me. I turned into my energy form and then crushed myself with the debris.”

Seraph paused to put on his shirt and then continued. “I had hoped that it would kill me, since I’m weaker against physical attacks when I’m in that form. Instead, I only succeeded in breaking my powers. I was, at first, ripped apart and my energy was scattered everywhere. I remember falling through the air, almost weightless, and looking at my shattered body; I was flashing in and out between my energy form and my physical one. When I hit the ground I could barely feel anything apart from the pain inside of my mind and I could hardly move. After several hours though, I began to come back together. I had to crawl out of the debris and finish pulling myself together. Even after several more hours, random pieces of my body would spontaneously flash into energy and then fade back to normal, and every time I would be overcome with immense pain all throughout my body. After that, I knew my powers had been lost. It took me the better part of four years to learn how to really use most of them again, and even now I have very limited use.”

Felicity waited a few moments before speaking again. “Why did you do that?” She asked, still in shock over Seraph and his past.

Seraph rubbed a particularly large scar on his forehead. “I had nothing left to live for.” He said. “I killed thousands of innocent people in an effort to reclaim the life that I had been denied.” He gazed out over the expanse of the ruined city that surrounded him, “But most of all,” he went on, “I betrayed the only true friend I ever had. He knew that he was no match for me and that he would lose that fight. He knew that if he and I fought, that I would kill him, but he came any way because he knew that it was the right thing to do.”

Felicity was becoming uncomfortable; Seraph was acting as though it was perfectly normal for her to be standing there, listening to him. She didn’t know why he was sharing all of his intimate thoughts with her, but at least she felt as though he trusted her. However, now that she knew what had happened to Erick and Seraph, she wanted to change the subject. Death was not an easy topic for her to discuss just then.

“What were you doing?” She asked uneasily, “When you where in that hole in the ground?” She knew that Seraph was already aware of her question, but asked it regardless. Seraph stretched for a moment, apparently glad for the change, and then extended his arms. As he did so, all of his wings unfurled and appeared to be stretching as well; Felicity saw that they were all back to their withered and weakened state. Seraph’s trench coat, which had been lying at his side, was lifted up and then pulled over his arms so that he was now fully dressed. Felicity was always slightly unnerved whenever she saw Seraph or Erick use their abilities; neither of them had ever been bounded by normal limitations.

Seraph remained silent and began staring up into the evening sky. “What were you doing?” Felicity asked him once more. This time, he drew in a deep breath and then let it out in a low sigh. “What I was doing,” Felicity heard his voice inside her head, “Was absorbing some of the energy that was left over after I tried to kill myself.” His voice faded away and then he began walking toward the building that she had come through earlier. “Every once in a while,” Felicity heard his voice, once again speaking from inside of her head, “Enough energy comes together here and I can absorb it.” As an after thought he added, “That hole you saw me in is actually the crater made from the explosion that came after my attempted suicide.”

Seraph walked through to the other side of the building and Felicity followed. “So why have you come here?” Seraph asked while watching the sun set behind the distant cliffs that overlooked the fallen city. Felicity had expected this to be Seraph’s first question and it took a few moments before she could answer. “I want you to help me.” She said resolutely. “It was my parent’s last wish, and I want to see that it’s fulfilled.”

Seraph stared long and hard at her. “No,” he finally stated. “You’ve seen what happened the last time I tried to stop them. I won’t do it again.”

Felicity was crestfallen. “You’re the only one that can help me.” She plead, “Please, as a last favor to my parents–

Before she could finish Seraph interrupted her. “Do you have any idea as to how many people I’ve murdered?” His voice was full of both remorse and of warning. Felicity had never thought about what Seraph had done as murder, except for with Erick. Even then, however, she was willing to forgive him because she accepted that Seraph had not meant to kill him.

Seraph, who had been reading her thoughts said, “You’re wrong. Erick is the only person that I killed by accident.” Seraph sat down on a piece of broken stone. “There were exactly one million, one hundred eighty-four thousand three hundred and twelve people who were in this city when I destroyed it.”

Felicity was surprised at how quickly Seraph was able to call up this piece of information.

Seraph took a few shallow breaths to steady himself. “Do you know how I know this?” He asked Felicity with his voice beginning to tighten.

“How?” Felicity managed to whisper as she too began to feel her throat tense up.

“I know because I dug every last one of them out of the wreckage, and then placed them around the city so that they could be taken and given a proper burial. One million, one hundred eighty-four thousand and twelve. That is how many people I have murdered!”

After that, they both sat in silence. Felicity had taken a seat on the stone next to Seraph and neither felt like speaking. Felicity was at a loss as to what she was going to do for her parents, and Seraph was somewhat shaken from having to revisit that part of his life again. At last, Seraph broke the silence.

“I’ll show you what I know about The People.” He spoke as though he didn’t quite trust his decision.

With that, he stood up and began walking. He led her quite a ways further into the city toward an immense pile of debris. Felicity followed, not able to speak for fear of Seraph changing his mind. When they reached the mass of concrete and rebar Seraph crawled into a small hole and disappeared from view. When Felicity ducked underneath to find where Seraph had gone, she found that there was a stairwell leading down into the ground.

Seraph was about halfway down, which was quite remarkable considering there were large sections where the stairs had collapsed and nothing could be seen beneath them except for an endless expanse of pitch black air.

“I rebuilt the stairs about five years ago.” Seraph’s voice echoed inside her mind. “The gaps are from pieces of rubble that have fallen down since.”

Felicity became suddenly unsure whether or not she really should follow Seraph down into this place.

“Don’t worry,” Seraph consoled her, “It won’t collapse while we’re in here.”

Felicity was at a rather large hole in the stairs and wasn’t sure if she could make it across when Seraph turned and raised her into the air. He held his hand out at arms length and then raised it up slowly. Then he brought his hand in closer to his chest, and as he did so, Felicity floated over the chasm. Seraph brought her the rest of the way down the stairs to where he was.

A steel door was laid open in front of them, and beyond that was a dark hallway that faded into indiscernible blackness. The only light came from the faint glow that Seraph was giving off. Now, however, he raised both hands and a bluish-black flame sprung up in them, resulting in quite a bit more light than Felicity would have guessed from such flame.

She grabbed Seraph’s arm before he could lead her any further. “Please stay out of my mind.” She said. She had been getting more and more annoyed by Seraph reading her thoughts and then answering her questions before she could really ask them. Also, she didn’t like the idea of not having her mind as a secure place for her private thoughts. “I don’t mind if you speak to me in my head, just, leave everything else alone.”

Seraph nodded and then led the way down the corridor. After several more flights of stairs they came to a long hallway with countless rooms on either side.

“Not much of this actually survived my siege.” Seraph told her. “I rebuilt it in memory of where I grew up.” They had stopped in front of one of the doors. “This is where I spent seven of my first ten years.” He pointed through the little window in the otherwise solid door. Inside Felicity could see a small foldout bed, a desk, and a small table. “This is the only room that remained intact after the collapse of this building.” He stroked the glass, almost longingly, “Inside that room, somewhere, is my real name.” When Felicity gave him a puzzled look he explained, “I’ve never known who I was. I have no idea who my parents were, or what my little sisters name was, it’s the only reason I’m still here; I want to know who I am.” With that, he turned and they resumed their trek through the dark halls.

At last they came to a large room with countless shelves filled with boxes each containing files or videotapes. “This is what I have.” Seraph said. “It’s really only a fraction of what was here before, but hopefully it will have what you need.”

Felicity could only stare at row after row of shelves. She knew that she would never be able to make any real progress without any aid simply because of the enormous amount of information, and she wasn’t even sure what she needed to look for.

“Have you gone through any of this?” Felicity asked, desperately. Seraph picked out a large box from the shelf in front of them.

“This should get you to where you need to go.”

Felicity took that to mean ‘yes’, but that he wasn’t going to give her any more clues than the one box. Before leaving, Seraph pulled out a couple more boxes of videos and added those to the stack.

Once they reached the surface, Felicity saw that the sun had now fully set and it was incredibly cold, even for mid autumn. Seraph came out of the crevasse a few moments later, he being slowed down by having to carry most of the boxes out.

“I can help you back to your car with these, if you like?” Seraph said once he had laid the final box down.

“Thank you.” Felicity was shivering slightly by that time and was ready to get back to her apartment and get warm. “Why is it so cold?” She finally asked.

Seraph looked up from the boxes, which he had been tying together with pieces of rebar that he had pulled out of some neighboring cement blocks.

“It’s always cold here,” he replied. “It’s because I’m here.” He clarified. “When I absorb some of my leftover energy, the surroundings try to make up for the sudden drop and absorb as much energy as it can. So at night when there’s no sun to keep adding energy, it sucks it out of the air, and makes it seem colder.”

Felicity didn’t fully understand his explanation but didn’t feel like pressing the issue. Everything about Seraph was just too much for her, and she had more important things to focus on.

Seraph made as though he were shaking out a rag or something when he said, “Here, this’ll help keep you warm.”

He mimed tossing the imaginary something at her. Felicity almost screamed when she was hit in the face by a thick, woolly blanket. She pulled it off of her head and stared at it. “Where did–

Seraph interrupted her. “It use to be Erick’s,” He told her. “Well, actually it was your sisters. Erick had it when I met him, and then I took it after he died.”

Felicity waited until Seraph had finished attaching the boxes to one another before clarifying her question. “I meant, where did it come from? There was never anything in your hand.” She hated having to say anything because she was fairly confident that Seraph, regardless of his promise, had read her thoughts and knew what she had meant. Seraph just smiled and shook his head.

“You don’t really want me to answer.” He said. “You hate all of my explanations.” He then added, “And I didn’t need to read your mind to pick up on that.”

Felicity wrapped herself up in her sister’s old blanket and then was picked up by Seraph. He had her in one arm, and the wrapped up boxes in the other. They flew over the city in only a matter of minutes and then they were back on the ground in front of Felicity’s car. Seraph helped her load the boxes into her car, after taking them out of the makeshift cage he had made, and then said good bye to her. Felicity watched as he turned and walked slowly back toward the fence that ran the entire way around Purge. When he reached it, Felicity heard a slight buzzing sound, and then saw that Seraph had passed straight through without affecting the fence in any way. He faded into the darkness a short while later and Felicity got into her car and drove away.