Allison was quite honestly dead on her feet by the time they reached the Commonwealth space dock.  Apparently hosting the essence of a divine being with a penchant for whining uncontrollably about what a mess he made was exhausting.  Especially when he was hosted by a teenage dhampir.  She inserted the memory card that held Enid’s program, and the hologram loaded.  Lucifer looked around.


    “Computer take us to a cathedral or something?”


    The hologram shifted from a bar to a beautiful Cathedral with vaulted ceilings.  Enid looked around herself when she shimmered into existence.


    “Oh, this can’t be good.  Who are we praying for?”


    Allison was over all of this now, so she sounded exasperated.


    “Me.”


    Enid laughed and motioned to a pew near the altar.


    “Come into my office.”


    Lucifer was not happy about any of this, and he spoke his mind.


    “Her?  She’s my sister in her mortal skin.  She’s no saint, trust me I’ve seen her at her worst.”


    Allison’s eyes snapped to him.


    “You shut up now, I’m talking.”


    Enid watched Allison with curious eyes.


    “So, why are we here?”


    Allison sat down and took a deep breath.


    “Okay, now say, a son majorly betrayed his father.  We’re talking poisoned serrated knife in the back and then twisted it just for good measure.  Then he like convinced a bunch of his siblings to do the same… do you think his father could forgive him if he was truly sorry?”


    Enid sighed.  Allison gave up on pretense.


    “Okay, like say Lucifer was repentant.  Not just I’m sorry I got caught but truly saw the error of his ways and he just wanted to say I’m sorry, please forgive me to God.  You think God would like… say yes?  You met him right, God?”


    Enid shook her head.


    “Wow, you made that choice… I didn’t see that coming, well I did but it was only a one percent chance.”


    Allison blushed.


    “What choice?  We’re talking hypotheticals here… uh, mom…”


    Enid stood up and started to pace.


    “Don’t try to lie to me kid.  Even like this I can see right through you.”


    Allison sighed.


    “Fine, yes, I ate his soul.  Go ahead and yell at me everyone else is going to you might as well get started.  It’s not like you haven’t already told me how bad it was.”


    Enid looked at her daughter.


    “What is that supposed to mean?”


    Allison looked at her mother like the petulant teen she was.


    “Seraph already told me he didn’t deserve the mercy of oblivion you’re basically Seraph with a different face, right?”


    Lucifer was nodding along with her.


    “You tell her.  She’s not as nice as she pretends, do you know how many of my brothers and sisters she killed with that face on?”


    Allison shot Lucifer with a withering glance before looking back at Enid.


    “Uh no, Seraph and I are vastly different people… beings… whatever.  I wasn’t going to yell at you.  You had a six percent chance of finally killing the sadistic bastard once and for all, I’d say the fact you managed it at all is a miracle.”


    Lucifer stood up and started yelling at Enid, not that the hologram could hear him.


    “Sadistic?  Sadistic?  I lived in pain for a thousand years because of you.  You killed some of my brother’s and sisters slowly on purpose to make them suffer?  And I’m sadistic?  You crazy murderous genocidal psychotic bitch!”


    Allison looked at Lucifer.


    “Sit down and shut up.  She can’t hear you; Idiot and I already have a headache.  Or do you like this pounding pain in our head?”


    She turned back to Enid.


    “Sorry, what do you mean… a six percent chance of killing him for good?  You didn’t know what would happen?”


    “Yeah, my odds were on you sending him back to hell with blessed nova bombs and starting this mess all over again, there was a ninety percent chance you would just drop the bombs and leave, five percent chance you’d storm his room with the wolf-born and send him back to hell, of course you’d lose both of them, the twins would have survived.  Four percent chance you would stab him in the heart with a spirit sword, killing him permanently.  One percent chance you’d figure out how to use your divine energy to summon Seraph’s staff, that one didn’t end well but he died, she loves that staff… as much as she can love anything.  Finally, you drain him dry and suck his soul out, one percent chance.  Though that one didn’t end great either.  You got trapped in a transporter buffer and when they tried to rematerialize you… you were a pile of goo.  Should have taken you over a year for your nanites to reconstitute you, pretty much lost Eden and your family because of that.  Wait, how are you here and not a pile of goo?”


    Allison was getting tired of people not hearing her today.


    “I told you; You were there.  You picked me up, wrapped your wings around me, stopped time until they could get all of me in the transporter buffer and told me you wouldn’t save me again.”


    Enid shook her head.


    “Impossible.  Do you mean Seraph was there?”


    “Sure, whatever you want to call yourself.  Yes.”


    Enid rubbed the bridge of her nose.


    “Allison, I am not Seraph, and she is not me.  We are different individuals.  Why would she save you?  That makes no sense.  She literally prides herself on non-interference.  For someone who has no emotions she sure behaves like she does.  No wonder things were so obscure around this.  Allison, you need to be careful.  If she saved you then she is actively paying attention to you and that is a very, very, very bad thing.”


    Allison looked up at Enid.


    “Whatever.  I have more pressing concerns than some nebulous cosmic power that might be after me one day or something.  How do I deal with him?”


    Allison pointed in the direction of Lucifer.   Enid leaned on the pew beside Allison.


    “What was he saying about me anyway?”


    Allison glanced back at Lucifer who smiled innocently.


    “I’ll quote him directly, he called you:  a murderous, genocidal, psychotic bitch, said you were no saint, that you’re the sadistic one.  Basically, he called you evil.”


    Enid moved her head from side to side.


    “I can see how one might get that impression from another perspective, but in my defense, he started the fight, I just tried to finish it.  You mess with the bull you get the horns.”


    Allison looked back at Lucifer.


    “You seriously picked a fight with her?”


    Lucifer couldn’t meet Allison’s gaze when he answered.


    “Not exactly… it was a… misunderstanding…”


    Allison rolled her eyes.


    “How did you think it would end?  She sent you to Hell the first time you stepped out, why would you pick another fight with her?  Wow, you really are an idiot.  That’s like invading Russia in the winter… whatever that means.”


    Lucifer rolled his eyes right back at her, just like a petulant teenager.  Further proof she was slowly devouring what was left of him.  Allison looked back at Enid.


    “He says there was a worm in his brain whispering things to him that he could not resist that he sees it all very clearly now.  You think that’s enough?”


    Enid shrugged.


    “How should I know?”


    Allison was confused.


    “You’re Saint, you met God and Angels all the time, you have to know.”


    Enid laughed.


    “Wow, you’re looking in the wrong place.  All I can tell you about God is he was the universe’s first asshole misogynist.  Women should serve man, What the fuck is that?  Lilith said no so he tossed her away like trash, then this asshole.”


    Enid waved in the direction Allison had indicated Lucifer was.


    “Tries to take advantage of her and when she says no to him, and he spends six versions of creation trying to hunt her down.  I never questioned why this jackass rebelled, I knew exactly why he did it.  But you just had to keep coming after me and Lilith.  If you’d stayed in your own lane instead of coming after me and mine, I wouldn’t have given you a second thought.  You know God had the nerve to trick Seraph, his equal into believing she was just one of his little angelic cogs?  Why?  Because she was an aspect of the feminine?  Why would you even want his forgiveness?  His version of love has always been:  Do what I tell you and I’ll love you; Disagree with me and you better watch the fuck out.  He is a negligent parent at best, a narcissistic abusive prick at worst.”


    The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    She paused.


    “And Lucifer I want you to know, Seraph didn’t send Allison to finish you off, I did.  I finally got you, you cockroach.”


    Allison glared at Enid.


    “You sent me into this?  I lost a good pilot.”


    Enid waved her hand dismissively.


    “It was a better way to die then she originally did, she went home for leave at the end of the week and her boyfriend murdered her because he thought she was cheating on him.  You think I didn’t make sure the people who die when you’re doing things I put into motion weren’t already dead in the original timeline?  I have always been a monster, but I’ve never been heartless.”


    Allison blinked at Enid.


    “And my Babu?  How was he supposed to die? How about the rest of my people?  The one who shot himself in the head?  Was that a better way to go?”


    Enid clenched her fists.


    “Before you entered the timeline he died on Mars, with his wife and daughter in the terrorist attack.  The pilot who killed himself did it in the other timeline too, only its because the leader of his squadrons, didn’t recall him when he froze up and he caused his fiancé’s death directly.  Only in that timeline he took fifteen people with him.  Everyone dies Allison.”


    Allison was ignoring Lucifer now.


    “Except for freaks like me, you made me this way.  I will spend eternity losing the people I love and there is nothing I can do about it.  Why couldn’t you have at least warned me my Babu was going to die?”


    “Allison, I empathize with your plight, but that isn’t how this works.  It was his time.  It was Wendy Roger’s time, how it happens doesn’t matter.  There was nothing you could have done to prevent their deaths.  If you did, they would have just died another way.”


    Allison was in tears.


    “I know that, but I could have at least forgiven him and told him I loved him one last time.  I will never have that chance again.”


    Enid wrapped her hands around Allison’s upper arms.


    “The mistakes we make are what builds our character.  The regrets we have teach us lessons about ourselves and about the universe.  Some people, like Lucifer never learn those lessons whether by ego, or by being sheltered by an overprotective parent.”


    Enid cupped Allison’s cheeks in her hands.


    “If I had told you he was going to die, you wouldn’t have believed me.  You are a stubborn child and while I watched you grow God how I loved you for it, but you wouldn’t have spoken to your Babu.  You would have ignored me and carried on then, he would have died, and you would have hated yourself even more.  You can hate me, but I am never going to coddle you.  I am going to let you make mistakes.  I am going to let you have your triumphs. I have provided nudges to get you near the right place at the right time but whatever happens from there is up to you.  You could have just as easily ignored Zelda’s plight.  Your choices led you to this path.  Yes, I nudged you to this galaxy the rest is on you.”


    Allison wiped the tears from her eyes.


    “If I bring you back, you won’t remember any of this will you?”


    Enid nodded.


    “Yes.  I’m sorry.  I am a poor replacement for the real Enid, I am just an echo.”


    Allison sniffled a few times.


    “Where you there when Mary died?”


    Enid nodded.


    “I was.  I touched your cheek.  I told you I loved you.  I gave Mary a perfect moment of love with her daughter.  I gave her the chance to live long enough to reach the station so her daughter could be born like she asked me to.  The pain she was in…  I wish I could have taken it away but that is not how…  It was her time.  I just granted her last wish.”


    Allison sniffled again.


    “You said if I should have taken a year to recover… and Eden was lost… my family, how does this end now?”


    Enid shrugged.


    “I have no idea Allison, the moment Seraph interfered directly it made all of my predictions useless.  I am as blind to what comes next as you are.  Did she say anything?  What was she like?”


    Allison hugged herself.


    “At first, she was… motherly.  She brushed my bangs from my face.  It reminded me of when you brought me back in time… to the beginning…  It was like I was home.  She caressed my cheek.  Called me her child…”


    Allison recounted the rest of her encounter for Enid.  Enid paced for several minutes.  Lucifer leaned forward.


    “This is getting us nowhere, lets go, you’re wasting my time.”


    Allison glared over her shoulder at him.


    “This isn’t about you, shut up.”


    Enid seemed to ignore the exchange, or well Allison’s side of the exchange.


    “She… cares about you and it annoys her because she doesn’t understand the emotions.”


    Allison raised an eyebrow.


    “I got the distinct impression she thought I was a pebble in her shoe or something she called you the anomaly.”


    Enid nodded.


    “Yeah, that is what she calls me.”


    Allison sighed.


    “Could we deal with his Lucifer situation?  I’m going a bit nuts.  Do you know how strange it is to go pee while he’s standing there watching me?  Or change?”


    Enid moved her head from side to side pondering Allison’s words.


    “All I can say is I basically told God go fuck himself, ignored everything he wanted me to do and said, sorry my bad afterwards, and he said cool I love you.  Of course, I was more powerful than he was at that point so… that could have had something to do with it?”


    Allison sighed.


    “So, I’m stuck with this… guy?”


    Enid nodded.


    “Sorry, hon.”


    Allison groaned.


    “It would be nice if you know the Christian’s hadn’t caused a civil war and killed five hundred thousand people in a terrorist attack, I’d be able to find a Catholic Priest anywhere.”


    Enid held up her finger.


    “All you need is a Catholic priest?”


    Allison nodded.


    “Well, there I can help you.  They didn’t die off or quit, they went underground.  Like they did in Rome when they were persecuted.  There is a church in New Amazon, under the Wazu Corp tower it is run by Archbishop Quinton.  He’s a bit rough around the edges, used to be a mercenary.”


    Allison quirked her head to the side.


    “How could you even possibly know that?”


    Enid shrugged.


    “The same way I know you’re going to have a cheeseburger for supper tonight.”


    Allison was skeptical.


    “You said you can’t predict anything anymore.”


    Enid smirked.


    “That doesn’t mean I can’t access the ship’s systems.  The Archbishop is protected.  He’s on the list of Christians that the System’s Alliance is watching.  That means leave him to his business.  And the big draw for supper tonight is Cheeseburgers.  It’s that or spaghetti and you don’t love pasta.”


    Allison made a face.


    “I would have checked the watch list… eventually.”


    Enid nodded.


    “I know, now go eat something you look like a half-starved rat.”


    Allison nodded, gave a small wave and left the holo-sim.  Lucifer started talking as soon as they were in the gangway.


    “Well, that was useful.”


    Allison glared at him for the thousandth time that day.


    “It was worth a try.  We have a lead.”


    Allison made her way to the Ark Royal’s officer’s mess.  They were indeed serving cheeseburgers and French fries for supper.  She almost got spaghetti out of spite, but the cheeseburgers looked really good.  She started with the fries.  Lucifer watched her eat.


    “Those taste delightful.  Now the burger, take a bite.”


    Allison narrowed her eyes at him and took another fry and ate it slowly.   Lucifer shook his head.


    “Now that was just spiteful.”


    Allison was starving so her willpower only lasted so long.  She had just finished her burger and was eyeing the double chocolate fudge ice cream.  It had definitely been a double chocolate fudge day.  A call came in on her AR HUD and she answered it while looking wistfully at the coveted ice cream, it was the doctor in charge of thawing out the colonists.


    “Battlelord, are you coming?”


    Allison was confused.


    “For what?  I thought the process was figured out and safe.”


    “Your relative, Zuri is being thawed out in this batch.  You said you wanted to be here for that?  Also, you said you had preparations to make.  You have notified your family, haven’t you?”


    Allison blushed.


    “Uh, yeah, I did… um sorry, I lost track of time.  I have some… things to take care of, fleet management and the like.  Please save her until last and I will be there.  If I’m not, please keep her sedated.”


    Lucifer spoke in a mocking tone.


    “Someone’s in trouble.”


    Allison stood up and dumped her tray as they walked towards the holo-sim she spoke quietly.


    “Somehow you were less annoying when you were being a megalomaniacal star devouring mad man.”


    She hooked her wristband into a port on the holo-sim control panel.  She called her mother.  Apiyo answered immediately.


    “You’ve been gone for three days, and you finally call your mother?  What kind of daughter does that?”


    Allison smiled, her mother turned to face the holo-recorder and her eyes filled with concern.


    “Are you alright?  You look tired, is that blood on your cheek and in your hair?  What has happened?”


    Allison bit her lower lip.


    “Just a rescue mission.  Things got complicated.  I’m fine mom, I just ate, I’m going to get lots of sleep tonight.  So… I was umm, wondering, do you still have that VR construct of your home in Kenya?”


    Her mother didn’t really hear the question about her VR sim, she was more focused on the ‘rescue mission’.


    “You are there on a diplomatic mission and are attending school, what is this about a rescue mission?  Were you in a fight?”


    Allison bit her lower lip.


    “There was a small skirmish.  It was nothing just a few scratches.”


    Under no circumstances was Allison willing to disclose that she went blow for blow with a being stronger than an enraged wolf-born or vampire elder to her mother.  And she’d die before she’d tell her mother that she’d devoured the soul of Satan.  Her mother was religious and that would not go over well, not at all.


    “You look like you fought off an army.  What did you do?”


    Allison touched her chest.


    “Me?  I just did my job.”


    Her mother wagged her finger towards the holo-recorder.


    “You’re on a bridge.  You don’t go to the front lines anymore.  That is what you said.”


    Allison shifted uncomfortably.


    “That isn’t exactly what I said, I said I wouldn’t be in the front lines that often anymore.  This was one of those times.  I’m sorry if we didn’t have clear communication about that.  My bad.  Look mom, I’m kind of on a timeline here, do you have that VR thing or what?”


    Apiyo shook her head.


    “Yes, of course I do.  Why?”


    Allison rubbed the back of her neck.


    “So, like, I just need to unwind, and I was going to make it into a holo-sim, you know so I can relax and just enjoy… Africa”


    Apiyo tapped around on her own AR HUD, hers was provided by cybernetic eyes instead of contacts and she swept a data bundle towards Allison who grabbed it.  The teenager swept it into her own data storage then uploaded it to the holo-sim.


    “Thanks mom, you’re amazing, love you! Bye!”


    Allison closed the communication channel Lucifer was making a tsking sound behind her.


    “Lying to your mother.  You are such a naughty girl.”


    Allison glared at him while she waited for the Ark Royal’s computer to process the VR sim into a fully realized holo-sim program.


    “Bite me.”


    Lucifer moved to lean against the wall in front of Allison.


    “My dear Allison, I believe it is you who does the biting in this relationship.   It is what got us into this predicament.  Did it feel good?  Draining the life from me?  Feeling my soul ripped from my body and devoured?”


    Allison clenched her fists.


    “Yeah.  I just wish I could have made it more painful for you.”


    She tapped a few commands into the holo-sim computer and watched as her mother’s old house materialized then the Kenyan countryside.  She glanced around to make sure nothing was out of place.  She looked back at Lucifer.


    “My teenage aunt is about to be woken up from cryosleep.  I am going to be talking to her, and I swear to the Dark Mother that if you even breathe too loudly while I’m helping her get acclimated I will eat nutrient paste and drink space rat blood until you’re gone.  Before you try to call my bluff, I’ll remind you who my biological mother was.  Then I’ll remind you just how stubborn and vindictive she was.  The apple did not fall far from the tree.”


    Lucifer pushed off the wall.


    “You are quite the negotiator.  My demons could have learned a thing or two from you.  Just one little tip, the stick is all fine and good, but the promise of a carrot can just as easily keep someone on the line.  I will leave you to your little family reunion, but you need to agree to eat a medium rare steak and over easy eggs for breakfast.”


    Allison punched the console and ripped the liquid metal cable out.


    “Fine.  Deal.”


    He faded out of existence, but she could still feel him there at the edge of her perception.  She shook her head and went to sick bay.  Zuri was next up; Each thaw took half an hour.  So, she had time.  She sent a request for some replicated food from the Commonwealth.  Her mother’s chicken curry recipe.