She had bruises and cuts covering her body. Her blackened eyes were nearly shut closed, so it was miraculous she could summon me in the first place. The symbol she made was made out of blue crayon, which she still held in her small, shaking hand. All the crosses that adorned her psychopathic fathers’ walls, which impeded my entry a week ago, were either torn of the walls and placed on the floor, or were shattered and bent.
Then I saw it. The bottle of empty Jack Daniel’s that sat on the counter of her kitchen. There was a small cook’s knife laying just a meter away from the bottle, with a red liquid covering it. I knew it was hers.
In that moment, there was no fire in hell that could even compare the heat I felt rise to my face. The bile I felt in my throat came from the mere idea that the ‘almighty’ God would allow this to happen. I turned to the child, feeling my frayed wings flair up in anger.
“Do you see why I chose to fall now? Why I gave away my halo?” She didn’t respond, probably too shocked to really acknowledge what happened. “I shattered it so I could hunt those who hurt the innocent. The monsters that use children like you for entertainment.
“I will not allow this to continue. Listen to me, Mary. I cannot guarantee that If you make a deal with me that you will make it to heaven.” She looked away when I said that.
“But,” she turned to me slightly, somewhat interested. “I can guarantee that your father will not. I can promise you that your father will burn like the bastard he is, and I can promise that he will feel what he has done to you one hundred times over, and he will feel this pain for the rest of eternity.”
She looked back at me. I was still in my ethereal form, so I could not interact with anything until she took my deal. Not until she shook my hand.
Stretching it out, I said one last thing. “I can promise you, Mary, that he will never, ever, hurt anyone again.”
She stretched out her hand, but balled up every finger except her pinky. “Pinky promise?” She said in her tired, sore voice.
I returned the gesture, and locked my pinky with hers. “Pinky promise.”
It was done. I started to take my physical form, starting from my hand. Slowly, I started to realize a scent: Cigar smoke. Of course, the bastard smoked. Why wouldn’t he?
After I was done forming, I simply asked one question. “Where is he?”
She pointed down a darkened hallway. I marched down the hall, following the scent I knew all too well: The scent of whiskey and hatred. I went to his door, and before I broke it down, I looked to Mary. She stood at the other end, looking at me.
“Mary,” I spoke softly, “Go to your room, and lock the door. No matter what you hear, do not open it until I knock six times, okay?”
She nodded quietly, and tiptoed to her room on the other end of the hallway. I turned to the abuser’s door, and smirked. I was about to have some fun.
To say her father was surprised that I busted his door of his hinges would be an understatement.
“Mark Hamburg. Your God has abandoned you, and I am here to take you away.” I boomed. I’m pretty sure he pissed himself.
“B-but why? I’ve been a god-fearing Christian since the moment I went to church!” He said in a southern drawl.
I chuckled. “You may have been, but you hurt your daughter. You’ve burned, cut, bruised, and even groped her, Mark. There is no place in heaven for you. There is however, plenty of room for a bastard like you in hell.”
I dashed over to him, and grabbed him by the neck, right below his chin. I picked him up as if he were a rag doll. I carried him to the circle Mary made.
“That little shit summoned you?! That ungrateful bra-“I didn’t let him finish. I choked him a bit, showing that he was not in control.
“She had no choice. You left her no choice. You and your psychotic God abandoned her. I was the only one who heard her prayers. I was the only one who answered.”
I looked over to my summoning circle, and waved my hand above it. It slowly turned into a pit straight to hell. I felt the hot air rising from the hole, coming from my forced home. I simply put him over the hole, and dropped him in. I shut the pit behind him, and started to go check on Mary.
I knocked six times on her door, just like I said I would. She cracked open her door to show only a sliver of her face.
“It’s done, Mary. You are safe. You can call the cops now.”
“What do I say?” She whispered back.
“Just say he left and he said he won’t be coming back. I’ll take care of the rest.”
And took care of the rest, I did. I forged a note in his handwriting, admitting to everything she did to her, plus a few embellishments here and there for flavor. I took his car, teleported over the Mariana trench, and dropped it in.
That was over five decades ago. Mary grew up to be a wonderful mother of two, and went to college to get a doctorate in psychology. She has three books, one of which is a New York Times Best seller, named “The psyche of the abuser and of the abused: a deep-dive”. I had no hand in it, by the way. I don’t know where she will go, but I she does come here, I will make sure she isn’t touched, not even by Satan himself. After all, I made a pinky-promise.
