The air around me suddenly got very cold, then very hot. Hot, cold, hot, cold, it was extremely uncomfortable. I'm still laying on the pavement but everything is far darker. Pitch black. I crane my neck, seeing the fly still on my shirt, and suddenly I fall. I fall into nothingness. Endless falling. It's like those terrible dreams where you start falling into an abyss and wake up in a cold sweat, only this one you can't wake up from. I scream, but soon run out of breath. Taking another deep breath, I continue screaming. Water starts to hit me as I fall down, like water droplets suspended in the air. It feels like cobwebs are sticking to me too. I flail my arms and legs, a loud droning noise creeping around me. High pitched noises drill into my ears, threatening to deafen me. I start hearing voices. Angelic voices. Then clashes and bangs, flashes of coloured light, flashing designs that look like the lights that play behind your eyelids. I curl into a ball, scared out of my wits. Some of the angelic voices start to warp and yell nonsense, strange words in English and Italian. The voices fill my ears, singing, babbling, laughing, screaming. I hear wings, but at this point my eyes are closed. Was this heaven? Was this hell? I had no clue. Hopefully it would just fade out and I'd die for good...

I hit a hard stoney floor with a thump, but I didn't fall hard. It was as if I had fallen from no more than five feet. I open my eyes. The ground beneath me is dusty rock. Not dust... ash? I look around. Around me are mountains.. Well, not really mountains, more like tall jagged spires of rock. The sun was rising, casting light on the landscape. The spires stretched for as far as the eye could see, a soft pastel grey, almost lavender. I was standing on a flat surface of rock, a spire with a flat top. A few taller spires towered in front of me. I get up and turn around, taking it all in. The air smelled strange. Clean but old. Very old. The sun rose unusually fast. I wandered in circles, taking it in. I'm silent. I'm struck with the pure silence of the place. No wind, no birds, no cars, not even the crinkling of bugs under the rocks. Nothing. The place was utterly lifeless. That's why it felt so strange. After a few moments I looked down at my chest. Still bloody, but the pain had subsided. Still, there was an ache in there.

I suddenly became aware of someone's presence. I turned around to see a winged figure alight on a stone spire that had fallen horizontally. A winged human. A winged woman in white robes. I didn't breathe for several seconds. She didn't speak, but she looked at me with caring, concerned eyes. From the sky descended more of them, both women and men, all with white wings and white robes. There was maybe ten of them, perched on spires surrounding my flat mountain stage. They weren't saying anything, but a soft comforting hum seemed to fill the air. I began to calm down a bit, starting to smile. I could feel the compassion radiating off of them. I'd never felt so... happy.

The humming came to an abrupt stop and a sense of dread filled me. The Angels - for that is what I figured they must be - stopped smiling. I looked around. A rumbling came from the sky. I turned around frantically, but no matter where I turned the noise came from behind me. It got louder and louder until it sounded like a jet engine was on my shoulder. Out of the sky, out of nowhere, two huge wings swooped over my head, feathers flying. The beast alighted on the tall spires before me, wings slowly folding onto his back. He turned to me, and I finally got a good look at him. He was bigger than the average human, but not very buff. Not intimidatingly so. He was pretty thin. He had a bare chest, but his bottom half was that of an animal, somewhere between a deer and a Clydesdale. He had a short beard, a young face, and short spiky hair that trailed down his back like the mane of a hyena. His wings were that of a raven, large and black with feathers. Above his head towered two tall, black horns. (I looked it up later, and found that they were the horns of an African animal called an oryx.)

I stared at the creature for several minutes, taking it in. I didn't know what to do.

A rumble came from the creature's chest, and then he spoke.

"Care to say something?"

I looked around at the Angels, who were emotionless, hands folded in front of their robes. I turned back to the thing in front of me.

"Who.. Who are you?" I asked.

"Call me Giro. Ward of His Lord Beelzebub."

"Beelzebub?" I wonder aloud.

"My Lord goes by many names; Beelzebub, Lucifer, Satan, to name some of many."

The heart almost beats out of my chest. Satan??

"Wait... Wait..." I say, as if trying to delay my decent into hell. This couldn't be right... Wasn't Jesus supposed to meet you when you die? This wasn't like they had described it at all.

"Child," the creature locked eyes with me. His eyes were a piercing gold, like an eagle's eyes. "do you believe in Jesus Christ?"

I think, the realization hitting me. "No." I reply. I don't believe in Jesus. He wasn't real to me. Why would he be real now?

I look up at the creature, Giro, waiting for him to continue.

"As the ward of His Lord Beelzebub, I am charged with bringing all those who have committed unjust, evil actions down into the depths of hell, suffering the consequences of their sins."

Before I can speak, a voice comes from behind me. "The child's actions were not unjust, Lord Giro."

The demon looks over my shoulder, narrowing his eyes. I turn to see an angel with her palm raised.

"How so?" asks Giro.

The angel who had spoken stepped forward. "Young Lesra has led a just life. One act of self preservation should not discount it."

There were murmurs of agreement among the other angels. Giro snorted like a horse.

"I have been sent by My Lord to escort this miscreant to hell. Consider me generous, for minors are not punished as badly as grown men."

"But Lord Giro, one act of sin does not qualify for an eternity of suffering."

"One act of sin outweighs a thousand acts of kindness." Giro snarled. "Murder, unjustified murder, is one of the worst of sins."

"But Lord Giro, Lord Giro, his murder was not unjust." several angels chanted together, almost singing.

"Care to explain to me why that is?" asked Giro. I could see the contempt boiling behind his eyes.

"His victim, young Rodney, assaulted him. The only course of action young Lesra saw was to kill him. He was not killed in vain. Young Lesra tried to apologize, but-"

"They.. They stabbed me." mumbled Lesra. "Oh.. sorry.. for interrupting."

Giro sighed. "Youth. No etiquette." He sat down on the horizontal spire, thinking. "I may be a devil, a ward of Satan himself, but I am also a judge. A judge is not to be biased."

The angels looked at him sceptically. A thought suddenly came into my head.

"Um.. L-Lord Giro?" the creature looked up at me. "Is being gay a sin?"

He looked at me, quizzical. I looked around at the angels, but it appeared as if they were waiting for Giro to answer me.

"Well," he began, "it's not a sin proper. Dishonourable; strange, indeed, but not a sin. Your people twisted the words of the Holy Bible through translation, inflating the resent Leviticus showed. Their treatment is unjust. It is their abusers who are sinful."

"And, Lord Giro," and angel interjected, "young Lesra was not the sinner in this fight."

Giro turned to the angel. "Indeed, you have made your point. The sinner was young Rodney."

"No," continued the angel, "the sinner is young Julian. Young Julian is the sinner."

"Jules?" I say aloud. It's hard for me to keep my thoughts to myself in this place.

"How so?" asked Giro, genuinely intrigued.

"Behold," said the angel, spreading their hands toward the ground. Slowly, the ground faded out until I was looking down upon the streets of Koreatown. It was dark. It was the night before. I saw me and Jules walking towards my house, and I saw the three older boys creeping up to us. I had turned to Jules, ready to come out to him, and the tallest boy started creeping up on me. It wasn't a mad dash and tackle, he creeped up pretty slowly. I couldn't see him, but Jules sure could. Why didn't he warn me? It took Rodney, like, ten seconds to get there, but Jules didn't have the mind to warn me? Did he think this kid was a friend? Rodney - for that's what the boy's name was - tackled me, and Jules didn't do anything. He just stared. He didn't even seem fazed. After a while Jules backed up, running farther away but still watching. It was only when I pulled the gun on Rodney that he looked shocked. When I pulled the trigger, he ran. He ran like a coward. He left me to die. It almost looked as if he was in on the plan. The rocky ground faded back.

I looked up at the angels. I looked at Giro, who seemed shocked.

After a long silence, Giro spoke. "I was not aware. I was not aware of this act of treason. We may be different entities, but I must agree with you, wards of God, you are right. This is the real sinner. A traitor. Be grateful that I am unbiased, human."

"Unbiased, my posterior." one of the younger male angels whispered to me. I had to snicker.

"Silence!" roared Giro. He sighed. "Well, it appears, my child, that you are the innocent in this case. Continue to lead and innocent, honourable life and you shall see no more of me. May you have God's mercy."

I looked up at the devil. A devil, of all things, had spared me.

"Thank you." I say. "Thank you for sparing me. You know, you're not as bad as I thought you'd be. You listen to reason."

The devil looked at me, at first gratefully but then angrily. He let out a horse grunt, turning away. "Never trust a devil, child. Never trust a devil."

That was the last thing he said to me. The stoney, beautiful landscape around me started to fade and fizzle. The ache in my chest started coming back. I turned to the angels frantically, but they were fading too. I panted, running around, trying to run toward them. They would make it stop, surely.