Chapter 2: Rebirth

One final breath. That’s the last thing Eric experienced as darkness claimed his consciousness. One final breath, and then there was no longer any pain. ‘Wait’ Eric thought ‘there is no more pain’. In fact, Eric no longer felt anything. He could not feel the bed underneath him or the breeze of the air conditioning blowing across his skin. Eric slowly sat up, taking stock of his new surroundings.

The white hospice room was no more. Surrounding his medical bed was a roughly 10 foot diameter sphere. The sphere was purple in color and was constantly moving and rotating. Small eddy’s and larger whirlpool’s a varying shades of purple dotted the surface. As Eric slowly examined the full room he looked back to see his old body still lying on the bed. As he looked closer, the view was almost too much for him to bear. His old self was horribly emaciated, and the burns on the left side of this face were still very prominent.

Just as Eric was turning away from his body, he caught movement in the corner of his eye. Walking straight through the purple wall like it wasn’t even there, came a beautiful woman in a business suit. Throughout his life, Eric always jumped between being an atheist and an agnostic. Now, looking upon this woman, he was a firm believer in God as she could only be an angel.

“Hello” came from the beautiful woman’s voice. “My name is Aeliana”, she said with a smile. “I’m a Succubus and would like to make you an offer to become an Incubus.”

It took a few seconds for the woman’s words to fully register to him. Once they did, the aww on his face was quickly replaced by fear. Eric tried to quickly back away, but found that the purple wall she so easily walked-through was an impenetrable barrier to him.

“I have absolutely zero interest in any offer from you” Eric said, doing his best to keep the fear from his voice. “My life has already been shit so I will not allow your lies to take my soul from me”.

The woman still wearing her smile calmly said “I understand your reaction, but there’s a few misconceptions we need to clear up. First and foremost is that there can be no lies told here. Where we’re currently standing is inside of your soul. No one, not you, nor Angels or Demons, can lie while in the soul space. You can’t even tell a lie from ignorance. If you were to right now, try to say 2+2 = 5 you would be incapable of doing so. Even if you were taught that was true from birth, your soul knows the fundamental truth of the universe and would not allow you to speak it. You could say that you were taught that 2+2 = 5, but that would be the extent of it. If you need further proof, go ahead and try it for yourself.” The Demon calmly stated.

Eric could feel that everything the woman just said was the absolute truth, but not wanting to take a chance he decided to give it a try. As he tried to push the words out, it was almost as if an invisible barrier inside of himself would not allow him to continue. The harder he pushed the more the barrier clamp down on him. Frustrated and also relieved, Eric finally gave up.

Seeing his attempt failed, Aeliana started speaking again. “Now the second thing we need to clear up is that nothing you know about Angels and Demons is correct. Throughout history, knowledge of who we are and what our purposes is has been misrepresented or intentionally corrupted. Angels are not the good guys and Demons are not the bad guys. What we actually are is more like caretakers with different responsibilities.”

Just as Eric was about to speak the succubus raised her hand in a wait motion. “I understand you are going to have a lot of questions but let me get through this first. This is going to be a fairly large info dump, so bear with me for a minute.” She said, cutting him off.

“When the creator formed existence, he also created every soul that has or will be. Souls are pure energy that have quite a lot of power on their own. If these untested souls were simply set free, they could cause a great deal of damage. To fix this issue, the creator also formed the lower plane in which the universe occupies. In this universe, he created worlds that could sustain the bodies he made for the souls. When a child first takes his breath in the world, a soul enters it. The soul will stay within the body gaining experience until its last breath. Once the soul is expelled from the body, it is then set to be judged. If the soul is deemed to be worthy, having lived a positive existence for itself and those around it, it is permitted to pass on to the higher planes. If the soul is judged to be unworthy, it is sent to hell to be recycled. To be clear hell is not a plane for the damned to spend eternity suffering. It is, however, a place where the soul must be cleansed of its past actions by reliving them. It experiences the pain it caused to others, both from its perspective and the others. Once the soul has been cleansed, it will be allowed to take a new body. It will have some instinctual understanding of what it did wrong and not to do again. Doing this a few times is generally enough for the soul to be allowed to pass onto the higher plane.”

Taking a breath, Aeliana raised her eyebrow, wordlessly asking if he was keeping up so far. Nodding his head and using hand to motion for her to continue, Aeliana started again.

“Now if you were to think of the creator as an owner of MANY large farming plots, and the souls as the crops. Then the Angels and Demons would be considered the farmers. We are souls that have been granted gifts to help look after and prepare the ones who come after us. The Angels job is to help water the fields and guide the growth of all. Demons’ responsibility is more of weed pullers. We find the souls that are corrupting or otherwise hindering the growth of those around them and pull them.”

“And you want me to be one of these weed pullers?” Eric asked with a disbelieving look. “You want me to give up a shot of the afterlife to go back to that miserable place?”

Now for the first time her smile was replaced with a sad expression. “You are not eligible to move on” She stated plainly. “You are one of the very rare exceptions. You did not do enough to earn a place on the next plane, while at the same time not doing enough to warrant being recycled. Any bad that you did in your life was perfectly countered by any positive influence that you had.”

“What are you saying? Where does that leave me?” Eric said, unable to control the helplessness and anger coming from his voice.

“It leaves you with a choice very few others will get” The demon said not reacting to the bitterness coming from Eric. “You cannot move on so you will have two options. The first is to be recycled. This will not be too bad of an experience for you as you really don’t have much to atone for. The second option is to accept my deal and become an Incubus. Any action that you take that helps remove the soul’s corrupting those around them, will be a positive experience towards you moving on. As long as you do your job, you will be all but guaranteed to ascend the next time your body dies.”

“OK, two questions” Eric started once the succubus stopped speaking. “Well at least the first two, as I’m sure I’m going to have many more before we’re done.” Aeliana nodded and indicated to him to proceed. “First, are Incubus and Succubus what I think they are? Do you “pull the weeds” as you say by having sex with them? If that’s the case, why? Why is that more efficient than simply taking a knife or a gun and killing them? For my second question. My body is currently dead. Are you intending to grant me a new body or resurrect my old one? Because if it’s the second one, I’d much prefer to stay dead”

“First, yes that is what we are and what we do” she confirmed. “It’s what our power is and it makes it easier to mask what we’re doing. To give you a much broader understanding of it. I need to explain more about the body.”

Taking on a lecturer’s pose, she started again. “The body is just a shell that the soul occupies. While it is different, the body does have its own form of energy. From the very moment of its creation the body starts its countdown to when that energy is going to dissipate. When that happens, the body will die. It can take many forms, from old age to cancer. But once the timer runs out, it will die regardless.”

Aeliana slowly walked over to Eric’s body while she continued. “Let’s take your body for instance. It was given 41 years, 10 months, 13 days and 52 seconds of life energy. Even if you had found your cancer early and taken steps to fix it. You would have still died at this moment, regardless. The cancer might have come back or you could’ve had a stroke. Any number of possibilities really, but the end would be the same. Our gift is to take that life energy and to use it for ourselves. We never grow sick and we can’t grow old.”

“You can make me immortal?” Eric asked.

“Not as such.” Aeliana shot him down. “It is true that you cannot grow old or suffer from diseases of any kind. That does not mean you cannot die. If you have a car accident or catch a bullet to the brain it won’t matter how much life energy your body contains. This is why any form of murder is highly frowned upon, as it cuts short the time the soul has to accumulate experience.”

“But what you do is rewarded?” Eric asked while raising an eyebrow.

“Yes.” Was the simple reply. “Another one of our gifts is soul sight. I can turn it off and on at will. When it is on, I can easily see the corruption in people that allows me to determine if they need to be removed. As long as I only harvest energy from those who deserve it, it will add a positive marker to my soul.”

“OK, while I can see the upside to that. It still doesn’t answer why you just can’t use a gun or a knife. Even if you lose out on the benefits of energy, you at least wouldn’t have to sleep with some of these disgusting people.” Eric said while making a face that showed how repulsive he thought that was.

“Oh you absolutely can use that method, and it will still count in your favor but there are also downsides to that Eric. The first is that when someone knows their life is in danger, they generally fight back. The second and more important reason is that it gives us more anonymity. Think about how long it would take for somebody to piece together when you’re at the site of multiple deaths. Especially with the current levels of technology. It might take years or even decades, but sooner or later you would get found out. While on the flipside, if somebody has an aneurysm, they’re generally not going to look back to see who they had sex with three or six months ago.”

“I take it you can control how much energy you take so you can time their death?” Eric interrupted.

“Precisely” Aeliana responded. “We are able to take as much or as little energy as we choose. I myself like to leave between 3 and 6 months on those I cull to ensure nothing has ever traced back to me.”

“And you are perfectly OK with fucking these people?” Eric asked again. “Some of the guys that you sleep with have got to be far below your standard.”

“There are downsides,” Aeliana nodded. “But besides being ageless, there are also upsides that come from being one of us. The biggest one being companions. Instead of taking energy from someone, you can give up part of your energy to make them a companion. Be very careful with who you choose to make this offer to though. Before that person can accept, you will both experience the other person’s life from start to current. You will know everything about them and they will know everything about you. If either one of you does not like what you see, your souls will not allow the connection. Once the offer is accepted and the connection made, any action they take will reflect on your soul and vice versa. If the offer is refused, then somebody out there will know every last thing about you. While you can kill them, it would be heavily marked against you.” Aeliana took a second before continuing to make sure Eric understood the gravity of what she was saying...

“Now, then” Aeliana continued “The upside for choosing the right companion can be monumental. First, you will have somebody with you who knows what you’re going through. They can be your rock in the hard times. Second, they will also gain some of your gifts like soul sight, but they cannot harvest energy directly from other people. To keep them ageless and disease free, you will have to periodically transfer energy to them the same way that you take it from others. If you transfer enough energy, you can actually reverse the aging to any age you want”

“Ok then, back to my second question” Eric started when Aeliana finished speaking. “How exactly are you intending to go about fixing me? I’m not exactly young and half my face is burnt off.”

“That one’s easier” Aeliana said with a smile “I’m going to send your soul back in time to when you first hit puberty, and your body started producing semen. To be exact, it will be your 12th year, 4th month, and 13th day. This will take quite a lot of my energy, but when a candidate as perfect as you comes along, it’s well worth the cost”

Eric stood silently for a second as he processed that, and then it hit him. His mother, he would be able to see his mother again. He could hold the one person in this world that ever cared for him and tell her how much he missed her. Eric was running through all the possibilities when a second realization hit him, and he looked to Aeliana then asked “If my mother has already moved on, wouldn’t pulling her soul back be cruel?”

For the second time Aeliana’s cheerful expression turned sad. “Eric, your mother did not move on either. As I said before, killing someone is a large marker against someone’s soul that is not easily balanced out. Your mother killed your father so she is currently in the process of being recycled.”

“SHE WAS DEFENDING ME!!” Eric screamed while taking a step forward.

Even though she was much older and more powerful than Eric, Aeliana took a reflexes step back from the venom in his voice. “Eric, I am not the one who makes those decisions” Aeliana said trying to calm him down. “We are the farmers not the judges, but you can still save her from that fate”.

Even though he no longer needed to breathe, Eric mimicked taking several deep breaths to calm himself and think through this. After a few minutes he asked,”So if I go back in time and stop her from killing my father, she will no longer go on to be recycled?”

“Yes and no,” Aeliana stated. “The only way a soul can be cleared of its markers is through recycling, and she has not finished that process yet. Even if she does not kill him this time and even if she does not remember it, she will still be accountable for her previous actions. If you take the offer to go back and she lives a completely selfless and virtuous life, that might be enough to balance her out. The other option of course, is you could make her your companion and together clear her markers.”

“But you said to make somebody a companion you have to have sex with them” Eric stated plainly. “You want me to take my mother as a lover, not just for one time, but for years and decades.” Eric said with a disbelieving look on his face.

“Yes” was Aeliana’s immediate reply. “I know you love her Eric, even if you’re not willing to vocalize it.”

Eric tried to deny it. Tried to tell her how wrong she was but was unable to speak. Once again as he tried to push the words up, he found that he couldn’t, that he was blocked. With a sigh, he bowed his head and didn’t say anything.

“She wouldn’t deny you if you asked, Eric,” Aeliana said in a soft voice. “I know that you feel like it’s wrong but considering what both of you have been through, it’s really not. Both of you have lived lives where everybody around you was either indifferent or hostile to you. It’s really not that odd in those circumstances for maternal love to develop into something deeper.”

Eric said nothing for several long minutes as he tried to come to grips with what he was feeling. Thinking back on his life he could see how Aeliana was telling the truth. He tried to tell himself his isolationism started after his burns, but that was a lie. The truth was his father’s family was so influential throughout the town that it always felt like it was just Eric and his mother.

Eric’s head snapped towards Aeliana with that realization. “That’s why you want me. That’s why you want to send me back. You want me and my mother to take down my father’s family. You want me to fuck all those disgusting women who made my life hell.”

Aeliana nodded

“I feel like I’m repeating myself, but once again, why?” Eric asked “Why should I get near them with what I know? Why can’t I simply do what I did before and expose them to the world?”

“You absolutely could Eric, but did you ever check on what happened with your father’s family after you did that? Especially the younger ones?” Aeliana asked, looking directly into his eyes.

With a shrug and a shake of his head, Eric confirmed that he didn’t.

Confirming what she already knew Aeliana started again “Believe me I understand who they are and what they did to you” Aeliana stated “But you have to remember that this family has been indoctrinating their young for generations. While some of the older ones must be removed. Once that is done the younger ones can go onto to have a chance at a proper life that they are currently being denied. That’s who we are. We’re are a scalpel, not a broad sword”

“And killing a few old women will do that” Eric questioned “What about the men? I can damn sure tell you right now that no matter what you are offering I’m not touching any of them.”

“No you don’t have to worry about that.” Aeliana smiled at his remark “While yes, you would be only removing 8 women, trust me when I say that will be enough to stop all of it. Without those older women there pressuring the middle and younger generation, they will quickly pull away. Without any women at the family gathering is just a bunch of guys with nobody to fuck.”

“And all the guys get off scot free” Eric asked

“Nobody said there wasn’t going to be punishment, Eric.” Aeliana stated “While we are few in numbers, if the men in that family start trying to make a mess of things again a succubus would be sent. If not, they will be given a chance to right their wrongs before their judgment time comes.”

Eric knew he was just stalling with questions at this point. He knew no matter what she said he was going to accept this deal. If for no other reason than to see his mother again. After so many years of being alone, just the idea of seeing her again was enough for him. And to top it off, the thought of her being punished because of him would have him crying if he was still able to.

With his mind made up, Eric looked to Aeliana and said “I accept your deal, but I cannot go all the way back to when I was 12. The thought of reliving all those years of abuse to me and my mother. I just can’t.” Aeliana nodded in understanding “Can you instead send me to my 15th birthday?” Eric asked “And can you do anything to make me stronger? Even at 15 I was still mainly a twig and my father has always been strong.”

Aeliana looked away, deep and thought at his question. “I can’t do anything to immediately change your body.” Aeliana said mostly to herself while thinking out loud. “What I could do is make a small change in your body’s genetics. Your body would produce more testosterone naturally, so it would be like you were taking steroids constantly without any of the negative effects.” Aeliana said, looking directly at him now. “You would still have to put in the work, but because of who your parents were, and with this minor change, you could gain a lot of muscle mass very fast.”

“I can work with that” Eric said once she finished “So before we finish up, is there anything else I need to know about being an Incubus? Any last-minute advice?”

“There’s only one final thing, but it’s fairly minor and not really a true power” Aeliana stated “Our kind gains a natural aura that makes us more attractive. It’s not by much but if you were to put it in the numbers, it would be something like 30%. With both of your parents being fairly attractive people, you would’ve been between a 7 and a 9 in attractiveness. Depending on how well you took care of your body. If you make a point to take care of yourself, you could easily be a 10 or 11, which will make your job much easier.”

“OK well I guess it’s time to get this show on the road” Eric said both nervous and excited. “What exactly happens now?”

“Close your eyes and when you start feeling my power push into you, don’t fight it. Just relax and I will take care of the rest of it from here.” Aeliana said as she started drawing on her power.

Walking over to Eric, Aeliana put one hand on his shoulder and started to flood him with her power. As she did, Eric’s soul space started to shrink towards him. Becoming gradually smaller and smaller each second. As she pushed more and more power into him, the speed in which his soul shrunk increased. Once it was only a quarter of its original size, Aeliana gave one final massive push, and his soul collapsed into him at the speed of a black hole.

Eric let out a gasp and quickly set up in his bed. That was not a pleasant experience for him, but he quickly set the pain aside to view his surroundings. A quick look around confirmed he was in his old home and the light coming from the window showed it to be early morning. His hand slowly rose and started to gently touch the left side of his face. He felt no burns, only the smooth skin that he’s so long ago forgotten about. Slightly confused Eric did notice that his left eye was slightly swollen and tender. He quickly remembered this was one of his father’s gifts for his 15th birthday. Looking up at the sound of his door quickly opening, Eric saw his mother standing there. Unable to believe the site that was before him, tears started flowing out of his eyes.

Sarah, having heard the gasp from Eric’s room, quickly went to check on him. When she opened the door and looked at him, she could see him holding his left eye and crying. Not understanding that they were tears of joy. Sarah quickly went over to her son and hugged him. Eric held her so tight, like he was afraid she was going to float away. He just kept telling her over and over how much he loved her. Sarah was unable to keep the tears from welling up in her own eyes. She hugged him back and told him everything was gonna be OK. In her own mind, Sarah just kept repeating the words “3 more years.” It became her own personal mantra at this point. Every time Seth got angry or violent she just repeated the countdown to herself. Today was Eric’s 15th birthday and they only had to hold on for 3 more years. 3 more years and Eric would be out of Seth’s family’s grasp. He would be an adult and could choose where he lived. Eric would be free and she would finally divorce Seth, regardless of any consequences to herself. Just 3 more years.

After 15 minutes, Eric was finally able to get a hold of himself. He told his mother that he was sorry for making her worry, but he really was fine. He just loved her so much and he needed her to understand that she was the world to him. After a few more tears, they were both able to compose themselves. Sarah went back to making breakfast while Eric got up and started re-familiarizing himself with his old room.

Eric was surprised at just how foreign it felt to be back in his old room. So many posters and knickknacks that he completely forgot about from his past life. He knew that he was going to have to put in some work quickly so it didn’t look too odd about forgetting so many simple things. The first thing Eric did was look up the weekday. He was lucky this year his birthday fell on a Sunday so he would at least have a day before he needed to return to school. Eric quickly got online and looked up his class schedule while re-familiarizing himself with the school’s layout.

Once he knew he wouldn’t make a fool of himself at school he sat down and started to think about his timeline for a plan. The first thing that Eric decided had to be done was to get his mother up to speed on everything that was going to happen. He was going to need her help quickly if they were going to survive this. He knew his mother trusted him completely, but if he just sat down and told her everything, she would think he was going insane. The only way for his mother to truly understand what they were up against this coming year would be for Eric to make her a companion. He was both excited and terrified at the prospect of trying to seduce his mother. On one hand, he knew everything that Aeliana told him about his mother was true. At the same time, the fear that if she rejected him, it would completely change their relationship. In the end, he knew he had no choice.

On his first go-round, Eric already spent a large portion of his time with his mother. Now, any free time that he had he was always by her side. They would work together doing chores around the house, or simply talking and enjoying each other’s company. What used to be innocent hugs and quick kisses became longer. He was never openly brazen about it, but he made sure to constantly show her more and more affection. He knew from stories that she used to tell him that she always loved dancing. Eric, under the guise of wanting to take a girl out, asked his mother to teach him to dance. Over the next week, they went through almost every kind of dance that existed. From country, to classical, to more alternative types that were basically more jumping around than actually dancing. He never had to worry much about his father catching them, as Seth was almost never home before 9PM.

With Saturday coming up, Eric’s father was going to be gone all day and would not be home till the following morning. He knew his mother always thought that after Seth went to the family church, he would hook up with some girl he met at the bar. Powerless to do anything about it she just accepted it at first. As the years went by, they were both more than grateful anytime Seth spent somewhere else. If everything worked out, very soon his mother would learn the whole truth about his father.

It was now around 5 o’clock on Saturday. With Eric’s father safely at the family gathering, Eric went looking for his mother. She was in her room, folding laundry and humming a cheery tune when he knocked on the door. Greeting her with a smile he asked her if she would like to go dancing with him. At first, she was happy with the prospect, but almost turned him down until he told her they could go to the next town over where none of the locals would report back to Seth. Sarah always had to be careful. Anytime she went out and did anything, If another man talked to her it would always get back to Seth, which would cause a fight. It had been so long since she had any kind of fun. Thinking it was worth the risk, Sarah happily agreed and went to get ready.

When his mother finished getting ready and met him in the living room, Eric’s jaw almost hit the floor. His mother was always beautiful, but she very rarely ever spent any time dressed up. She came up to him, wearing a beautiful red spaghetti strap dress that came down to her knees. Wearing a white Stetson cowboy hat, a belt with the belt buckle, and tall cowboy boots completed the ensemble. Seeing her son speechless, Sarah gave him a playful smile and asked if he was ready.

They spent a 45 minute drive to the next town chatting about anything and everything. The mood was almost electric when they finally arrived at the large warehouse that was converted to a dance hall. Being at the place served alcohol Eric was only let in with a large stamp on his hand, proclaiming him to be a minor. The next three hours Eric could only describe as the best day of his life. Eric, having only been practicing for a week, was nowhere near as good a dancer as Sarah. He did well enough not to make a fool of himself, but she was the personification of grace on the dance floor. When they got tired of dancing, they sat at a table and just talked. Sarah would occasionally drink a 7&7, but never had enough to even get her buzzed as she would have to drive back.

Having been there for several hours now, they both were starting to get a little tired and hungry so they decided to call it a night. As they were leaving, Sarah made to hit up a local drive-through to grab some food for the way home, but Eric asked her not to. He told her if she could hold off for 30 minutes he had a surprise that he thought she would like. As they made their way back to their hometown, Eric started to give her directions to a place where they could sit down and eat.

As they got closer, Sarah started to recognize where they were going. This was an old dirt road down to the dam and the lake. Sarah used to visit this place when she was younger and had many fond memories of it. She used to tell Eric stories about it, but she didn’t think he remembered. Once they parked, Eric asked her to open up the trunk and got out. He pulled out a blanket and a cooler that she did not remember seeing him place in there. He smiled and grabbed her hand, walked down to the edge of the lake.

Eric spread out the blanket and started pulling food out of the cooler. Sitting down next to him Eric handed her a plate of Shepherd’s Pie that left Sarah speechless. Shepherds Pie is a fairly simple dish, but Sarah always loved it since she was a child. It was one of Sarah’s mothers go to foods anytime that either one of them was sad. Sarah couldn’t remember making this recently so she had no idea where he got it from. When she asked him about it, he just smiled and said that he learned to make it for her. Holding back tears, Sarah ate silently next to Eric and she couldn’t remember a time being this happy.