“Mhm…Don’t go,” muttered Jo.

“I’d love to, hon. But I’ve gotta open the shop,” I whispered softly. Kissing the hand that lay on my chest, and pulling away from the arm, shoulder, and bosom that were connected to it. My wife Josephine was always a bit “sticky” as a bedmate. Clinging to the other person in bed for warmth and comfort. She’d been especially clingy lately. I was pretty sure part of it had to do with that damned Empire of Violet attacking Brandy and me. Jo’s model of designer-soldier were like many others, created to be guard dogs and attack-dogs, and programmed to feel heightened anxiety when their targets were at risk.

I also had this feeling that maybe there was something else there. I’d tried talking to Jo, and/or reassuring her, but oddly enough Jo just sort of clammed up. Which was odd, because usually, my wife was a pretty open book, or at least compared to my extra-sketchy self she was generally pretty open. So either, she really didn’t want to tell me what was bothering her yet, or she didn’t exactly know what was bothering her yet. In either case, heaven knows she’d put up with enough of my vagaries and secretive nonsense throughout our relationship, so I was willing to let her be until she was ready to open up.

I brushed. I showered. I considered shaving, but ultimately didn’t shave because having complete control of one’s physiology meant controlling the length and behavior of one’s body hair too. I made a nice hearty breakfast for the household. Tasty breakfast quesadillas made with light-auroch cheese, iron-roc eggs, and crimson spirit fruits. With fresh apple juice, oatmeal, and coffee for the table. Then after I’d eaten I headed to the shop.

Today was supposed to be a light day. Well, admitted every day was fairly light, thanks to my figments dealing with most of the more tedious work. However, today in particular was pretty light. There was no restocking to oversee, that was yesterday. All the new offerings had already been put up on the shelves with the older offerings having been transitioned out, or moved to the clearance aisles. Today all I needed to do, besides routine inspections for neatness and safety, was placing a few new games into the arcade.

I did so, and then a little under two hours later, I stepped outside to take a breather. I stood under the strange smiling sun of the server known as Zabyvat-Pomni-Slomay. Pretty much everything was partially anthropomorphic, and potentially sapient, here which made for some pretty unnerving scenery, but I supposed the locals had gotten used to having everything quietly watching them. I drank some coffee, while waiting for customers to trickle into the quantum-branches of the shop that were opening in the other servers.

Just as I was prepared to head back in, and greet my first customer of the day, suddenly out of the blue, appeared a being of light, with countless wings, countless eyes that crackled with lightning, and a flaming spear. I leaned out of the way of the spear. Then when one of the being’s multiple wings turned all tendril-like and tried to pierce through me, I teleported to the back of the being.

My view was awash with fire, as the creature retaliated by calling down holy flames. I let the flames wash over me, consuming me. Turning that particular version of me, into a faint wisp of ash, and ozone. Then countless magical duplicates appeared in the empty air. With a wave of their hands, the duplicates counterattacked, sending out spikes of kinetic force that struck the being of light and pinned them to the ground. Golden blood dripped out as the being struggled to rise back at its feet. More of my clones appeared, and all of us together, struck the being again, turning it into a pincushion.

Of course, that wasn’t enough to kill the creature. I was clearly dealing with some kind of true-immortal here. Otherwise, there was no way, I wouldn’t have seen it coming. I had a feeling that I was finally running into the thing that I’d felt watching me over the past few months. I’d kind of hoped that this would be resolved after I took Violet for myself, but it seems those two threats were unrelated. Violet was Violet and this was this.

I gathered a spell of vorpal darkness that would tear the creature to shreds, but then I stopped remembering that I was no longer a villain anymore. I no longer had to live like a rat in a twisted skinner’s box, acting according to imposed conditioning. I had the space and the freedom to act like a reasonable person. So I put away my clones, I took out a replacement coffee, and then I took a sip and decided to have a chat with the bleeding figure before me.

“Well, old bean…I do say that’s quite the fine howdy-doo. It’s a little bit too energetic for my tastes, on a lazy morning like this, but I appreciate the enthusiasm…All jokes aside, exactly why are you attacking me, stranger?” I said. Gazing down at the being of light from my perch in mid-air.

The creature glared at me, with the few of its countless eyes that hadn’t been pierced or ruptured by my spikes of kinetic force. Then after a moment, it stopped glaring. When it spoke I realized what I was dealing with. The creature spoke in the language of the holy host. It seemed I’d apparently drawn the attention of the angels somehow.

That was surprising news, as well as unpleasant news. As one would imagine, the angels were no friends to villains. And unfortunately for me, thanks to my commoditization, I’d been a particularly prolific villain, and had managed to get thoroughly into their bad books in my time.

Even when they acknowledged that I had little to no say in the matter, they then just sort of treated whatever version of me they ran into as a kind of contraband that the worlds were imbibing in, before snuffing out that particular alternate-me out like a lit doobie.

“The flow of fate is chaotic and warped around you…After determining who you were, I was sent to stop you…” said the angel.

“Mhm…That’s disappointing to hear…Have your superiors properly been watching the mutations of fate?… Or did they just identify me and decide to attack just for “prudence’s” sake?” I said. One brow raised.

The angel fell silent, but I noted it was now no longer glaring. Angels were people, and like most people they could be wrong, but say what you want about them, the vast majority of angels were extremely logical beings, and quite reasonable when they weren’t operating on some “holy mission”.

Which meant in the rare instance when you could prove them wrong, they quickly accepted it and acted accordingly. Though, like anyone else, they’d come back spitting flames and sparks if they found out you’d tricked them somehow.

“I…See…Perhaps, this was in error…” said Angel. The light in its eyes became a lot less like righteous fire, and a lot more like placid, sun-like, warmth. Even despite my own ill-feelings for the angelic host, and my annoyance at this particular angel, I couldn’t help being mollified.

I imagine at this range, it could see that the flow of fate from my person was relatively "peaceful". Or at least no more disruptive and/or destructive than your average person's interactions with the flow of fate would be. In other words, my cosmic “alignment”, or my karma-meter, what have you…was still set to neutral-good, despite my past world-mandated affiliations with evil, and formerly-sinister nature.

The most disruptive thing I’d done of late, was taking over Violet, and Violet was a despotic, authoritarian, nightmare, prone to constant wars, and a flatly dystopic amount of human rights violations. Under my rule, the country would likely be much more well-behaved. So even that wasn’t enough to serve as a serious black mark for a being like myself.

“You blamed a slave for being bound by the will of his masters…And on your own, you marked me by their misdeeds. Now, instead of properly watching the eddies of time and causality to see if I am actually having a negative effect on the cosmic balance sheet you jumped the gun and attacked…” I said. My voice was cold and deep, reverberating from around and beyond my body. My eyes narrowed and began to glow with yellow light.

I closed my eyes, and took a deep breath. The anger flowed away from me like a leaf in a stream. I opened my eyes and smiled. It wasn’t often that one had the moral high-ground over an angel. I calculated with my fingers, and quickly decided my next move.

“I’ve decided not to kill you…You can scram now!… And when you get back, tell your superiors I will be filing a complaint with the high-seraphs for this affront. I’ve done no crime, the fates I’ve changed are either fates in need of aid, or fates changed for the better, and I refuse to be assaulted simply for running an honest business…” I said. My voice getting a bit thunderous, growly, and beastly again, as I shook off the calming effects of the angel’s presence, and grew angry again.

The angel did as I asked. Disappearing, and I'll begrudgingly admit, it rather politely, cleaned up the scene of our fight as it did. I slowly lowered myself down to the ground, and then I entered the shop. Shaking my head as I prepared to return to start with the day's shift at the shop.