29 Chapter 26

I whistled happily as I walked out of the hotel, looking up at the morning sky, the sun rising up over the mountains and took a breath of the cool morning air.

"Ah, feels good to be alive!" I grinned.

[Shame I can't say the same.]

Aw, buddy. We'll get you a body soon enough. Don't worry.

[I'm not. What I'm worried about is why you're being all chummy chummy with discount build-a-bear over there.]

You've been waiting the whole night to ask this haven't you? I chuckled.

[Yes. Now spill.]

Sure. That whole thing, it was an act.

[No shit Sherlock. I've seen pride marches straighter than that persona you put on in there. Kinda obvious.]

It needed to be. It's what I was going for- slightly mentally unstable, overtly extroverted, and BPD. A little pinch of salt to complete that performance and convince him that I did have the Mark. Not all effects of the Mark are good. It has detrimental effects on the mind too. And if I had acted all cold and calculating all the time, he'd have gotten clever and that is not ideal, especially in this particular deal.

I needed to give off that particular impression. Put him at ease; well, as much as I could at least.

He's suspicious by nature so to some extent he'll always be on guard.

That's why, knowing this, I made sure to give him a strong impression.

Something to remember me by, but something that was a complete 180 degrees from what I really plan on doing. He'll be chasing chickens while I butcher his pigs and make away with the bounty.

[I don't get it. You're saying you don't want all those things you asked?]

No. If I get them all, that's great. But knowing him, he'll probably back stab me first chance he gets to avoid paying me. In fact, I'm counting on it.

[You want him to betray you?]

Yep. You see, the easiest way to hide my true intentions from him wasn't hiding things from him but rather giving him a whole different, yet complete picture of my desires, the impression of utter omniscience, such that he never even bothers to question my intentions in the first place, because doing so means questioning his own perceptions and thoughts. People are surprisingly resilient against their own self questioning, especially arrogant, know-it-alls like him.

He'll never even think, and in fact actively dissaude himself against the very idea that he could have gotten my intentions wrong.

[So while he thinks he's playing you like fiddle...]

I grinned.

He's actually doing exactly what I want him to do.

Now that he thinks he knows exactly what I want, he'll plan around it.

[And you'll plan around his plan?]

I laughed.

No. Nothing that complicated. I'll just do what I want anyways. That whole act was the insurance. A little distraction to keep him busy while I take everything I need.

[Then why even bother involving him? You know where the Angel Tablet is, you know the trials, if all you want is that fee, you extort far more if you went directly to the angels.]

And put my own life at risk? Never.

Besides, I know the trials but I don't know the spell to complete them. A little grain of truth I added to make the lie more real. And I'll need Metatron to decipher it for me.

[Then catch a prophet. You know who the next one is right?]

Nah. Prophets are a pain and a half. When they awaken, storms ravage the location, lightning strikes, plague sweeps the place and it's a whole mess. It's like a giant supernatural neon sign telling people to come and kindly fuck me up the ass.

And then once they have awakened, somehow everyone and their grandma can track their location. In the show, some random thug could find him. And he's not exactly the most cooperative kid anyways. Catching a prophet just to get my hands on one puny ritual is just not worth risking my life over.

No thank you.

I'll stick to Metatron. He's predictable and knows how to hide his tracks.

[But what's to say he'll tell you the spell?]

That's the thing, PK. I don't need him to tell me anything.

As I said, it's all one big distraction. He'll do exactly what I want him to do without even knowing he's playing right into my hands.

He'll get the Angel Tablet, he'll 'betray' me and skip town. And he'll fulfill the rituals all by himself. Without me having to lift a single finger. No risk taken. He'll do all my work for me. Why would I want to change that?

And once he completes the ritual? Banishes all angels from heaven? It will be a live broadcast across the world. I don't even need to put a tracker on him. All I need to do is clear the road for him at the start and let him run my race to the finish for me. And once he's at the finish line, all gloating, I swoop in and reap the rewards of his hard work.

And you know what the best part is, PK?

Since he'll do it all alone, no one will know it was me who was the real puppet master behind him. No blame, no responsibility.

Take a guess what that means.

[You don't mean-] PK gasped as he finally realized what my true goal was.

Yup. Exactly what I always planned.

[You never wanted the angels' graces did you?]

I smiled deviously.

Why settle for the golden egg when you can steal the whole goose?

[That is genius.] PK laughed.

Glad to see you like it.

I cracked my neck and stretched my arms as I pushed on with the day's agenda.

Now, onto our next target.

[And what is that?]

A mentor. I need experience in both fighting angels and Enochian magic if I'm to clear the road for old chubster back there. Not to mention do it all while hiding from Chuck's wandering eye in the sky. I'm no fighter, but I think it's about time I start working on it.

[Ah, it's time for a training arc, I see.]

Breaking the fourth wall already? I chuckled.

Getting meta are we?

[I'm a Kaleidoscope mystic code. Meta runs in my veins.]

I suppose so.

I pulled out my phone and brought up a location on it.

[Portal?]

Portal.

I pumped magic into the ring and it began to pulse with a prismatic glow. I raised my hand and made a circle around us, erecting a temporary bounded field to hide the use of the Kaleidoscope from potential prying eyes and raised a knife hand.

With one clean stroke, I brought it down, and with it, the second true magic, Kaleidoscope.

Space shattered into a million colorful fractals before me as a portal tore open and without hesitation, I walked right into it.

_________________

And okay, so the mentor didn't show up this chapter. But next chapter for sure.

And a cookie for the first person to figure out who the mentor is going to be.

BTW the mentor won't be a love interest FYI (unless you guys want it? We can discuss here.)

Anyway, thanks for reading.

Donate your powerstones to motivate me. The more motivated I am, the faster I pump out chapters, so go on ahead!

And add the fic to your library while you're at it.

See ya later skaters!