Love as the Darer Binding

***Abi's collection points to some failings in a few areas, the way that he sees it. He's already had a few improvements in mind and he begins to implement them in this.

If Imogen's part of the dialog reads a little "young", it's because she's nineteen and lives alone. Not a lot of chances to gain sophistication, but that'll change. 0_o

***

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Still on the western coast of Florida somewhere.

"Wh –what are you gonna do with me?"

Abi turned to look at Imogen in a little surprise, "You?"

He smiled, "Nothing Imogen, I wasn't here for you. I'm actually very happy that you're alright and to be honest, I've been dying to talk to you.

May I sit down? You don't seem to be all that afraid of me and I'd like to ask you a few questions. If it's alright, of course."

She thought about it for a moment. "What are you? You look like a demon. You're not the devil are you?"

Abi shook his head, "No, I'm not him. I am a demon, though." He rolled his eyes and shrugged, "You caught me."

She chuckled at that, "Ok, um, is there a name? And who was that uh, girl there?"

"A soul-huntress," he said, "She's actually pretty well-known where she spends some of her time. If she's not the best, then she can't be very far from it. Today, I'm here doing the same thing that she was here for, but I'm not as good as she is at all, from the talk that I've heard.

And I can't really give a human a name, though in your case, I'd kind of like to. It's sort of against the rules.

You can call me Abi if you like.

Um, if it's not going to make you feel uncomfortable, why aren't you wearing anything? Don't get me wrong, I think it's wonderful personally, and I hope you can see that I haven't been staring or anything."

"I don't really mind," Imogen smiled, "I have a feeling that if you wanted to, you could just see through clothes anyway, couldn't you?"

He nodded and they laughed a little.

"I don't know if I can really explain this," she said a little shyly, "I know I'm not anything to look at, but when I'm alone, well, I just like to be naked. I don't have to pay for the heat here, so I just turn it up a little and take my clothes off. There's never anybody to see me, and it just feels good to me."

Abi nodded, "I think that's a really good attitude. I really wish more humans were like you. Besides needing to keep warm, I've never understood their shame over it. Demons rarely ever wear anything. I pretty much only wear clothes so I don't shock too many people when I have to be here.

But you know, Imogen, if you don't mind me saying it, you are something to look at. I can tell a lot of things about humans, so I saw almost right off that you don't like the way that your body looks – as far as what's outside the door is concerned. Take it from me, you look great."

He looked down and groaned then, "And this is where you'll give me the great big, long list of what you see as imperfections about yourself."

He looked back up with a twinkle in his eye then, "Go ahead. I've got a rebuttal for each and every one. I've even got tons of suggestions."

She laughed out loud, "You're joking!"

He shook his horned head and kept smiling, "Nope. And almost every one is about cosmetics, and I don't mean the kind you wear. The rest are all simple, easy to do things. I did say that your nose was pretty, remember?"

"Yeah," she smiled, "Nobody ever said something like that about me before."

"Well, it's true," he said simply.

His expression changed then and she wondered about it, "What's wrong, Abi?"

He shook his head, looking a little angry, "It's nothing. I'm a little mad at myself, that's all. I'm really not much good at soul-hunting. I mean, I have lots of power and ability. I catch almost everything that's a thought or an idea. But I miss some things sometimes, and one of them has just come to me – really late."

He leaned back on his hands, "I've been wondering why you called that guy 'daddy'. You don't have to say a thing, Imogen. It just hit me."

She looked down, "My dad died and I don't have a clue where my mom is, not that she ever cared about me much. I got some money from Dad's will.

I used some of it, about two thirds, to take a ground school course and I took some flying lessons, because I've always wanted to fly and so that I could tell myself that at least I'd done something in my life. But I saw how fast the money was going so I had to quit. I've saved whatever I could and just spent what I had to so that I could live. I can't really get much of a job. I've got my high school, but that doesn't count for anything.

That guy, he'd come around now and then. For forty bucks, I'd let him fuck me and I'd call him 'Daddy'. He wanted that. He always paid me and never cheated once. I uh, I've never had a boyfriend, and if I closed my eyes and imagined, then it felt pretty good sometimes."

She looked down, "But I guess that was what you must have figured out, huh?"

She seemed to shrink a little before his eyes and he saw in a flash of insight that she was about to get up to get dressed. To Abi right then, it would signal something that he really didn't want to see in her. More than that, he thought that it would be a downright shame.

He sat up, reached out, and touched her shoulder lightly. Imogen looked up.

Abi only said, "No."

She was confused, so since he was already touching her, he felt a lot of things about her which confirmed his ideas earlier. He sent her some confidence and the knowledge that he wasn't going to be critical of her. Imogen saw his genuine thoughts about her and felt better immediately.

"How did you do that? And um, ... thanks, Abi."

"How did I do that?"

He laughed softly after a moment, "Imogen, I'm a fucking demon, ok? Trust me, I just can.

I'm not going to sit here and tell you EVERYTHING about me and what I can and can't do. For one thing, neither one of us has the time. Look, I hope you can see that I'm not going to hurt you in any way, but, ... well, come here. I can't think of the last time that I've seen anybody who needed a hug the way that you obviously do."

She smiled at him and after a moment, she just gave up and came to him. He guided her so that she sat on his leg and he put his large arms around her and held her for a moment. She laid her head down on his shoulder and sighed.

"I uh, I hope that's a good sign," he smiled.

Imogen nodded, "I've never felt a hug this good, well except from maybe my dad when I was little."

Abi smiled and looked around for a moment, trying to think of how to say something to her gently.

"You don't really know how to cook, do you?" He asked, pointedly looking at all of the take-out food packaging, "I'm really regretting that I didn't know you months ago. I'd have taught you how and more importantly, I'd have taught you how to shop for deals on the food you buy. You could have saved a ton.

I get the feeling that you didn't know any better and that's probably because your father didn't know himself. You mother was gone, you said, so you couldn't possibly know.

I know that we can't change the clock, but I really wish that I could for you. You'd be able to take more lessons then. How far did you get?"

As she began to tell him about it, Abi saw her light up a little bit, just from remembering as she spoke, "I was only flying a go-slow old Piper, but I did manage to get a good start. I did everything, Abi. I even flew the very same as I'd have done if I got to fly solo, only with my instructor beside me.

She told me what we were gonna do, and that unless I needed her, she was gonna just sit there with her hands in her lap and not say a word. And I did it!"

"Have you still got your learner's permit or whatever they call it?" he asked, "In other words, assuming that you had enough to live, if you somehow stumbled over enough money for a few lessons to brush up and get the hang of it again, would you try, so that you could get your license?"

Imogen's face lit up, "Sure!"

He held up his hand then, "Just hold that thought. I've got more questions. We'll come back to that." He looked at the large screen, "What were you doing here?"

"This is just a game that I was playing, it's a first-person shooter. That means you run around blasting things that'll kill you if you don't. I also like role playing games, but my very favorites are flight simulations. Can I show you?"

He nodded and she was off his lap and gone, moving over to power up a PC with five monitors attached to it and laid out in a roughly semi-circular array around a comfortable-looking chair, though the monitor directly in front of it was larger.

"This took me forEVER to rig up, since I had to stuff in a few video cards and get it so that none of them conflicted with each other. It lets you look out at the scenery around you as you fly. The PC cost a bit, but this is my baby. I spend days right here."

Several minutes later, Abi sat enthralled as she flew through a very realistic simulated world, even handling radio calls from the artificial intelligence which ran the Air traffic Control. He heard the advisory remarks to warn her of other traffic in the sky around them whenever it occurred as well. Imogen might look off to the side for a moment then, and if she could, she'd point the other aircraft out to Abi as she acknowledged the advisory.

Half an hour after that, he asked the question which was third-most in his mind. "This is a small transport that you're flying here. Is it possible to overstress it?"

"Yup," she nodded, "I've got this set up for absolute realism all the way. I do dumb shit here, I can snap a wing off, just like I would if it was outside that window there. I just don't get killed when I crash. I did this because I like to fly, Abi. What would be the point in faking it? I've even got it set up to have random failures."

"Have you got any time in a fighter?" he asked, "Something more nimble, you know, something very agile?"

She nodded, "Gimme a minute and we'll be in a Firefox. I've got a Raptor profile that I downloaded, but they're pretty new, so I don't really trust it for really being a faithful reproduction. I figure the authors of the profile might have been a little ... optimistic or something. My Firefox profile is authentic. All of the factors and numbers are right on the money compared to the real thing. I checked for that."

After her 'by the numbers' takeoff in the Firefox, she flew very aggressively and the screens dimmed for a few seconds now and then, "That would be me beginning to black out a little from the G forces – even taking the effect of the simulated pressurized suit into account."

"I understand," Abi nodded from beside her, "But there is perhaps a good side. Many fighter pilots suffer from hemorrhoids caused by those forces."

"Yeah, but I'd rather feel the sensation of flying. If I had to fly a real fighter every day, I'd have to put up with that too, though they get paid for it."

She sighed, "One of the big drawbacks to this is that I can't really feel the Gs sitting here in the chair. I really wish I could, though. There are some parts of flying that you can't model on a livingroom PC set up."

"Like inverted flight?" Abi suggested.

"That's only one thing. The world goes upside down, but you're not really hanging from the harness straps then," she said as she flew a half-Cuban eight pattern without effort. "See? The horizon tilts, but if we were in that plane, we'd feel this. We can't really feel it here. This fools the eyes and the mind can visualize me flying. My heart jumps on board because I really want to fly.

But my ass doesn't feel like it's flying. There's no sensations of lift and descent there and without my ass feeling it, I have enough experience in the real thing to know that if my ass isn't feeling it, then it isn't happening. End of illusion.

I'm not really flying."

Abi nodded and she flew for several minutes before he spoke again.

"Let me see you land something big," he said.

"Like what?" she asked, "I've got lots of heavy metal birds. I could bring in a B-52H, complete with the weight of the bomb load, if you want. The descent and approach take like forever in those things, but I'll show you if you want to see."

They settled on a Boeing 747 freighter, fully loaded and fueled accordingly for a long flight since Abi asked for it, even though the planned flight was only a few hundred miles. Abi watched as she took off from Billings Logan International in Montana and climbed, looking for a cruise altitude of 37,000 feet and headed for LAX.

"Can you change the weather?" he asked and she nodded.

"I've got this set up so that it gets real world weather data from the internet every time that I start up. What's out there over the West and Midwest in here is what's really there. If you want me to mess with it to give us a blizzard in California, I'd have to re-start."

He shook his head, "Too much trouble, I was just asking."

Not long before she'd finished the climb-out, he turned to her, "Imogen, let me see you divert to Oildale, California. Can you simulate an engine failure on say, your number four engine? To be clear, the starboard side engine, outside, nearest the wingtip. Don't dump any fuel."

She looked over at him and shook her head, "Can't. That field if I remember - 'cause I flew there one time, can't handle the weight of a 747 Heavy like this."

"What would they do?" he smiled, "Rip up your simulated license? Remember that this would be an emergency. Would they turn you away?"

Imogen smiled at him, "You're testing me, aren't you?"

"Let's call it challenging," he chuckled, "I want to see you do it. I know you don't have the benefit of the second officer to leaf through the procedures manual, but I'd like to see it."

"Ok, " she said, nodding, "but why can't I dump fuel to save weight and stress?"

"I dunno, to make it harder. Pretend the dump valve is stuck closed."

"Ok," she said, "You're the boss."

The rest of the flight was very challenging as she flew it facing the uneven thrust of only three engines, especially during her approach and landing, since it was after dark in Oildale by that time.

But an hour or so after they'd agreed on the details of the 'emergency', they were rolling along on the ground in heavy rain squalls with Imogen muttering at how much of a bitch it was to park a 747 Heavy in the general aviation parking area at that airport with so many little planes all around them.

Abi was smiling.

He watched Imogen do this all the way to engine shut-down and she sat back.

"Ok, that was a bitch. I've flown lots of times in a Heavy through lightning and thunderstorms, but not with one engine out and making me need to counteract for the asymmetrical thrust.

And never through tornado and wind shear warnings. We got blown around like a leaf."

"You did have the autopilot to help most of the time," Abi pointed out quietly.

"Yeah," she nodded, "but not for that wild landing. If it were for real, I wouldn't have trusted the systems for an ILS-assisted landing. For shit like that, ya gotta fly hands-on all the way down at the end."

She configured a replay of their touch-down from an external view and pointed, "I almost wiped us out here when we were banked against the wind as we came in. See how close I came to mowing the lawn with our wingtip?"

Her face changed as a thought came to her and then she began to grin at him. "You knew!

You knew it all along, didn't you? That's why you asked about the weather, isn't it?

You KNEW there'd be shit in the sky over a little place like Oildale by the time we got there tonight, right?"

Abi nodded with a laugh and it caused her to laugh as well.

"Yeah," he sighed, "but I also know that the field in Oildale is closed right now for the same hazards that you flew through for me. They probably wouldn't refuse an emergency approach, but not from what you flew, if it could be avoided at all.

Here, let's celebrate a little."

He handed her a bottle. She looked and found herself holding a bottle of rather well-known beer. He had a second one in his other hand. Both of them were opened.

"Where did you get these?" Imogen asked with a smile, "I hardly ever drink because I'm so out of money, but this is my favorite cheap beer when I do. I guess you know that too."

Abi chuckled, "Are we back to what I can do? These are quite real, Imogen. Don't worry, I won't let you get drunk."

"What are we celebrating?" she asked as they both sipped their beer and smiled at each other. Abi decided that he hated those glasses there on her nose. She'd look much better without them.

"That you passed my challenge so well," he smiled, raising his bottle to clink it against hers, "Though we might need another couple to celebrate something else if you accept my offer."

"I dunno," she said a little worriedly, "You said that you weren't here for me. I don't even know where what's-his-name's body went."

"I hold his soul at the moment until I can deliver it to the place that I told him that he's going. His body is in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Santa Margarita Island. The seals are migrating to their breeding and mating grounds there at this time. It always attracts many Great White sharks, who often have difficulty telling humans and seals apart. A couple of them have been feeding on his carcass for a while now.

I didn't come for you, but I'm so glad that we met through the one I was chasing. I have to warn you not to fall in love with me for anything, because it just couldn't end well, and I have a female. She doesn't mind it when I do this, and I hardly ever do."

He stood up and took her hand, "Come and sit with me, Imogen. We need to talk about a job for you."

She stood up and he turned back as he felt her resist the pull. "Abi, ... I'm not sure how to say this, but, ... is there any way that I could maybe get to kiss you a little? You look really good to me like this. I've just spent hours alone with you. It's pretty surprising to me in one way, and not at all in another."

She pointed at her simulated leather chair, "Look Abi, I've been sitting there wet as anything for hours."

She looked down, "Is that even allowed? I don't want to go to Hell for kissing you, but it's what I really want to do."

"You don't have to worry about that," he said quietly, "It's not all black and white or good and evil, you know. What some parts of mankind have been frothing about for centuries hasn't been that clear for thousands of years, though I guess that it started out that way. For most of the time since, it's been more like the difference between corporate philosophies."

He chuckled as he put his arm around her, "Honey, if every girl who wanted to kiss one of us, ...

Well, if every girl who ever kissed a demon went straight to Hell over it, I think the world's overpopulation problem would be solved in about a month.

There are things to be considered, though. We're not all the same kind. We all look sort of the same to you, I'd guess, but there are dangers. The lovely female who came in earlier is fairly high on the evolutionary ladder for what we are. But if you kissed her, or a male like her, you'd probably get sick and die from it. They know this, so it almost never happens.

My kind is ok to kiss, though," he said a little proudly, and Imogen laughed a little.

"So it's alright?" she asked.

He nodded as he led her to where she'd been sitting before and sitting down himself, he took her into his arms again as he moved her to sit on his leg. "It's fine, and I consider it as a compliment that you feel this way."

She reached around his neck and pulled herself against him. The kiss was something very soft and really good to Abi, and it almost caused Imogen to pass out.