"Dead? No. No, he can't…" Peter reached for Michael, who somehow looked a lot smaller than he already was. His feathers seemed greyer. His eyes were partially open, staring at nothing.

As Peter picked him up, Micky reached over, too, and gave the chicken a shake, as if this would just wake him up. None of them seemed to know what to do, or how to react.

Once Micky realized that Mike wasn't waking up, he pulled his hand back as if he'd stuck it right in the blue fire held in Forty-Two's hand. Wide-eyed, shocked, he glanced wildly at the others. "Wh— what are we gonna do? He— his family— I mean, they— No, he can't be dead. Mike! Michael, come on, man, this isn't funny."

Davy's eyes were fixed on nothing as he grabbed Micky's shoulders, preventing the drummer from giving the body another shake. Maybe he'd already accepted it, or maybe he hadn't allowed it to quite sink in just yet. To Forty-Two, Davy was always sort of a wildcard - at various points, he was either as down-to-earth as Michael, or as up-in-the-clouds as Micky.

Peter was already allowing the truth to sink in, tears gathering in his eyes and spilling down his face. He hugged the still-warm body close to himself; it was strange to see that ever-present optimism fall apart. Nothing would be okay now, his actions seemed to say. Nothing will work out for the best, the game is over, and we didn't win.

So, there was a choice.

The decision ended up being surprisingly easy for the demon. His talons curled around the azure fire in his hand, holding it fast to earth.

"I've got him. Here." His tone was clipped, but deep and resonating. Despite his natural form's relatively small size, his voice echoed unnaturally through the vacated factory. Nodding at the fire, Forty-Two forced a smile. "I'm keeping him from moving toward the Light, but I can't hold him forever. And if some other demon gets a whiff of an imprisoned soul, they're gonna want it, so we don't have much time."

"…You can save 'im?" Davy quickly asked.

"Peter, you have a wish left," Forty-Two said. He wanted to answer Davy, to explain everything, but there just wasn't enough time.

"But you said you couldn't … Couldn't do something to — I mean — " Peter fumbled over the words, but it was hard to miss the hope in his grey-blue eyes.

"You need to do it now. Make the wish."

Compared with Micky's highly detailed and complex order for a car, Peter's was simple, to the point, and heart-rending: "Fix him."

Being more specific wasn't necessary, though. Really, it was up to the genie to twist the wish - or not - and in this case, Forty-Two had done more than enough damage to last several lifetimes. He was going to make this right, he was going to do exactly what they wanted him to do. He was going to fix this mess.

"I'll need some room."

Peter set Michael down - reluctantly - and he and the others backed away a little, sitting on the floor. Hope had returned to their eyes, and Forty-Two wasn't about to disappoint them.

All demons had an incredible amount of power. Infinite, some would say. Bindings existed to prevent abuse of that power, but it never meant that those abilities were taken away. A demon could change rank, after all, or request a new set of bindings to adapt to his job.

He sunk he claws into the soul, eyes closing, communicating with it on a very basic level. Souls were tricky things, after all - neither living nor dead, since the spirit of anything couldn't exist in either state. It would continue on in this partially sentient form until the Light took it to its destination, and wasn't accustomed to accepting orders from a demon. Forty-Two didn't mean to hurt what was essentially Michael's very essence, but his claws scratched the surface, causing it to register a tremor of pain before it agreed not to follow the Light off the mortal coil.

And that's when the demon began to heal it.

Rearranging the body came first. In its present state, it couldn't live, so he knit broken bones, repaired destroyed blood vessels, and replaced various wrecked bits of internal anatomy. It wasn't perfect, but it would be enough so that the soul wouldn't reject it as a home.

He pulled the fire downward, and it disappeared.

Slowly, the chicken began to look less like a chicken. Feathers melted into skin or became hair. Michael's limbs lengthened and regained their proper numbers of fingers and toes. It didn't take long before he went from less than a foot in height to his normal six-foot-one, during which his face reformed its proper features.

It was Micky who realized that his bandmate and friend had no clothes. Before the former chicken could awaken and suffer embarrassment, the drummer quickly stood up, pulling another dropcloth off one of the machines, and covered Mike with it.

Humans and their taboos.

Abruptly, Michael gasped, sitting up and nearly shaking the sheet off himself in a desperate attempt to get to his feet. Before he could do so, though, Peter reached for him, one hand closing around the other man's upper arm. Mike winced in pain, since that was his damaged shoulder, but at least he stopped trying to run away from whatever it was he felt he needed to escape.

It was like he was frozen, half-crouching and facing away from them, breathing as if he'd just run a marathon. He would feel the need to steal as much oxygen from the air as he could, though, since being dead tended to do that to a person. One didn't really appreciate breathing until one couldn't do it anymore. Between breaths, he trembled, finally shaking himself right off his feet and to his knees. He planted his hands against the floor to steady himself.

After a few moments, Peter said, "Mike, it's okay."

Realizing he was covered with a sheet, Mike looked down at himself, then quickly pulled the cloth more tightly around his shoulders. Chuckling, Peter said again, "It's okay, Mike. You're all right."

Finally, the black-haired young man turned toward the others, and, surprised, Peter released his arm, scooting backward. The others wore similar shocked expressions, and were met with a questioning, almost hurt look from their recently-transformed friend.

"Your eyes," Davy said.

Mike blinked, still breathing heavily. "Hh… whh— "

"Take it easy, huh? You're not used to talking yet, buddy," Micky said. "Your eyes are glowing."

Surprised, Mike arched his eyebrows.

"And orange," Peter added.

Looking quite exhausted, Forty-Two managed a smile on his goat-like face. "Yeah, when you have a demon's claws in your soul, there tend to be a few… side effects. It's like a scar. It'll diminish over the next few years."

"Y— ye—years?" Mike stuttered, turning his attention to Forty-Two. He narrowed his eyes, which were now the same pupil-less, sunset-colored eyes of the demon. It also didn't escape the astute young man that their friendly neighborhood genie looked a lot different than he did before. "Are… you…?"

"Yeah, it's me. Pretty cool, huh?"

Mike nodded, weakly.

"So," Micky said. "How bad is it gonna be for you, Forty-Two, breakin' the rules and all?"

The demon was quiet, tired, looking at the floor. Several times, he started to speak, but every time, he couldn't quite find gentle enough words to tell them. Maybe he could spare them the awful truth and tell them something less severe? But no, he owed it to them, after everything they'd been through. "The punishment is the same for any broken bind. As we speak, I'm being judged by the angels. I'll stop existing."

"They'll kill you? For that?" Davy asked, incredulous. But it was the knowing realization on Peter's face - horrified, destroyed, beyond saddened - that brought a sad smile back to Forty-Two's face.

"To die would mean I'd be sent back to hell. No, I'm going to be erased from existence. My consciousness, my thoughts, my future… There will be nothing left."

That was a lot to give up, and by the wide-eyed look on his face, Mike had realized it. At least if Mike was allowed to die, he would have continued existing in some form, even if it was out of the reach of his friends. Forty-Two's punishment - the only one administered by angels upon demons - would be far worse. Even so, he felt peaceful. It was the right thing to do. He should have done it from the start.

"'m not worth it. Take it back," Mike whimpered, reaching out for the demon's brown-furred shoulder.

"We could… uh— " Micky shook his head, eyes darting around the factory as he tried to settle on a solution. "Hide you! You just come home with us, we'll— "

He stopped talking.

"Look," Forty-Two said. "I knew what I was doing when I told you to make that wish." He pointedly focused on Peter, who looked exceptionally miserable, having essentially signed the demon's order of execution. "I've been on earth for, what, a few days? And you've made me love you guys. Love, you know? It's pretty awesome." He gently pulled the beads over his head, holding them for a moment, before handing them back to Peter. "It's something you don't really see coming, 'cuz you don't know what you're missing 'til it blindsides you. And then Michael died, and it hurt. And the only way I could think of to stop hurting was to make things right again."

Silence. Then Davy asked, "Did it stop?"

The demon nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, it did."

He added, fear coloring his words, "I need to go now. I'm being summoned."

—-

In the immediate aftermath of the events involving the demon, Michael certainly wasn't himself. The first day after, he hardly spoke at all, in fact, sitting in his bed and staring blankly at nothing. Granted, given what had happened to his eyes, it was hard to tell exactly where he was staring, but Peter knew. There was a certain detachedness apparent around his friend, but it was only to be expected from one who'd died, and had a demon's claws stuck into their soul.

Eventually, Peter got him to talk, to open up about the whole thing. Mike didn't say too much about it initially, except that it was a chapter in his life that he'd never forget. Once out of bed, he meandered pretty aimlessly around the pad, until some of the old spark began to return, little by little.

Mike was changed by the ordeal. Irreversibly. Even so, it wasn't like the dark-haired young man to let his bad experiences rule him. In spite of his recovery, he was still jumpier than normal, he still refused to eat any sort of poultry, and, of course, his eyes glowed a steady, eerie orange wherever he went, but he felt much more at ease as time progressed. Less than a week later, he was back to joking around, practicing with the band, and sleeping through the night. He still complained of nightmares, specifically of a light pulling him in one direction, while thorns hooked around his legs and tugged him the opposite way, but even those became more manageable.

Some time later, Peter discovered Mike standing out on the balcony, looking over the ocean. Despite the fact that it was night, he had his sunglasses perched atop his head. He'd started wearing them around to save people from the weird new appearance of his eyes, but Peter didn't particularly mind what kind of eyes Mike had, so long as they were alive.

Still standing near the door, he made small talk, to break the ice a little. "Micky sold that car he wished for. It'll cover rent and food for a while, at least."

"Almost sad to see her go. It was nice."

Nodding, Peter approached the railing, leaning next to the black-haired young man. "How're you doin'?"

"Oh, sore still. My shoulder especially. The bruises are healing up pretty good, though."

It really wasn't what Peter wanted to know, and he was sure Mike understood that. Physical well-being was one thing, and there could be no doubt that the other musician had really gone through the ringer in that department. Remembering Mike's appearance the first few days after his return from the dead gave Peter a shiver, since there wasn't much of him that wasn't at least a little black and blue.

"I'm still bothered, Pete," Mike added, without prompting.

"It's okay. After what you went through…"

Mike turned toward his friend, eyes leaving a smokey orange trail that dissipated a second later. "Not that. I mean, about what Forty-Two did for me. Ain't right that someone should give up his existence for me."

Peter's shoulders slumped. On one hand, he understood where Mike was coming from, since the blond himself had made the wish. On the other hand, he was selfishly glad for the demon's gift, because it meant that he still had one of his best pals in his life - alive and human.

When Peter said nothing, Mike added, "I figured you'd be the one to talk to about it and all. You're as close to neutral as they get. Micky and Davy would just tell me I was crazy."

"I don't think they would," Peter replied. "Mike, I'm glad you're here. But… But it makes me shiver when I think that he's… Well, he's…"

"He's nowhere. Gone."

There really wasn't that much more to say on the matter, so the two of them just stood there, listening to the ocean. Peter couldn't think of anything to say to make it all right, because Forty-Two's erasure from existence was more than just a sacrifice. Normal heroes made sacrifices. Maybe they died, but that energy that made them a person continued to exist after that, thinking and feeling. What the genie did cut far deeper than that, and he wouldn't even be lauded for it. The most amazing act of altruism ever committed would go unsung for the rest of time.

None of the boys were really okay with that. Even if they were mourning a lowly demon.

Peter tried to be good company, but he had very little to say. All he could really think of to do was stand close by, hoping that the nearness helped Mike in some way. It seemed to. Between that, and the calming crash of the waves, they both relaxed, ignoring whatever commotion they heard from inside the house. It was probably just the other guys walking around anyway, and not something worthy of their pre-occupied attention.

They were eventually disturbed by a soft, muffled series of footsteps behind them, which, thanks to their proximity, piqued the boys' curiosity. They turned at the same time, only to find Micky and Davy standing there, smiling, with the blond-haired, blue-eyed demon in front of them.

Mike actually rubbed his eyes. When he pulled a hand away, an orange trail briefly followed.

"Ah, hang on. Lemme fix that for you. Close your eyes." Forty-Two reached for Mike, who was still too stunned to argue as his hand was taken. He closed his eyes for only a few seconds, before the boy released him, and said, "Okay."

He blinked, looking with confusion to Peter, who pointed excitedly at Mike's eyes. "They're brown again! Hey! Hey, how'd you do that?"

Mike added, "How are you here? We thought…"

"That's what we'd like to know," Davy said. "But he said he wanted to tell us all together."

If Mike ever had a bigger smile on his face, Peter had never seen it. In his glee, the tall guitarist almost stumbled over his own feet as he lunged forward to wrap the boy in a tight hug, which lasted until Forty-Two choked out, "Mike, I can't breathe."

Micky ruffled the kid's hair. "Demons need air?"

Forty-Two laughed. "Well, that's kinda part of what I want to tell you. The whole breaking the rules thing. Ignoring a binding. Rebelling against celestial beings. I came to find out that almost all the angels are former demons who did something extraordinary. You know, enough to pull them out of hell. Uh. I guess I fit the bill." He smirked. "So now I can heal things, like the scratches I left all over Mike's soul."

The others said nothing for a moment, then Peter asked, "You're an angel?"

Smiling, Forty-Two shrugged.

"Congrats!" Micky ventured. "I guess this means no more wish-granting and binding and all that stuff, huh?"

"Ah, well, there are limits." Forty-Two scuffed his toe against the wooded surface of the deck, his smile turning shy. "Angelic tiers. Stuff I still have to learn. But hey, I got an eternity to do it, right? They're starting me out as a guardian angel, I guess. I thought … I thought I'd keep an eye out on you guys, if that's all right."

He was met with silence again, until Mike finally found his voice. "Aw, you can't just walk up to someone and ask if you can be their guardian angel."

"No?" Forty-Two asked, concerned.

"Yeah," Mike said. "Yeah, it's… I guess it's just not done that way."

"Ever. In the history of anything," Micky added.

"Now hang on, I'm just sayin'," Mike said, waving one hand at Micky to quiet him. "We're all friends, and friends, they look out for each other. I mean, that's what love is, right?" He shrugged. "So, you look out for us, and we'll look out for you."

As impossible as it was for four ordinary mortals to look out for an angel, it really was the sentiment that counted in the end, and probably had a lot to do with Mike's hesitance to really rely on anyone. That's just how he was - self-sufficient, protective, there. Apparently, this even applied to supernatural beings, like former demons. He put his hand back on the kid's shoulder, smiling. "Looks like we both went through a pretty big change, huh?"

Though Forty-Two's smile diminished, it didn't disappear entirely. "Mike, I'm really sorry."

"For what?"

Confused, the angel narrowed his eyes, first looking at Davy (who could only shrug) to see if his tall friend had forgotten everything, then at Mike himself. "The whole chicken thing, and getting you … you know. Dead."

"Well, son, that's just it. I helped you earn your wings, even if I lost mine." He smiled, lifting up one hand to wiggle his fingers. "And if we had to go through all that to do it, I'm glad to have helped."

Forty-Two threw his arms around Michael, sniffling. "Then, thanks, I guess."

"Are we ever gonna see you again?" Peter found himself asking as Forty-Two backed away, rubbing his eyes.

"I don't know. I don't think so. Part of my binding is that I'm not supposed to appear to mortals. They're letting me break the rules this one time. Special case. I'm gonna miss you, though."

"Well, can you at least stay awhile?" Peter asked, suddenly very sad at the prospect of losing the boy forever, even if he'd be around, watching over their shoulder.

But the angel shook his head. "Nah, I gotta get back. But there's one thing I wanted to ask before I go." He looked at Mike, reaching for the dark-haired man's hand again. "Look, they say I need to pick a name, and I figured I'd go traditional. I mean, I'm no archangel, but… I'm kinda partial to the name 'Michael.' That okay with you?"

It wasn't the first time they'd seen their fearless leader speechless, but this time was different than the others. Mike's expression was hard to read - not quite into the realm of being teary, not quite blank, or stumped. Perhaps reverent would be the proper way to put it, as he stood there, restored light brown eyes staring into the angel's blue. He didn't say anything, only giving an almost imperceptible nod as his answer.

The newly-Christened Michael let go of his namesake's hand, and took a step back. With one last glance around at the others, he vanished, leaving the familiar dusty-blue light behind him, which faded a few seconds later.

EPILOGUE

Your mother still lives, the demon told him.

His dreams, his goals, his entire reason for capturing a genie almost completely melted away when he heard those words. Not so much that he sabotaged himself, but enough so that when it seemed all hope was lost, he immediately cut his losses and ran. He had to know.

Babyface found it hard to admit to himself that he'd never stopped being little Katya, that since he found himself thrown into an entirely new life, some measure of fear drove him onward for the next decade and a half. Having left his suit behind, he found clothing more suited to the Russian lower class. Warm, practical, drab and boring.

The Russian springtime wasn't exactly warm - patches of snow still covered the ground in various places, but at least they weren't knee-deep. That alone made it much easier to walk around. Being here, though, constantly reminded him of the cave - of a lying, maniacal demon who'd both saved his life and destroyed it.

What would he look like?

Having asked around, Babyface finally located the Serov household - a meager dwelling where his mother still lived. Admittedly, the house was much better than what she had before - perhaps they'd managed to elevate themselves out of poverty since the horrible turn of events on that winter day.

When he found himself at the door, he hesitated. So many things ran through his head about what he would say…

He knocked, and a moment later, the door opened.

He looked at her with tenderness, but she returned his love with distrust and apprehension. Before she could shut the door in his face, though, Babyface quickly pulled a package out of his pocket. Technically, it was dirty money, but that's how they'd lived their lives when he was younger. His mother wouldn't mind.

"I know your daughter," he told her in Russian. "Katalina Alexandrovna— Please. Here." He handed over the package, meeting her eyes. Babyface told himself that he wouldn't be disappointed when he saw no recognition there, but he couldn't help it, and his face fell. "She is alive and well. She hopes to return one day."

The woman tucked the package under one arm, and allowed a rare smile. Reaching out, she took the stranger's hand, leaning close to whisper, "Then you will tell my Katya that I love her, and look forward to that day."