The Devil's psychiatrist

wings

Years ago

"Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, Turn around. Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, Touch the ground." they sing. The children playing jump rope in front of the barn is one of the few things that look quite normal. The rest looks like it is some kind of period drama in the colonial period. A dark haired teenager is recording the children, it is the only evidence that they're living in the same world as ours.  He smiles but than he feels a hand on his shoulder. His smile fades. It is the shepers. "Leo, will you follow me?" He nods, because how could he not follow the shepard himself?

Leonid Crassus

The Herd is my home. Although I long for the outside world, I know everybody in the Herd and I don't know anybody in the other world. It would be so incredibly scary to leave the herd but I must say that I have been thinking about it more than I would care or have the courage to admit. I hate the endless rituals, the young that die at the initiation, I hate the things they shove in my mouth to get a vision, only accepting it if it fits his wants or needs. I hate the fact that I am cannot talk to the other followers my age, that I am not seen as human.

The sun sets. It is time. I stand up, my white robe is dirty from the mud of the fields. I walk through the fields to the temple. I do not know what kind of ritual today will be but I have heard it is something special. I walk into the temple, there is a big statue of the shepard and one of me, the little lamb who will become a shepard one day. I also see a drawing of a human with strange cuts in their back. That is not something that is normally there.

"Good evening everybody, tonight we take the first step in making the little lamb heavenly. Today we will commence the angel making." He says as he grabs the ritual knife. Two grown man push me down till I am sitting on my knees and open the back of my white robe. The shepard sits down in front of me and wipes my black hair aside. He looks me in the eye. "We must hurt to ascend." He says and he puts a cloth in my mouth. He kisses me on my cheek and whispers in my ear. "Try not to scream"

I feel the knife digging into my back and I feel the warm blood making it's way down my back, like a river streaming from a valley, the wound being the valley. I try not to scream through the cloth but the whimpers and tears in my eyes make it clear that I am in utter pain. Utter despair, they repeat this on the other side of my back, with the burning wounds I assume that it is over but I begin to feel another intense pain and I head a damp crack, I scream. I try to escape the grasp of the man but they are trained adults and I am only sixteen year old. What are they doing? I am panicking, there's this rage in me that I wish I could express. But I can't, I must always be reasonable and kind. Screw that, what they are doing to me is not reasonable and kind.

When they are done they release me, I fall on the ground. The pain seems to have paralysed me. I can barely move, I push myself up so I can look the shepard in his eyes, my robe is red because of all the blood. "What have you done to me, you...you...." "I have made your first step to your angel wings my dear Leo, your 11th rib has been broken and turned into a vertical rib by attaching it to the others, each year we will let your wings progress and after a while, they'll grow by themselves" He says with a smile.

Everything is getting blurry, I try to stand up but I cannot move without hurting myself. I try to say something but my eyes close and I pass out.

The following week I am plagued by nightmares, he claims they're a challenge from God, I must resist giving up. But Rut (For all who cannot pronounce it she changes it to ruth), my caretaker, (let's be clear not my mother. My mother is too devoted to the shepard to care for children) says that it is simply because I am running a fever and I shouldn't be worried. I am laying in my bed for days on end, hoping I will finally get some pain medication, crying and trembling over the pain I am in. I can't even lay on my back. Well, of course not.

One evening I am sweating too much. I cannot stand it anymore, I light the candle on the sconce and pick it up. I start walking, my bare feet are feel cold in the wet grass. But slowly I am picking up the pace as best I can, the crystal rain of sweat on my forehead is slowly becoming more and more apparent. I run through the forest till I see a tree again. Have I been running circles? I start running again, I am losing my sense of direction. I stop to catch my breath.

"You don't give up easily do you?" A boyish voice says. "Who's there?" I say, immediately turning. "Up here" He says. I look up, a boy dressed in all white is sitting in a tree. His long white hair and almond eyes beautiful by the faint light of the candle as he jumps out of the tree. "Nice to meet you Leonid. I am Gavrel" Says the boy, he must be about nineteen years old. "Why are you here?" "Birdwatching" He says with a crooked smile. "There are quite a bit of owls here, understandable, when there are no cars to disturb your sleep." He says with a smile. "Do you know how I" "Get to the normal world? Of course I do, that way is to the normal world." I look up and down at his clothes, he must be from the normal world. "That way is the herd" He says while he shrugs. "My suggestion is you wait a while. Ever heard of the army?" He says as he hands me a flyer. I look up at him again but he isn't there anymore.

"Leo! Wake up!" Ronan says with his worried voice. I push myself up. I am in the fields of the herd. I don't remember walking back. I try to keep my eyes open. "What happened?" Ronan asks. "Ronan" I whisper, "I don't think we should stay here"