CODEX Part 4: Among the Living

Going back a few years, no one quite understood what had happened with the guardian of the famous inheritor. Jasper died in Hell, his soul completely crashed by Zoe in a battle manipulated by Lucifer himself. Elijah was supposed to be there, to protect and advice Jasper; to teach him and lead him through the darkness surrounding him. But Elijah vanished before any of it took place. Where did he go and what did he do? There is only one person that could answer that--the person Elijah went to.

In the midst of a crazy day, two years ago, while in Britain the forces of evil were fighting against Zoe's inner demon, in busy New York, a son was rebelling.

"Mom! I told you I don't need financial support! I can easily room with my friends and cook for myself and have a decent and normal life!"

"Caleb, isn't it enough that we accepted your wish to become a journalist? That is not the job we wanted for you. And now what, you want to cut us off from your life just as you did with your career?!"

Caleb stared at his parents with his mouth hanging open, so many words on his tongue and yet none reached out. He was baffled by his mother in particular. The person that gave him life, that gave him joy and love was now the barrier between childhood and adult life. She was resisting his need to be independent and that alone was maddening.

"Mom, we'll live in the same city and we'll still be able to meet from time to time. I don't understand you, really! Don't you want what's best for me?"

"That's exactly why I have been leading you towards a path I can control. You know you have...your condition." She explained, using a tone that Caleb hated. It was the tone of a mother whose son had deeper problems than most people his age.

"This condition that you speak of is only in your head. I'm perfectly healthy and capable of paving my own future. Just, back off already! And stop insinuating that I'm crazy because I'm definitely not."

"That's not how you looked at your grandmother's burial." His father interfered making Caleb sigh.

"That was...grief. Just grief." He tried to use the words that another member of the family did back then. "You know how it can affect people. You're a psychiatrist, dad."

"You said that you saw her ghost frowning at the whole ceremony. Her ghost, Caleb."

That was indeed a mistake, especially because he had been hiding his ghostly eyes so well ever since the accident. Having a truly mental man stab him in the eye was not his choice nor was his fault. His father believed the situation at work was calm enough to take his son for a quick visit and then that happened. That unfortunate event led to a huge scandal in the family so much so that his mother was ready to divorce her husband but his miraculous survival mended it all. His eyes were perfectly fine, a fact that surprised the doctors, but they weren't the same. He could see more than he was able to before and he coped with it rather well considering he was 14 years old.

"Fine, whatever. It happened a while ago, I'm over it now. It's not even relevant to this discussion. I'm just...going to take a fresh breath of air." He mumbled quickly and hurried out the door with his mother scoffing in the background.

With his height and bizarre fashion choices, with his strong jawline and pale skin and with his crouched posture and intense dark eyes, Caleb was as peculiar as a human being can get. Groaning and mumbling to himself while walking around did not help his overall aspect, at least not from a human's point of view. Eventually, he went to the only place he could actually feel respected and even a little sense of belonging: the cemetery.

"Such a gloomy day and nobody's here," he stated to himself, never expecting an actual answer.

"I'm here."

Caleb froze and slowly turned around to see who just crept up behind him. To his surprise, it was a boy his age who looked pretty normal and not at all dead.

"Who are you? When did you get here? Are you visiting somebody?" Caleb threw question after question at the newbie, making him chuckle to himself.

"You are one curious lad, aren't you? My name is Elijah, I just arrived today and in a sense, I am visiting someone." He replied then took a swift look around. He must have noticed something because he pointed ahead at a blurry figure. "That guy. I'm here for him."

Caleb followed the trajectory of his finger and saw someone run. Elijah scoffed and made a finger gun before he fired. They waited for five minutes but nothing happened. Caleb turned his attention back on Elijah and saw him blow the imaginative smoke off his finger with a content expression.

"Job done. Another one crossed off the list and soon enough I will be a full-fledged demon," he stated to himself and smiled sarcastically at Caleb. "Now you see me, now you don't." He whispered waving his hand in front of him. Caleb blinked and caught his arm with ease.

"I still see you." The human retorted to a stunned former mental patient. "And what do you mean by a full-fledged demon? Especially the latter part regarding the word demon."

Elijah could see curiosity surrounding this human and he couldn't help but remember Ezekiel. They were two very different men with different styles and accents but at the core, this man in front of him had the gift that Ezekiel craved for so long and it was not a gift he received from his best friend. It just happened.

"Huh! You can see me, you can touch me and you're not afraid. Let's have a chat, shall we?" Elijah had so many plans already for this man. "By the way, what's your name? Or should I call you John Smith?" he joked seeing how an opportunity just fell into his hands.

"Caleb. You can call me Caleb."

The place chosen by none other than the human was the Starbucks around the corner. Elijah was in constant awe at the way coffee was being made in the 21st century and was starstruck when Caleb came to their table with two iced coffees instead of one.

"Try it. It's my favourite, Iced Peppermint White Chocolate Mocha." Caleb explained pushing one of the cups towards the not-yet-demon. "When did you die? And don't tell me last century because the way you stare at everything makes it clear it's been longer than that."

"I cannot really remember. I woke up one morning and I was dead but I couldn't leave either," his expression changed as he continued, "I had to wait for her and I did, thinking that she will save me but instead he caught me. He only needed her there in order to exchange that arsehole for me."

"What?" Caleb asked after a moment of complete bewilderment. Elijah glanced at the coffee and took a long sip, his taste buds very happy from his reaction.

"The 19th century. The late 19th century is when I died." Elijah answered before he sipped again loudly. "Aren't you worried that people can't see me? You look like you're having a conversation with air."

"I'm not bothered but if you are..." Caleb took out his phone and earbuds and put them on, making it look like he is speaking with someone.

Elijah couldn't help but laugh. He needed a moment to recover before he suddenly rose and went into the bathroom. He stayed there for exactly five seconds before he came out, visible to everyone.

"Can you see the difference?" Elijah asked remembering how Zoe could see which ghost was a ghost and which was a demon.

"I've never met a demon before so I don't know what should I look at. Usually, ghosts don't become matter. They're just these blurry beings, some times they look like illusions made by the rays of light. It's beautiful."

Elijah stared at Caleb as if he was staring at an idiot. It was both funny and very worrying, that if Elijah cared. But he didn't, it was not on his list of responsibilities and he was willing to have this conversation because of his own curiosities.

"Have you ever heard of the inheritor and commander stories? You know, the secret children of Lucifer and Beelzebub."Elijah asked leaning over the table.

"Is that who you're working for?"

"I'm not working for anybody. I'm just hiding at the moment... and doing some deeds for Leviathan." Elijah added feeling annoyed by his inconvenient status. "Once I'm a real demon with blue demon eyes that look like I was drowned and then blinded and with no feelings whatsoever and no memories of the past, then I will have the power of Hell."

"What are you hiding from?"

It was interesting how Caleb didn't seem to care much about Hell. He only wanted to know...Elijah wasn't sure what the human wanted to know because he asked Caleb for this chat in the first place.

"The war. Hell has been going crazy ever since Zoe became the commander. She's more dangerous than Lucifer himself if you can believe that! She's able to manipulate demons into having emotions. Demons don't feel anything at all, that's why it is so easy to create chaos. They are purely bad and that's it. But she's still human, or at least part of her is, and she's strong enough to make a demon feel. That rarely happens, it's against the natural flow of the world and yet the power of a human broke it down." Elijah scoffed and shook his head at the long explanation he just gave.

"The power of a human? You mean the occult?"

"No. I mean the good. Humans are both bad and good but what they don't know is that their freedom to choose how they want to be and their endless need to repent just so they could be saved gives them immense power. Zoe used that in her favour and she has two of the best worst demons in Hell in her palm."

"Zoe?"

"Zoe Lestrade is the reason this war is happening as we speak. If you ever see her, immediately look the other way. Her talent is drawing you in and possibly making you sacrifice yourself for a bigger purpose." Elijah advised the human, shuddering at the memory of being around her.

Caleb nodded but didn't understand why that was his problem. Elijah made it seem like that woman was Lucifer reincarnated but she didn't sound that bad.

Now, looking back at how he felt when he looked into those autumn coloured eyes, he understood why Elijah was so wary. He could recognize her as soon as his eyes landed on her: Zoe was like a house, a beautiful and well designed house that he could easily pass by and admire from afar but once he enters it, he can hear growls coming from the basement and light tremors shake the house now and then.

Elijah visited a few more times, appearing out of nowhere in the most crowded places and most of the times, he would keep himself unseen just to test Caleb. The human couldn't care less what people were thinking and Elijah loved that. And then, a month before the suicides, Elijah appeared when Caleb was taking a shower.

"Ah! Oh my God! Fuck, you scared the Hell out of me!"

Elijah laughed it off and watched the human grab a towel and dry himself up before walking into his bedroom. The now-demon looked around finding the small apartment very messy.

"Interesting new abode," he trailed before he jumped on the bed. "I have news. Hell's been very secretive ever since Lucifer was dropped into the Abyss and problems arise every day because there is no one in charge of the vanity demons. Beelzebub has been MIA for a while and Zoe's been MIA for a while although everyobody knows where she is but they just don't bother."

"What's the point?" Caleb asked seeing how Elijah could go on like that for the whole night.

"Cults. With Lucifer gone and the rest of the princes busy reforming their domains," he stopped and made a what the fuck face. "Anyway, low level demons have been answering messages from humans and they're trying to force their way into the living world. Cult members and over zealous teenagers have died because of that but since it's not really our trouble, christian brotherhoods and sisterhoods have been going crazy over it. The Holy Brotherhood is especially bad and they are searching for the inheritor. At the same time, so are the low level demons, only they are trying to drag her to Hell. Problems, problems!" Elijah exclaimed.

"And?"

"Don't you want to meet her?"

"Didn't you advise me not to approach her?

"True but that was back then and today is a new day. Come on, Caleb. Don't you want to be involved in a life changing adventure where you can actually use those eyes of yours?"

Caleb looked down at his dirty carpet before he looked up at the envy demon. His life has been rather common lately and his journalistic career had taken a turn for the worst when he said he wanted to go deeper into this world of cults and occultism. What better subject if not the inheritor herself?

And here he was, still watching the video with his subject. He chuckled to himself as he imagined himself as the head investigator in a paranormal documentary.