Chapter 2:

A Disappointing Return

MOTH MAN

Dylan Meaney zipped up the front of his navy blue jumpsuit and laced up a pair of cheap black mountain boots. He walked through his kitchen and into the back hallway. He saw his wife was in the living room watching the morning news, but didn't say anything to her. He rarely did. He put on his yellow high vis vest which he hung beside the door, and sauntered down the alleyway behind his house. He reached the end of the row of houses and exited the alleyway and stood on the footpath. He picked up a newspaper from a random neighbours doorstep and sat on the curb reading it. He lazily skimmed over news about celebrities, local events, a missing person in Kilkenny, but nothing really interested him. He folded up the paper and checked his watch. He tutted and looked around. He was waiting for his work partner Craig to pick him up in the bin lorry to begin the morning collection. Dylan's continued gambling and lack of education had landed him exactly where he thought he could escape from, manual labour. He simply sat on the back of the lorry and loaded up the bins while Craig drove door to door. It wasn't a bad job, and it made a bit more than minimum wage.

As he sat waiting the strong smell of drink his his nose. He looked and saw a group of hungover students making their way over a wall. They must have been drinking in the field next to his estate all night. He recognised a few of them who lived in the estate too, but didn't know their names.

"Oi, boss!"

One of them called out to Dylan. Dylan was far too tired and thought it far too early to deal with drunkards, so he opened back up the paper pretending to read the puzzles page.

"Boss, ya find anything interesting in the bins?"

The others all laughed as they stumbled towards Dylan. Dylan was easily angered and he could feel a boiling in his gut, but tried to distract himself by doing the crosswords out in his head. One of the boys booted him in the shoulder to get his attention, making Dylan drop his newspaper. Dylan stood up suddenly and broadened out his shoulders to square up to him. The group of boys flinched and stepped back. Meaney had quite a muscular build, probably from flinging around bags of rubbish all day. He took a step forward towards the lad who had kicked him and was reading to reach out and grab his collar when he heard the truck come round the corner. Craig pulled up to the curb and Dylan hopped in the cabin with him. As they drove off Dylan could hear the muffled obscenities of the boys get further away.

"Everything alright lad?"

Craig said, curious as to what the shouting was about. Dylan shook his head but said nothing. He was looking down, still angered. He could feel a pain rising in his head, like an itch on the inside of his skull. Ever since he had killed Mickey McGlynn twenty years ago, he got a taste for blood. And his urge to do it again he come back with a vengeance, whether it was being stuck in the same job for 15 years, or his shambles of a marriage, Dylan more often than not felt a boiling in his blood that he could not control, and he only knew one release.

Dylan finished his route, then spent a good part of the evening working out files for his next pay check, then Craig dropped him to his local pub. After a few drinks Dylan began to stumble home in the dark of night. His wife had probably gone to sleep by now, so he wouldn't have to talk to her. As he entered his estate he heard someone shout from a window above.

"Oi you! are you not that bullocks from earlier?"

He looked up, it was the boy who had kicked him in the shoulder earlier.

"How 'bout ya come down and get a better look?"

Dylan said angrily. The boy shut the window and disappeared from Dylan's view. Dylan began to walk up to his door to knock. He wanted to at least give him a scare. It might not make him feel better, but it would help him sleep. As he raised his fist to knock, the door suddenly swung open. The four lads from earlier all came out one by one with hurls in their hands. Dylan stepped back out the driveway. He didn't feel fear, just anger that he had been outsmarted. The first lad swung at Dylan's head. Dylan blocked with his left forearm and punched the boy in the nose with his right fist. He grabbed the hurl out of his hand as he fell backwards and swung it at a second boy, hitting him in the ribs. Dylan raised his foot to kick him as he hunched over in pain, when suddenly he felt a sharp pain on the back of his head as he fell face first on the ground. He tried to get himself to his feet, but he felt weak. He rubbed the back of his head and looked at his hand. It was stained red with his own blood. Dylan Meaney looked down at the pavement as he watched the fuzz creep in from the corners of his vision, eventually engulfing everything he could see and fading away to black.

Dylan suddenly felt a familiar feeling. The feeling of undying that came after death. He had felt it twenty years ago but always thought it to be a dream. He racked through his memory to try remember how it had went last time, when he suddenly called out.

"God? Are you still there?"

His voice echoed in the dark void. He listened to the echo suddenly come to leave him with nothing but silence for a brief lasting moment, but then suddenly from behind a higher pitched, feminine voice suddenly said

"Uh, yeah he doesn't really do that anymore."

Dylan turned around, and saw a young girl who looked around twenty shyly smiling at him. She was short, and was wearing a hoodie that was clearly four sizes too big for her, and a pair of long socks that just about ended before the bottom of her hoodie. Her hair was short, and almost starch white but looked to have a gold tint at certain angles, much like the halo that floated a few inches above it. Her tired eyes had a similar goldish colour. Dylan felt a familiarity upon seeing her. He remembered the large hand that reached out to him when he was here before, how it's pale skin gave of a soft light like hers did, and how her socks and hoodie looked like the glowing, white silk that draped off of the arm of the large hand.

"Are you... not the big hand from before?"

Dylan asked, hoping for an explanation on why things were so different to how he remembered. Instead of answering, she pouted, and threw her hands up next to her face, fingers spread and palms facing away from Dylan. She gestured at her pure gold, well kept almond nails and said

"Do these look anything like that big grubby mitt?"

Dylan scrunched the left side of his face in confusion. He stared at her hoping she would expand on what was happening, but she just stood pouting, hands still raised. She shook her hands slightly and widened her eyes. Dylan took a second, but then realised her question was not rhetorical.

"I... Guess not luv..."

She finally put her arms back down to her sides, satisfied with getting an answer. Her face returned to a bored and tired look, as she began to pace slowly past Dylan.

"Well... I was here for a reason at least last time, you gonna tell me why I'm here again now?"

"You're not even gonna ask who I am?"

She put on a clearly fake sad face with big puppy eyes. Dylan rolled his head back and sighed. It appeared he wasn't going to get any straight answers unless he played along with whatever game she was playing with him.

"Fine then luv, Who are you?"

She smiled, and skipped up to Dylan.

"Well, I'm glad you asked!"

She leaned in close to Dylan, but Dylan leaned back away from her.

"Because I'm really excited about giving my whole speech... This is my first job actually, hehe"

Dylan continued to only have more questions arise, but he knew that if he pestered her again he might never get a clear answer. She took a few steps back, closed her eyes and put her fist up to her mouth and cleared her throat. She opened her eyes again, and gave a look of sincerity and care, as if whatever annoying, bratty persona she had been putting on since Dylan got here was finished with.

"My name is Seta, and I have been appointed as your guardian angel..."

"So God doesn't do these anymo-"

Dylan didn't get to finish his question, as she cut him off, instantly raising a finger to her lips and furrowing her brow to shush him, before returning to her angelic pose with her arms spread out, like an old renaissance painting.

"God used to send those under special circumstances to a new world to fight a great evil, but that evil is no more. Wiped out just over ten years ago, by someone wielding the power off all the worlds light... and his actions have-"

"wait... WHAT THE FECK!"

Dylan impulsively shouted. Seta flinches, as she wasn't expecting his sudden outburst.

"Uhh... could you just wait 'till I finish-"

"That was supposed to be my fecking power! I got it in that auld hat twenty years ago!"

Seta's mouth hung slightly open, as her eyes softly darted around in thought.

"you did?"

"Yeah that was supposed to be mine!"

"Well, I sadly cannot give it to you if someone else has already claimed it, but I can give you a new one-"

Dylan was pacing in circles frantically with his hands on his head. Seta looked at him realised she was taking to herself, as he wasn't listening.

"Only gamble I won in me bleedin' life and it's fecking robbed o' me!"

As this was Seta's first job, she really had no idea what to do.

"Um... look... I could like... Let you pick a new one?"

Dylan looked over his shoulder at her. In his grief, he didn't realise it but this was the first time he had been offered a gamble, and he didn't jump at the opportunity.

"I mean, I kinda have to anyway... because I gotta give you one to send you off and-"

She looked up and rolled her hand around as she explained. Dylan walked over with his head hung low and reached out his hand.

"Just give me the feckin' hat..."

He mumbled moppingly.

"The hat? Yeah we don't do that anymore. Too many people said it was stupid, myself included tbh..."

Dylan looked at her, not knowing whether to say
"I thought it was stupid too"
or
"Did she just say "tbh" out loud?"
She looked at him and grinned excitedly.

"Instead, we get to spin this big wheel!"

A large golden wheel covered in lights rolled forward from the dark, like some sort of game show. Dylan looked up at the intimidating size of the wheel. Each sliver less than half a centimetre thick to fit the millions of powers. Suddenly Dylan felt a bump on his arm, as he looked down to see Seta elbow him with a smug smirk.

"Go on... Give it a spin!"

Dylan reached out and grabbed the bottom of the wheel. He closed his eyes and hopped with all he had for something as good as last time. He put all his strength into spinning it as fast as he could. Him and Seta watched it go round and round and round. It felt like the wheel would never stop. Seta got dizzy from watching it spin and fell onto her back.
The wheel eventually slowed down, and ticked over each peg and finally landed on one small sliver. So small Dylan squinted but still couldn't read it. Seta sat up and squinted.

"Moths?"

Dylan looked down at her.

"Moths?"

Seta looked up at him and shrugged her shoulders

"Moths..."

She sprung up to her feet and skipped around to face Dylan.

"Well, guess that's your new ability! Hope you like it-"

"wait wait wait... what does that mean? that's a bug not a-"

"I'll be sending you off now but I'll keep an eye out for ya~!"

"No no no wait, let me spin again please I cant just-"

Seta clicked her fingers, and forced an awkward smile. Dylan's vision began to be filled with a blinding light.

"what the feck do you mean me ability is..."