“All available officers in the vicinity of Grove and Washington, fire at Saint Mary Cathedral. Multiple injured. Arson. One attacker.” - Police Dispatch.

By the time I got there, the damage had already been done. The surviving nuns claim they saw an angel dragging the so called “guilty” into the flames. Witnesses claimed another angel intervened.

Now, one of the “angels” turns up in the morgue, wings still smoking.

All I could hope is that this dead angel was the bad one. If not, I figure heaven might be under new management. But as soon as I got a look at the angels face, I knew what I was dealing with— one of the fallen.

I figured if a third of them were kicked out of heaven, they all had to go somewhere. Just another reason Pale City is such nice place to live. Its body wasn’t charred by fire— it was painted by evil.

One down.

Many to go.

Case Closed.

My name is Detective Vale. Things like this used to surprise me. It was evil— like everything else I find in this town. It's my job to put the pieces together— no matter how petty or supernatural.

By morning, Pale City had already found something new to be afraid of. A new case. This case is extreme evil— enhanced by a microphone.

The case I’m working on now has the entire city on edge. The latest crime scene mimics the Zodiac Killer. A coded letter was left for police, and the use of the same signature symbol. Same sick bravado.

There was a copycat killer on the loose. Some maniac recreating the methods of infamous murderers. But this time, every killing coincided with the latest episode of a true-crime podcast: Under Oath: Serial Killer’s Among Us.

The podcast stories didn’t just inform—they invited. The show’s popularity had grown fast. Too fast. It started with detailed breakdowns of historic crime scenes. At first, I figured it was the usual motive: a small guy trying to look big.

Then fans started noticing the pattern.

An episode drops.

A body turns up.

Every time.

I declared the podcast studio a crime scene.

When I seized it, the host— Elias Crowe— showed mixed emotions. Calm on the surface. Slippery underneath. His ratings had skyrocketed with every new episode… and every new murder.

It all meant dollar signs to him. Greed— just another reason to kill.

Lila Moreno— the so-called producer. From what I could tell, Elias didn’t keep her around for her production skills. Or lack thereof.

She claimed the podcast exposed corruption law enforcement couldn’t touch. Said she wanted the killer caught. Said she hated what the show had become. But she needed the money.

They were having an affair. I could tell. Neither of them wanted to expose that truth. Secrecy mattered to two people living separate married lives. I just couldn’t tell if it was more than lust keeping them together.

Money talks and money kills.

Then there was Marcus Hale—the podcast’s largest sponsor. He paid for everything: studio rent, equipment, furnishings, advertising. And the money kept increasing. After every murder.

Like performance bonuses.

The payouts didn’t just go Elias. It was going to Lila too. They showed no signs of stopping. It was motive, even if it wasn’t much.

Marcus was shady, but I couldn’t picture him recreating the work of Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, BTK, or any of the other monsters. Elias, though? Elias could be bought.

Create the podcast. Inspire the killings. Boost publicity. That’s a quick path to riches. But the formula changed.

The copycat killings became almost daily. Sometimes Elias and Lila had alibis. Sometimes they didn’t. I put them under surveillance. I wanted to know where the podcast was really being recorded—and whether murder was one of their hobbies.

Then they vanished. And so did the podcast. Not live. Just… released. I expected the killings to stop. They didn’t. Marcus claimed ignorance. Before I left his apartment, I thanked him for his cooperation. He was in on it—I just didn’t know how deep.

Then I found a name on Elias’s confiscated laptop. One listener stood out. Obsessive amounts of fan mail. Long messages. Detailed instructions. Demands that episodes be released in a specific order.

Jonah Pike.

I brought him in for questioning. Didn’t get far. He lived in his own head. But one thing was clear—he knew too much. Details about the copycat murders. Mistakes made at crime scenes.

Details not released to the public. Details I hadn’t written down yet. That was enough—until another killing happened while Jonah was sitting across from me.

Maybe it wasn’t a dead end and he was an accomplice. Or maybe just another upstanding citizen of this grimy city.

I drove Pale City for hours. The details and photos of crime scenes lay in the seat next to me. The more I knew about how serial killers killed the better I would be at catching them. But the more I studied, the darker this world seemed.

I drove past old crime scenes I’d memorized. Places where monsters once worked. Hoping I could stop whoever was doing this. Hoping—desperately—I could stop the next one.

Then I found it.

By the time I arrived, it was too late. The victim— massacred— publicly displayed. But the killer was still there. It wasn’t human. It was the other angel the nuns spoke of.

They had it wrong. An angel of light? In Pale City?

Not a chance.

They were both fallen. Evil. Twisted. My guess? One of them said the wrong thing at the wrong time. Before they knew it, they were trying to destroy each other. On the night of the cathedral fire— one of them lost.

I went to Marcus’s apartment out of instinct.

He was already dead.

Money littered the floor of his luxury condo. The fallen angel looked back at me and said humans will do anything for money.

I emptied my magazine into it. Didn’t do much good. It spread its wings and vanished into the night. The crime scene didn’t end there.

In another room, Elias and Lila lay dead. Bound. Tortured. Executed exactly like the killers they glorified. On the wall above them, written in blood:

BTK.

Pale City went quiet after that. The podcast stopped. The murders stopped. Maybe bullets can take down a fallen angel or maybe it just flew back down to hell with the rest of its friends.

People might call it justice. I call it coincidence. In this city, evil doesn’t need encouragement. It just needs someone willing to listen.