Between Heaven and Hell

by Jeff Kirvin

  Gabriel said nothing.

  “You’ve let me down, old friend,” Michael continued. “Cho was given a place of prominence on my staff not only because the world expected it, but so you could keep an eye on him. We knew, you knew, how dangerous he could be and still you let this happen.”

  Gabriel got defensive. “You still have Richardson.”

  “Yes, thankfully. She’s still under control, and depending on what Cho may have told her, we might even be able to use her to do some spin doctoring. But that isn’t the issue. You will find Cho and return him. He’s too dangerous to be allowed to walk around on his own, especially if he knows what he says he knows. Find him. Quietly.

  “Now.”

  Gabriel left quickly.

  The more Daniel walked, the more furious he became. He felt like a fool. Not just me, he thought. Michael played us all for suckers. As Daniel walked further into the parts of Los Angeles that weren’t made of gold, he reflected more and more on what he’d learned.

  Virtually everything Daniel had been through in the last three years was part of Michael’s master plan. Not his initial discovery, of course; that was coincidence, luck, fate, whatever. But everything that happened after was part of a carefully orchestrated plan to place Michael exactly where he was.

  Satan had been telling the truth after all, no matter what Susan thought. Just as he and the demons sought to improve humanity through the fires of chaos, the angels saw themselves as lords of order. When Daniel began to discover what the demons really were, Michael (who had agents everywhere) saw it as his opportunity to eliminate his opposition, bring order to a chaotic world and finally make it stick. Throughout the Demonic Crusade, Michael and Gabriel carefully let the world fall apart, let millions die in the witch-hunts, all so that they could step in and defeat the demons at the last possible minute. All so they could be in charge by the time the world began to rebuild.

  In the name of Order.

  The problem, Daniel thought, is that the Nazis were obsessed with order, too. Michael’s theocracy, earned with the blood of millions of innocent humans, was only the beginning. Now that he was in charge, he had plans for the human race. It was the knowledge of these plans, more than anything else, that drove Daniel from Heaven.

  While Satan sought to strengthen the human race through adversity, weeding out the weak, Michael had a much more straightforward strategy. Rather than waiting for misfortune or an inability to compete to weed out the unfit, Michael had decided to remove them directly, in the name of genetic purity.

  Daniel had heard rumors about an unbalanced health care system that the angels had implemented. People with chronic problems, the ones that needed the most care, seemed to hit the most delays. He’d even heard that some, people with Down Syndrome or diabetes, for example, had been transferred to specialized “Care Centers”. Now he knew what the Care Centers really were: concentration camps.

  Michael was systematically removing from the gene pool anyone with illnesses or infirmities that could be passed on genetically. It wasn’t a Darwinistic manner of the genetically unfit not being able to reproduce. It was that they simply weren’t allowed to reproduce.

  Unconsciously, Daniel’s hands clenched to fists.

  All that was only the start. There had been much more on the computer, but Daniel had only been able to copy so much before he had to get out of that room. Knowing what he knew about Michael, Daniel had no doubts the angel would have him “removed” if he had begun to see Daniel as a threat. So Daniel removed himself first.

  He stopped and looked at his surroundings. He didn’t know how long he’d been walking, but the immense, gleaming edifice of Heaven was still visible on the horizon behind him. Immediately around him, however, stood buildings of a different sort altogether. The slums reminded him of some of the tenements in Washington he’d visited as a paramedic. Most of the buildings looked as though they were still standing only because they were too stubborn to fall down.

  Amazing, he thought, that such squalor could exist so close to the angels’ headquarters. It served as yet another indication of the disdain the angels felt for those that that weren’t “good enough”.

  Daniel was so busy assessing the slums, he never saw the hands reach out of the shadows to grab him.

  Inside his armor, Gabriel fumed. He had warned Michael many times that Cho’s attitude problem could blossom into something far more troublesome, but Michael had consistently ignored him. If Gabriel had half Michael’s talent for organization, he’d have replaced the overconfident buffoon centuries ago.

  And these slums! Gabriel had recommended to Michael countless times that they be leveled. Considering his plans for the humans, Michael had been surprisingly concerned with what they’d think of such an action. What good was the power he held over the humans if he didn’t use it?

  For whatever reason Michael let the eyesores stand, they made Gabriel’s job a hundred times harder. He and a team of armored angels had been searching the area surrounding Heaven for hours, but they’d seen no sign of their quarry.

  They’d have to turn back soon. The longer he stayed out here, the more questions the humans would ask. They were quickly approaching the limit of what they could pass off as a “security patrol”. As much control as Michael had over the media, humans were too damn curious for their own good.

  Michael was right about two things, Gabriel thought. Cho is too great a threat to be running loose.

  And I will find him.

  Heretic!

  Daniel crouched in the shadows, held silent and immobile by powerful arms as the angels walked by in their sleek, muscular armor. When the angels were finally gone, the pressure relented somewhat and Daniel was able to turn around. The man holding him was a monster, a walking wall of muscle and bone. The man put a pale finger to his lips, and motioned for Daniel to follow him.

  After glancing over his shoulder to where the angels had been, Daniel followed. His huge guide led him through a maze of half-fallen walls and make-shift shacks, occasionally stopping, thinking and scratching the blond stubble on his nearly bald head. Finally, they arrived.

  Buried deep within the wreckage of what had been South Central Los Angeles was hidden a sanctuary. The building consisted of one large, open room, and Daniel guessed that it had once been a warehouse. It was hundreds of yards away from the nearest open street, and presumably not discernable from the surrounding wreckage when seen from the air. There were maybe three dozen people milling about, and the few that noticed Daniel’s interest quickly turned and went about their business.

  “Now you can’t be who I think you are,” said voice to Daniel’s left.

  Daniel followed the sound and saw a tall, well built black man walking towards him. The man wore a tee-shirt and overalls and was busy wiping the engine grease off his hands with a rag. Behind him was a mid-90’s era sedan, with the markings of a police interceptor. Daniel wasn’t terribly surprised. Internal combustion vehicles had been outlawed for months, but he doubted many here could have afforded the conversion process to electric. It wasn’t until the man got closer that Daniel noticed the black eyepatch against the man’s dark skin, obscuring his right eye. The man thrust out a hand nearly free of grease. “Ricardo Jones.”

  Daniel shook. “Daniel Cho.”

  Jones smiled. “So you really are Daniel Cho, Discoverer of Demons, Hero of the Crusade, and Security Advisor to the Archangel Michael.” Jones’ smile disappeared quickly at the mention of Michael’s name. He now looked very serious, and suspicious.

  Daniel decided to take a chance. “Former Security Advisor,” he amended. “Michael and I have had something of a falling out.”

  “Is that a fact.”

  Daniel smiled inwardly. Once again, he was about to engage in a struggle to spread the word. He pulled the disk from his jacket. “Got a computer?”

  Heedless of the guards, Susan stormed into Michael’s office. The angel was alone, engaged with whatever was on his computer mo
nitors. He did, however, notice when Susan barged in. It would have taken intense concentration not to. “Susan,” he said, offering his most charming smile. “What can I do for you?”

  “Where’s Daniel?” Susan stopped just short of Michael’s throne and burned holes in him with her eyes.

  “You don’t know either?” Michael said.

  Susan softened a bit. “You mean you don’t have anything to … I’m sorry, Michael. Daniel said some things to me last night, and … He’s been under a lot of stress—”

  Michael stood and walked down to put an arm around Susan. “Yes, he has. And I’m afraid he’s done something rash.”

  “What?”

  “Susan, sit.” She took her normal seat.

  “I’m afraid Daniel has turned against us. I had been warned someone with his life experience might develop a persecution complex and turn against any and all figures of authority, but I suppose I just hoped Daniel would keep it under control. That changed this morning. I received an email from Daniel shortly after he left Heaven of his own accord. In the letter were many paranoid, inflammatory statements, and threats that I have no choice but to consider acts of treason. Gabriel is trying to find him and bring him back, for treatment, but Daniel, as you know, is awfully good at hiding.”

  Susan was speechless.

  “Susan, it’s important for you to be strong. You and Daniel are heroes to your people, and with Daniel turning on us, it’s important that people know that they can still rely on you. Can you do that?”

  Susan’s mind raced a mile a minute, but she managed a nod.

  “Good,” Michael said.

  “No shit,” Ricardo Jones said as he finished reading.

  “You don’t seem terribly surprised,” Daniel said, looking over Jones’ shoulder.

  Jones swiveled in his chair and motioned for Daniel to sit. “I’m not,” he said. “Why else do you think we’re here?”

  Jones leaned in a little closer to Daniel and lifted his eyepatch. While his left eye was a deep, rich brown, the right was a sickly, milky bluish-white. The iris was contracted to a pinprick, and it didn’t react at all when exposed to the light. “Congenital defect,” Jones said. “I was born with only one good eye.” He lowered the eyepatch into place again. “Since I’ve never known what’s it’s like to see with two eyes, it never really bothered me.”

  Jones leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head, running his fingers over his short, black hair. “I’d never really considered it a disability, and neither did the angels, at first. But I knew people with real disabilities. People that either needed constant medical care, like diabetics and hemophiliacs, or people with problems that made it difficult for them to interact with society, mental retardation, that sort of thing. One by one, over a period of months, these people disappeared into the night. When anyone asked the authorities what happened to them, the answer was always the same.”

  “Care Centers,” Daniel said.

  Jones smiled. “Give the man a cigar. Yeah, Care Centers. You ever hear the phrase ‘Those that forget the past are condemned to repeat it’?”

  “Santayana,” Daniel said.

  “Yeah. Well, I’m a student of history. As a matter of fact, I was working on my Masters when the angels came into power. My thesis was on the psychology of the Nazis, and I’d seen this pattern of behavior before. I figured I could either disappear or wait for them to get around to taking me. I chose the former.”

  Jones gestured around to the others in the sanctuary. “Others had the same idea. Everyone in here, according to this,” he said, holding up Daniel’s disk, “would have been tagged by the angels as unfit to reproduce, and eventually eliminated.”

  He threw the disk in Daniel’s lap. “Except for you,” he finished.

  Daniel barely had time to grab the disk before the hulking brute that guided him in grabbed him from behind and pulled him out of the chair.

  Jones stood and walked over to him. “Bob here doesn’t say much, but he’s very strong. Now why don’t you tell us what Michael’s lap dog is really doing here?”

  Before Daniel could get a word out, someone called, “Ricardo! Take a look at this!”

  Jones walked over to the other man, part of a group surrounding a television. Bob followed, with Daniel securely in tow.

  Michael’s face was on the screen. Someone turned up the sound. “In light of these events,” the angel said, “I have no choice but to charge Daniel Cho with Heresy Against the State, a capital crime. We can’t afford to allow anyone, not even a former hero, to jeopardize what we have built here. The state is offering a substantial reward for information leading to the arrest of Daniel Cho, and all citizens are instructed not to deal with him directly. He is considered armed, delusional and extremely dangerous. Thank you.” The screen returned to normal programming.

  Jones turned and looked thoughtfully at Daniel. “Bob,” he said. “we need to talk about this privately. If you could?”

  Daniel felt Bob’s forearm constrict around his neck, then everything went black.

  Daniel awoke to smelling salts. The first person he saw was Ricardo Jones, but he then noticed that most of the denizens of the sanctuary stood behind their leader.

  “Daniel Cho,” Jones said, “you are a very lucky man. We put it to a vote, and most of us decided that the reward for turning you in wasn’t worth the risk of being captured ourselves. You are, for the foreseeable future, our guest. Welcome to the Underground.”

  Resistance

  ONE YEAR LATER.

  This is Susan Richardson with a Heavenly News Bulletin.

  “Last night, the world celebrated its second full year of peace and unity. Michael was quoted as being pleased with the turnout, and that he looked forward to many such celebrations in the future.

  “In other news, there is no truth to the rumor that a Care Center east of Los Angeles was the target of a bombing four days ago. As seen here, the Care Center is undamaged, and the patients inside are still happily and safely continuing their treatment and work towards their eventual recovery. Authorities believe the rumor began as part of an effort by the terrorists in the Underground as part of a propaganda campaign designed to undermine the public’s trust in Heaven. Citizens are instructed to ignore such rumors in the future.

  “The worldwide curfew instituted by Michael last month seems to be working. Street crime is down nearly eighty percent, with further reductions expected. Most citizens we questioned were strongly in favor of the curfew, stating that they felt safer than they had in years.

  “This has been a Heavenly News Update.”

  Daniel Cho had had a busy year. Things had been a bit rocky at first, as Jones and the rest of the Underground didn’t really trust him. After a few months (and more of Gabriel’s sweeps), they’d started to come around, and Daniel began to make the change from captive to collaborator.

  The Underground was far more widespread than Daniel initially thought. It seemed that as soon as Michael took over, there were people that disagreed with him, his policies, or both. Though Daniel had been introduced to the Los Angeles of the Underground, it existed to some extent in nearly every major city around the world. Organized loosely to put it charitably, the Underground had no central leadership, but the various groups did keep in touch with one another and passed on information. Daniel felt this would be useful when the time came.

  Daniel and Ricardo Jones became good friends. Once their initial skepticism wore off, most of the Underground began to treat Daniel almost as if he were visiting royalty, but not Jones. The de facto leader of the Los Angeles Underground, he treated Daniel with the respect due his accomplishments, but also regarded him as a valuable resource. Jones was still in charge in L.A., and Daniel saw no reason to challenge that.

  The Los Angeles Underground was several hundred strong by the second year of Michael’s reign. Most of the members were like Ricardo; they’d gone into hiding to avoid being captured because they didn’t measure up
to the angels’ standards of perfection. A small but steadily growing portion of the Underground, though, was composed of perfectly healthy individuals that had decided to stand against the angels’ regime.

  The Underground had kept busy, raiding everything from junkyards to the angels’ supply depots for supplies, though they never attacked civilian targets. After two years, they were finally ready for something big.

  Daniel and Ricardo sat in a makeshift planning room, going over some maps and aerial photographs of an area south of Los Angeles. In the warehouse around them, the Underground’s forces readied for a major assault.

  “If we come in here, from the north,” Ricardo said, “they’ll be less likely to see us coming.”

  “They’re going to see us either way, Ricardo,” Daniel answered. “If we come in from the north and they do see us, we have fewer avenues of retreat. We should come in from the east, towards the service entrance.”

  Ricardo leaned back in his seat and rubbed his eyepatch, something Daniel had often seen him do when he was frustrated or annoyed. “Damn,” he said. “Why’s a damn Care Center have to be done up like a fort?”

  “Because it’s not a hospital. It’s a death camp. Michael knows by now that I’m one of you, even if he can’t find me. He’s scared to death that we’ll do exactly what we’re doing. Consider us lucky. Last we checked, the camp didn’t have any armored angels as protection. We get in and out fast enough, we can rescue the inmates and be gone before any armor shows up.”

  Jones stood and opened the door. “That’s a mighty big ‘if’, Daniel.” He left.

  Daniel smiled and looked over the maps one more time. He knew what they had planned was a terrible risk, but it had to be done. More people died in that camp every day they waited, and to rescue them the way Daniel had suggested almost a month ago would draw attention to their cause, and maybe help make up the minds of the so many people that were uneasy about the angels, but didn’t really know why. Daniel knew that if it didn’t go off well, if he were captured, then he was as good as dead. Michael still had egg on his face from Daniel’s defection, and Daniel was still considered a Heretic by the government. He didn’t care, really. He’d been a marked man in one way or another ever since witnessing Batarel’s resurrection at that car wreck, so long ago. He’d learned to live with it and do what must be done. This rescue qualified. Rolling up the maps, he followed Ricardo.